Herschel Walker and Brett Favre
were football gods.
It should have ended there.
Herschel Walker was a great running back. Certainly the greatest to play at the University of Georgia and arguably the greatest in the history of college football. If only it would end right there.
At the demarcation point of voters in Georgia remembering how he dazzled and delighted their Saturdays through the early 1980s while also remembering their ballot isn’t a football trading card.
Brett Favre was a great quarterback. Certainly the greatest to play at the University of Southern Mississippi and arguably one of the greatest in NFL history. If only it would end right there.
At the demarcation point of citizens — and politicians — of his native Mississippi recalling how he helped reinvent the position in the late ’80s and ’90s while also protecting public assistance from greedy gunslingers, even if they’re pretty good at throwing footballs.
There should be a line. But as sports fans we keep blurring the boundaries between the player and the person. Superstar athletes amaze us with their otherworldly feats, and as a show of appreciation we then construct altars on which they can spend the rest of their lives feeling loved, admired — and removed from reality. Once on top, they are all but certain to let us down — because human beings tend to make terrible gods. This hasn’t stopped the sports-obsessed among us from desperately wanting our heroes’ characters to match their athletic skills.
It’s how a bumbling candidate such as Walker could make it this far. After winning the 1982 Heisman Trophy, Walker must have been rewarded with a lifetime of open doors, indulged by yes men and sycophants, many of whom have propped him up to represent the GOP in a race against Sen. Raphael G. Warnock (D). His exaggerations and downright lies are the kind of jokes that would be rejected inside the “Saturday Night Live” writer’s room for lack of originality, and yet he is still being seriously considered as Georgia’s next senator.
But there’s a real man behind the giant bronze statue that depicts a young running back frozen in the Heisman pose. The man beneath the UGA helmet has lived in a messy and troubling world.
Away from the serenade, his ex-wife has accused him of pointing a gun at her head. Outside of the football field in Wrightsville, Ga., that bears his name, he has fathered children with several women. And this week, a former girlfriend told the Daily Beast he paid for her abortion in 2009, an allegation Walker has denied. The New York Times subsequently reported Walker urged her to terminate a second pregnancy two years later.
These claims, if true, expose Walker, the hypocrite, considering his hard line, antiabortion views as a candidate. Worse, these stories air the dirty laundry of Walker, the deadbeat.
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