Sunday, October 18, 2009
Sports, "Hunt's Grunts"

On the right path

 

Scott Gries/Getty Images
Van Earl Wright

By Hunt Archbold

Big doings this week, and not just because the owner of the most recognizable voice in college football, Carrollton native Keith Jackson, celebrates his 81st birthday today, Sunday, Oct. 18. Whoa, Nellie indeed. Today is also World Menopause Day, and while I am inching closer to the age where permanent cessation of menstruation occurs, I don’t have a uterus, so that holiday will pass without much personal fanfare. Same for Thursday’s observance of International Stuttering Day, considering it’s not the speech impediment I hear whenever I speak. Instead, it’s Monday’s annual arrival of Evaluate Your Life Day that should have us all conducting a personal and careful examination of ourselves.

While the Bulldogs are off this week, it can be opined that Georgia coach Mark Richt might not have much spare time to judge his level of success or failure with regards to spirituality, health, love, money, intellectual prowess or the numerous other aspects of life that need to be synchronized for true fulfillment. No, he’s too busy attempting to salvage this already disappointing season as his team prepares for what could be another embarrassing beat-down administered by those relentless Gators.

Richt is focused on the now (as in the next game), while his growing critics are busy evaluating his team and coaches. Defensive coordinator Willie Martinez has taken much of the heat, but the team has numerous problems on both sides of the ball. This is a program in need of a recommitment to strict discipline and a demand for excellence and toughness. While Richt resists doing so now, a concise evaluation of his program will need to take place at season’s end, and difficult personnel changes will have to be made.

Tough choices need to be faced, and regular moments of self-evaluation need to be taken to determine if one is really heading in the direction one wishes to be. Take former Atlanta Hawks No. 1 pick Rumeal Robinson, who 20 years ago was the hero of Michigan’s NCAA championship team, but last week was indicted by federal authorities for his part in an alleged swindle of more than $2 million involving a proposed resort development. Robinson made more than $5 million in NBA salary alone, but was so bad at handling his money he declared bankruptcy while still in the NBA. As he sits in his rented Miami apartment awaiting a trial that carries a 10-year maximum punishment if found guilty, how does Robinson evaluate his life?

How do you evaluate yours? Does your life feel like a confusing treadmill of stress and reaction? Do you ever stop and ask yourself: “Is this where I want to go?’’

The new book by Jon Krakauer, “Where Men Win Glory: The Odyssey of Pat Tillman,” is the story of a man inspired to leave behind the fame and riches of the NFL to serve in the military after the events of 9/11, only to become disillusioned with our government’s mission afterward. The army cover-up surrounding his death by friendly fire five and a half years ago in Afghanistan is also examined, as the real tragedy in Tillman’s case is the way his memory was exploited. But there is a new revelation in the book that describes how Tillman turned down a chance to get out of the army after two years and return to the NFL with a multi-million dollar contract in hand. Even though Tillman had become discouraged with his country’s intent in Iraq and Afghanistan, he returned to war. How did he evaluate his life in making such a decision?

And then there’s native Atlantan Van Earl Wright, who, long before today’s super-smooth sportscasters were offering an endless babble of catchphrases, was entertaining the country as the unseen voice of CNN Headline News’ sports segments in the late ’80s. Wright’s bellowing voice (one can still hear his elongated pronunciation of  “Los An-gee-leeeeeeeeeez” and home run calls of “Deeeeeeeeeeeep over the wall …”) helped pave the way for a two-decade run in television and radio broadcasting. I remember Wright to be a nice and funny guy, and along with some others in the biz, we had some rather wild nights in Buckhead, at the Omni and CNN back in the day. But I hadn’t seen him on TV in some time, until he popped up last week in an Alumni Relations position for Cirque Lodge, a Utah-based alcohol and drug rehab facility.

“If you’re struggling with the disease of addiction right now, I can totally relate,” Wright says in a video welcome at the facility’s Web site. “I was in your shoes not too long ago, scared and also ready to have a change in lifestyle.”

I’m not sure my old acquaintance Van Earl needed a made-up holiday such as Evaluate Your Life Day to make the necessary changes he did, but I congratulate him for doing so.

While I’m at it, I’m reminded that men like Tillman fought for my freedom, and that with that freedom comes a responsibility to myself, my family and my community. This week is as good a time as any for a little self-evaluation to make sure I’m on the right life journey in regards to such things. Or least not too far off the beaten path.

Happy times … and here’s hoping you’re on the right path, too, my friends. SP