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by David P. Greisman - The world loves a good underdog story, particularly when it comes to sports, whether it is Rudy on the football field or Rocky in the ring.
Often such love is based on who the underdog is: the undersized defensive lineman striving to play for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, then waiting to make it onto the field, and at last entering a game to score a sack on the final down of the season; or the underachieving slugger who ends up challenging for the heavyweight championship.
But sometimes the love isn’t based on who the underdog is, but rather on whom the underdog is challenging. Every hero, after all, needs a villain to defeat or a conflict to overcome.
J’Leon Love once was an underdog story himself, a young man seeking to leave his past path behind in favor of a better future. He had dealt drugs in the Detroit suburb of Inkster, Michigan, a small city where the crime rate is more than two and a half times the national average. Just last year, the police chief said he either needed the state to give him more money to bolster his thinning ranks, or for the National Guard to be sent in to help handle the violence.
“It’s rough. It’s the ******, it’s the hood,” Love told Chris Robinson of Examiner.com back in 2012. “A lot of murders, a lot of **********s, the whole nine. That’s what it was about, but it makes you stronger because when you step out, you know what you’re fighting for. Not only am I fighting for myself and my family, but I got so many people behind me that I can help out.”
Among them are the 10 young children left behind by Love’s brother Gerald, who was murdered in Inkster in March 2013.
“I make good money. Supporting 11 people is what I’d do in another case if I had to,” Love told Kevin Iole of Yahoo! Sports earlier this year. “I really don’t think about it too much. When I get a call, whether they need diapers or formula or an iPad or a MacBook, I’m there.”
His should’ve been a great story. He should’ve been a person worth rooting for, this young man who told Lem Satterfield of RingTV.com that he once believed he would be in prison or in a grave before the age of 18, whose amateur career had once been sidelined due to severe injuries suffered in a motor vehicle crash, and whose pro success in boxing took him to a new life in Las Vegas. There, he had been taken under the wing of Floyd Mayweather Jr., showcased and spotlighted, a prospect whose paychecks were going toward kids who’d lost their father. [Click Here To Read More]
Often such love is based on who the underdog is: the undersized defensive lineman striving to play for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, then waiting to make it onto the field, and at last entering a game to score a sack on the final down of the season; or the underachieving slugger who ends up challenging for the heavyweight championship.
But sometimes the love isn’t based on who the underdog is, but rather on whom the underdog is challenging. Every hero, after all, needs a villain to defeat or a conflict to overcome.
J’Leon Love once was an underdog story himself, a young man seeking to leave his past path behind in favor of a better future. He had dealt drugs in the Detroit suburb of Inkster, Michigan, a small city where the crime rate is more than two and a half times the national average. Just last year, the police chief said he either needed the state to give him more money to bolster his thinning ranks, or for the National Guard to be sent in to help handle the violence.
“It’s rough. It’s the ******, it’s the hood,” Love told Chris Robinson of Examiner.com back in 2012. “A lot of murders, a lot of **********s, the whole nine. That’s what it was about, but it makes you stronger because when you step out, you know what you’re fighting for. Not only am I fighting for myself and my family, but I got so many people behind me that I can help out.”
Among them are the 10 young children left behind by Love’s brother Gerald, who was murdered in Inkster in March 2013.
“I make good money. Supporting 11 people is what I’d do in another case if I had to,” Love told Kevin Iole of Yahoo! Sports earlier this year. “I really don’t think about it too much. When I get a call, whether they need diapers or formula or an iPad or a MacBook, I’m there.”
His should’ve been a great story. He should’ve been a person worth rooting for, this young man who told Lem Satterfield of RingTV.com that he once believed he would be in prison or in a grave before the age of 18, whose amateur career had once been sidelined due to severe injuries suffered in a motor vehicle crash, and whose pro success in boxing took him to a new life in Las Vegas. There, he had been taken under the wing of Floyd Mayweather Jr., showcased and spotlighted, a prospect whose paychecks were going toward kids who’d lost their father. [Click Here To Read More]
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