I Beat the Odds_ From Homelessness, to the Blind Side, and Beyond - Michael Oher [35]
Craig's dad had moved away from his family not long before my family moved into the neighborhood, but I think it helped that he'd had a male role model for at least the first ten years of his life. Craig was the middle child of five living with his mother (plus two more half-sisters), so we were similar in that we weren't old enough to be counted with the big kids but we weren't so young that we were still the family babies, either. We were both kind of quiet, and I think that's why we first started hanging out; but as we got older, I could see that there was a reason Craig and I stuck together, and it was because we needed each other. Craig didn't think the drug dealers or gang members were cool. He didn't drink or swear or do any of the stuff that was just normal for everyone else around us. He wanted to have a steady job to support a nice family when he grew up, so he was determined to do whatever it took to make that happen.
That was exactly the kind of friend I needed--someone who didn't laugh at me when I said I was going to have a different kind of life. Being with Craig reminded me that I wasn't wasting my time by studying sports, practicing my game, and trying to figure out what it would take to get me to junior college. He wasn't into sports as seriously as I was, but he was definitely focused on making a good future and responsible life for himself. I needed that kind of solid friendship to help keep me in line and my mind in the right place as I steered through the challenges of middle school and becoming a teenager in the ghetto.
But even before meeting Craig, I was determined to make sports my "thing." Somehow I knew sports would give me discipline and help me grow my talent so that I could use it as a tool for a career. I was actually the only one of my brothers who was really into playing sports. I don't mean I was the only one who liked to play--in the neighborhood, everyone plays basketball. But I was the only one who was involved with sports teams at school. It just seemed like a good way to work on my life skills, and I think I kind of knew, in the back of my head, that it would help keep me out of trouble, too. My older brothers each had their own talent. Some were good at singing, or at video games we played at other people's houses. Marcus was artistic and was great at drawing. Carlos was athletic but never got excited about playing for school teams the way I did. Athletics just became the area where I stood out--and it wasn't just because of my size.
A couple of my brothers are tall, too: Andrew is six feet six and Deljuan was six feet seven. My sister Denise is pretty tall, too. Just like my mother, she's about five feet ten, so I am grateful to our mother for passing that height on to us. But while my size may not have made me stand out in my family so much, it definitely did with my friends. Craig used to tease me about fitting in with the men of the neighborhood when we'd play football on those empty lots. But I wasn't just a huge guy--I was also very fast and coordinated. The teams I joined in junior high and high school helped me develop these abilities.
I made plenty of poor choices when it came to school. I missed far too many days and relied on my teachers and coaches not noticing or caring. What I was really doing was putting my eligibility at risk, which would have upended my dreams. But fortunately, I ended up making more good choices than bad choices.
CHAPTER NINE
Big Tony and Steve
As I hit my teenage years, I totally threw myself into sports. I was pitching for the baseball team at school and playing pick-up ball. In Hurt Village, the Greet Lot was where everyone got together to shoot hoops. I played there and at Morris Park, near where my mother had moved us as I was starting high school. There were a lot of talented players, plenty of guys who could have played college hoops, but they had no one who took an interest in them by getting them