| The name most worthy of being pronounced during the NFL
draft never was heard, just as discouraging words never are heard by those who are home,
home on the range. Earthwind Moreland.
You don’t just pronounce a name like that; you are transported by it. Think of
purple sunsets. Think of a prairie at dusk and smoke spiraling up from a campfire while
horses, tethered nearly, move about quietly in the fading light. Put somebody named
Earthwind with a stage coach and some horses, and you would have a movie.
I jest, but there was an Earthwind Moreland eligible for the draft, a corner defender
out of Georgia Southern. Becoming aware of him, I of course awaited his name being
introduced. You can have Courtney Brown and LaVar Arrington and all those guys; I will
take an Earthwind Moreland every time. I put it right up there with Fair Hooker and Ornery
Jackson and some of the other great names of the draft. Yes, right up there with John
Wayne.
One year, some team or other did draft John Wayne. This was during the time when
American Football League teams had dozens of selections. In the draft’s closing
phase, when everybody was about half-giddy with fatigue, somebody, whom I can’t
recall, named John Wayne, Fort Apache State.
But back to Earthwind Moreland, a name that sings in the night. There also is a story
that goes with it. As they tell it at Georgia Southern, Moreland’s mother was a big
fan of the group Earth, Wind & Fire. One time the band was playing a concert in
Atlanta, and Mrs. Moreland went backstage to advise the musicians that she had named her
son after the band.
To make her point, she whipped out Earthwind’s Social Security card. Point made.
"After much repetition, it’s a story he never gets stale talkin’
about," said Tom McClellan, the sports information guy at Georgia Southern.
"Great kid."
Seems he can play a little bit too. According to McClellan, an Indianapolis scout
visiting Statesboro, Ga., in the days before the draft caught Earthwind in 4.31. He also
is strong enough to have squatted nearly 500 pounds.
To their credit, the Tampa Bay Bucs, looking, I’m sure, for somebody who could
stay with Keyshawn Johnson in practice, signed Earthwind as an undrafted free agent on the
Monday following the draft. "First guy they signed as a free agent," McClellan
said.
Georgia Southern had another corner eligible for the draft who was taken, by
Jacksonville in the fifth round. Kiwaukee Thomas. Kiwaukee. Rhymes with Milwaukee. Another
stellar name.
About Earthwind: He could just as easily been named Earthfire or Windfire. Wonder if he
has any brothers.
Before I go any further, I want to bow in the direction of the Atlanta Falcons, who had
the courage to invest their selection in the fifth round in a defensive back from Virginia
Tech named Anthony Midget. Takes gumption to take a guy named Midget. Leaves you open to
the second guess.
On to less interesting names. The draft, I thought, was anticlimactic. At the top,
teams took the players they had been expected to take. Ho, hum. I spent most of the
morning trying to determine if there is an Alvin, S.C., which is where Courtney Brown is
supposed to be from. There isn’t.
Oh, there are about 800 folks who think they are residents of Alvin, but since Alvin
does not have a post office, their addresses are in Saint Stephens, S.C. Confusing? Not to
Tommie Lee Kinlaw, the town barber. In Alvin, that is, only his shop is at 2214 Santee
River Road, Saint Stephens.
Anyhow, Tommie Lee’s place was the gathering point for the citizens of Alvin on
the day of the draft. Must have been 20-30 folks there when the Cleveland Browns led off
the process by naming Courtney Brown.
The holler they put up! "I thought the roof was coming off," Tommie Lee said.
Joe Hamilton, the Georgia Tech quarterback, also is from Alvin. Lives right next door
to Tommie Lee’s shop. Tampa Bay named him in the seventh round, which probably was
too low. "He’s going to prove himself, just as he did in college,"
predicted Tommie Lee.
That two athletes of such ability should come from the same South Carolina hamlet makes
a wholesome little story. Not everything associated with the draft had a similar theme.
This was supposed to be the year when NFL teams would shy away from selecting players with
questionable personal histories, but it didn’t work out that way. Peter Warrick,
charged with grand theft (subsequently reduced to petty theft) following a caper in a
Tallahassee department store, was the No. 4 selection, by Cincinnati. Michigan State WR
Plaxico Burress, considered not the most industrious of practice performers, went No. 8,
to Pittsburgh. On choice No. 17, Oakland named PK Sebastian Janikowski, a known roisterer
who faces charges of attempting to bribe a police officer.
The lesson was clear: Given a choice between a player of soaring skills but suspect
character and a lesser athlete of sterling personal qualities, NFL teams are going to
reach for the superior player every time. So much for a character emphasis.
Editor's note: Jerry Magee has covered pro football for the San Diego Union-Tribune
since 1961 and for PFW since its inception in 1967 |
