By Kim J. Harmon

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ll young kids must have their heroes. I think, as a kid, it has to be impossible to go up to the plate, throw a ball, shoot a three-point shot, or make a catch without thinking or imagining – in some small way or even in some large way – that you are someone else, one of the stars that shine so brightly on the fields or courts somewhere in America.

How many John Elways are out there, throwing little eight-yard outs to their brother or sister because that’s as far as their little arms can throw a football? How many Mark McGwire’s are out there, stroking a fly ball in the backyard that really looks like it’s disappearing into the afternoon sky even though it’s only drifting over to the tomato garden 50 feet away?

When I was a kid, only nine or 10, I took to the mound in a Wiffle© ball game and I became Nolan Ryan . . . yep, the Ryan Express. I patterned my style after his and tried to perfect a fastball that was as blistering (in a Wiffle© ball sort of way) as his. I managed to see three of his seven no-hitters and I reveled in each one just like I reveled in the New York Giants’ 1986 Super Bowl victory over the Denver Broncos.

When I was a kid, only nine or 10, I shot hoops in the backyard or inside on the Nerf© basketball hoop in my bedroom and I was Pete Maravich – Pistol Pete, that is. Sure, I was a New York Knicks fan and watched Walt Frazier and Earl Monroe and those guys. But when Maravich was on the court, bombing those long jumpers before anyone thought to draw him a three-point line, he was all there was.

And now that it comes to football – when I was an early teen, taking that pitch out in the backyard, making a break up the sidelines, or putting a spin move on my brother, I was Walter Payton . . . the greatest running back who ever lived.

(Yes, I’ve heard of Jim Brown. Jim Brown was Jim Brown. Walter was . . . sweetness)

 

I will always remember those moves he made, how effortless it all seemed, and when I carried the football I was Walter, too, and it all seemed so effortless even though – to those who attempted to tackle me – it must have looked horribly uncoordinated.

But to me it was – like Walter – so smooth.

During those years when I first became a football fan, I liked guys like Ken Stabler and Fran Tarkenton, Eddie Podolak and Jan Stenerud, Bob Griese and even Roger Staubach of the hated Dallas Cowboys.

But no one captured my imagination like Walter Payton.  When I shook the hand of Walter’s brother in Las Vegas back in the summer of 1984, I was ecstatic. I touched the man who was related to a legend.

My love of seeing Walter Payton run the football survived even those times when the Giants played the Bears (and I remember one snowy day, when they did). I always rooted for Walter to make those yards, get that touchdown, and when the Giants managed to stop him for no gain or bring him down in the back field, I couldn’t help feeling a little betrayed by my own team.

There have been injustices in professional football, but – in my mind – the greatest ever was in the 1985 Super Bowl between the Chicago Bears and New England Patriots when Mike Ditka called a goal line play for that human thyroid condition, William Perry, rather than Walter Payton. The Bears could have given Walter that touchdown that day, to thank him for the years of toil behind bad offensive lines on very mediocre teams, but, instead, coach Ditka decided to soil the moment with a gimmick.

(That one play, that one moment, is why I despise Mike Ditka and why I always chuckle at every new failure of the New Orleans Saints . . . like losing to the expansion – and winless – Cleveland Browns on a Hail Mary pass on the final play of the game. Ha ha ha)

 

Now Walter is gone, taken well before his time by a liver disease most people can’t even pronounce and liver cancer, and while I could never presume to match the grief being felt by his family and close friends, I still feel a deep sadness because I’ve lost a hero.

Bye, Walter.

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I have found myself, this week, wondering where the time has gone. It doesn’t seem like that long ago that the sports teams at Newtown High School were all starting the 1999 fall seasons with the requisite levels of enthusiasm and optimism and now, on November 3 (as I write these words), the field  hockey and volleyball teams are done until next year (both seasons ending rather abruptly considering the excitement last week), the cross country teams have just one meet left, the swim team has just one meet left, and the soccer teams are heading into the post-season.

Football – football is still going strong, but Thanksgiving is less than three weeks away and for the Nighthawks, at least this year, that’s all there is.

Where has the time gone?