Well, look at the bright side: your Friday night is now completely free!
Word of the day: Dejected.
HARRY THE HERO. Nothing I write today (or at any other time) will be as beautiful, honest, brave, disturbing, profound, or shocking as the letter Harry Miller shared with us yesterday.
So for this first section, I’m going to bow to him. If he didn’t read his letter yesterday, read it now. If you read it yesterday, read it again.
I am medically retired.
Ordinarily, I wouldn’t share that information. However, as I have played football,
I no longer have the privilege of privacy, so I’ll share my story briefly before
more articles continue to ask, “What’s wrong with Harry Miller?” that is good
question. It’s a good enough question that I don’t know the answer, although I have
I often asked.Before last year’s season, I told Coach Day of my intention to kill myself. He
immediately put me in touch with Dr. Candice and Dr. Norman, and I received the
support I needed. After a few weeks, I tried my luck at football again, with scars
on my wrists and throat. Perhaps the scars were difficult to see with the bandaged wrists.
Perhaps it was difficult to see the scars through the bright colors of television. Maybe
scars were hard to hear on all the talk shows and talk shows. they are are
Hard to see and easy to hide, but they sure hurt. there was a dead man
on the TV, but no one knew.At that point, I’d rather be dead than a coward. I’d rather be nothing at all, than
You have to explain everything that was wrong. I was planning to be reduced to my
initials on a sticker on the back of a helmet. She had seen people seek help before. I had
seen the old adage about how our generation was getting softer by the second, but I can
tell you that my skin was hard. It had to be. But it was no harder than sharp metal.
my box cutter And I saw how easy it was for people to put others down by talking
about how they were just a dumb college student who didn’t know anything. But luckily I
I am a student of the Faculty of Engineering, and I have a 4.0 and the recognitions that are
you might need, so maybe if someone’s injury can be taken seriously for once, it can
Be mine And maybe I can vouch for all the other people who hurt but aren’t taken
seriously because, for some reason, pain must have prerequisitesA person like me, who supposedly has the whole world ahead of him, can be completely
willing to give up the whole world. This is not a subject reserved for the distant and
outside. It is in our homes. It’s in our conversations. It is in the people we love.I’m not angry. I had to lose my anger because I didn’t know if God would forgive me if I went to him if I was angry. I did not know how the Host of Hosts would respond to my
untimely arrival, and she didn’t want to tempt him. So in my sadness, I lost my anger
and I learned many things. I learned what color blood is through the tears in my eyes.
learned that the human ear cannot distinguish between the two when its droplets hit
a tiled floor. But most of all I learned love, the kind of love that can only be taken apart
together by the mechanism of brutal sadness.And so I will love more than I can be hated or mocked, because I know the people who
tease more need the love that I was looking for. The cost of apathy is life, but
the price of life is as small as an act of kindness. I am a life preserved by kindness
that others offered me when I could not produce goodness for myself.We wonder “How could this have happened?” but that question alone cannot absolve us
of all the questions we could have asked while it was happening.I am grateful for the infrastructure that Coach Day has put in place at Ohio State, and I am
grateful that it allows me to find a new way to help others in the program. Hopefully
athletic departments across the country do the same. If it wasn’t for him and the staff, my
the words would not be a reflection. They would be evidence in an autopsy.God bless those who love. God bless those who cry. And God bless those who hurt
and they only know how to share their pain from anger, because they are learning to love with me.I’m good.
There is help, always.
800-273-8255
Dum Spiro Hope
As I breathe I wait
I don’t know Harry personally, and may never meet him. But with his letter and how many lives I am sure he has already touched, it is very clear that his pain had a purpose, and there is hope in his pain.
I’m proud of him. And he is dearly loved by more people than he will ever meet.
He will never play for Ohio State again, but I sincerely believe he will become one of the most impactful human beings to ever wear a Buckeye uniform.
DAY LEADS THE WAY. Obviously, I don’t know exactly what happened and I don’t want to speak for Harry, but from the outside, I’m not sure there’s a better head coach in the country that he can go to with his sanity. struggles and suicidal thoughts than Ryan Day.
Day gets it: he lost his father to suicide when he was young. And because of that, he has placed a tremendous value on mental health as a coach.
And I don’t think it was a coincidence that the night before Miller officially announced his retirement from football, Day was preaching the importance of mental health and sharing a bit of his own story.
It was no coincidence that last night, with Ryan Day in attendance, the Toledo/Wistert Chapter of the @NFFNetwork announced an initiative to promote mental health awareness. Later, Coach Day spoke about the importance of the topic. https://t.co/8za5KxsOBw pic.twitter.com/wvzUHMrWeh
— Mark Kunz (@MarkAKunz) March 10, 2022
There are many things that make me proud of my alma mater and the team that I support and write about professionally, and Day and Miller continue to give me more.
DEVIN SMITH JR. I usually try not to compare new or upcoming players to other Buckeyes from the past, because it doesn’t really feel fair to either player and usually sets the youngster up for failure.
But when you come from Massillon, change your number to Devin Smith’s number 9, and openly mention his name several times during your brief interview, I really have no choice.
Jayden Ballard was asked on three different occasions during his interview session today about being compared to Devin Smith. That’s going to be a popular comparison throughout his career at Ohio State, especially now that he wears No. 9 like Smith did at Ohio State and Massillon.
— Dan Hope (@Dan_Hope) March 10, 2022
The only thing that would make this better is if you told me that Ballard hasn’t lost a game in his career by scoring a touchdown.
SIGN IT. Liam McCullough hasn’t played in a competitive football game since his time at Ohio State, but he’s here proving he’s ready at a moment’s notice.
NFL free agent Liam McCullough (Raiders, Steelers, Ohio State) from March 2022 Zauner Free Agent Combine, with a perfect score of 30/30 in field plays and 17/18 in location and kick blocking clearance. Liam was the highest scoring long snapper of 25 at the Combine. pic.twitter.com/LaeuxGAdtE
—Liam McCullough (@LiamMcCullough2) March 11, 2022
I admit I know very little about long snapper, but it’s pretty clear to me that it’s the best snapper available in the country and might be better than some current pros.
If you don’t at least get an invite to someone’s camp this year, I’m going to be furious on your behalf.
SONG OF THE DAY. “Light My Booty” by Soulja Boy.
DO NOT STICK TO SPORTS. Wrongly convicted of terrorism in the terrible years after 9/11, Hamid Hayat lost everything… the wild world of invertebrate butts… a woman fights to keep your ‘FART’ license plate… The last party on lombard street… This man has lived on a cruise ship for 20 years… Fabric softener doesn’t really soften clothes…
