Reading this story today on Yahoo Sports gave me the chills. It’s a story about an NFL linebacker on the Green Bay Packers. It’s also a story about an unlikely friendship with a taxi driver and his family. And it’s a story that unfortunately does not have a happy ending. On the left is Sam Barrington. And this Sunday he says he’ll be “playing his ass off” for the woman on the right. I’ll explain who she is in a moment. First the back story. When Sam Barrington was a 16 year-old high school football player, he used to take a cab to practice because his mother worked nights. One of the drivers was named Travis Newsome. And the two of them would talk football during the cab rides. Sam says: We were friends. As crazy as it sounds, we were friends. We would just talk. It was kind of like an uncle-nephew relationship. One thing led to another and their two families eventually became close. And that friendship continued while Sam played college ball and then was drafted by the Packers. Sam says: They would make a couple of sweet potato pies and send them to college. He would never ask for anything. Hes one of the most genuine people I know. But then it happened. Travis wife Ann felt a lump in her breast. Ann is the woman in the picture on the right. The lump was not good news. She had breast cancer. Ann got treatment. But it kept spreading. Doctors eventually told her it was stage 4 and there was nothing they could do. She was taken to a hospice. Earlier this week Sam spoke with Travis over the phone. Travis said his wife only had a few days left. He also said he’d just told his kids that their Mommy wasn’t coming home. Sam says the phone call was heartbreaking: What can you say? What can you say to somebody who is about to lose someone they planned to spend the rest of their life with? Early yesterday morning Ann died. Her two adorable young kids will now grow up without their Mommy. Sam Barrington has dedicated this weekend’s game against the Carolina Panthers to Ann. He says simply: Im going to wear my pink. But Im also gonna play my ass off. For her. I like Sam Barrington. And I like Travis. They both sound like good people. And I think it’s cool how they became friends. I just wish there was a better ending to this story. I hate cancer. And for the sake of this post, I will assume two things if you hit like. First, that you hate cancer as well. And second, that you like the friendship between Sam and Travis. Story courtesy Eric Adelson/Yahoo Sports Pictures courtesy USA Today Sports and the Newsome family
Posted on: Sat, 18 Oct 2014 18:30:21 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015