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Holmes stopped him midsentence.

“Hell, why wouldn’t I?” he said. “Bring the nigger up here and lemme meet him.”

Hill laughed. Such was Bud being Bud.

Now, five years later, Hill and Holmes were at it again. The NFL Draft was scheduled for January 28, 1975, and according to the many scouts who had visited Jackson State’s campus, all three players were guaranteed to be selected—Payton and Brazile within the first dozen or so picks. The problem, however, came with representation. While various Southern attorneys and agents scoured the campuses of Ole Miss, Mississippi State, and Southern Miss, few—actually, none—trekked out to Jackson State. It’s not that the Tigers lacked talent. Everyone knew Hill’s program was a buffet of NFL prospects. No, this was about reputation. The white Mississippi agent who represented black players was known as a sellout to his race. College coaches wanted nothing to do with you. Prospects were told to ignore your phone calls. “Truthfully,” said Holmes, “I didn’t give a shit. If you could play, you could play.”

That’s why Hill and his players were here, in Holmes’ office, seeking out representation. The five men spoke for roughly twenty-five minutes, with the coach and agent doing 99 percent of the talking. Holmes would look up at Payton and Brazile and Young, their eyes wide, their lips pursed. He felt as if he understood what it was to be them—young and black and Southern born. That’s why, as the meeting closed and silence choked the room, he turned to Hill and spoke loudly.

“Coach,” Holmes said, “I just don’t think I can represent these boys.”

Hill was stunned. “Really,” he said. “What’s the matter?”

“Well,” said Holmes, “they seem like perfectly nice niggers. But look at those purses. I’ve never, ever represented any little queers before.”

With that, the players burst into laughter. Holmes shook their hands and promised honesty and respect. “All I ask of you is to be good citizens, look people in the eyes, and carry yourself with dignity,” he said. “If you can do that, we can work together.”

Walter Payton nodded. He had no idea what he was getting himself into.

Born on October 29, 1932, Bud Holmes was raised in the shadow of D.W. Holmes, his larger-than-life father. A onetime captain of the Ole Miss baseball team, D.W. played several years as a semipro pitcher before earning his law degree from Ole Miss. In 1948, at age fifty-seven, D.W. was elected mayor of Hattiesburg—a progressive, forward-thinking Democrat who planned on adding blacks to the city’s police force (a radical idea at the time) and refused to cower at social progress. While growing up in Lake, Mississippi, D.W.’s closest lifelong friend was a black man named Lawyer Cox. “Lawyer was like Daddy’s brother,” said Bud Holmes. “It wasn’t that Daddy always thought he had to do right by blacks. He just thought people should be fair. If that meant giving people equal rights and respect, then that’s what it was.”

Two years after his election, D.W. was traveling through the nearby town of Collins, Mississippi, when he was hit head-on by a drunk driver who had swerved into the wrong lane. He died on impact.

Eighteen years old and a senior at Hattiesburg High, young Bud Holmes was met by a harsh reality. His father was dead—and real life wasn’t easy. “We were never rich, but we were comfortable,” he said. “Well, two days after Daddy died my car didn’t have any gas, my dogs didn’t have any food, and I had two dollars in my pocket. It was my wake-up call that the world wasn’t going to show me much pity.”

Bud took a job in the bookstore at the University of Southern Mississippi, working with athletes who needed academic assistance. He enrolled at the school, and befriended a professional baseball player from West Point, Mississippi, named Bubba Phillips. Working his way through Detroit’s minor league system, Phillips, a Southern Miss grad, needed someone local to watch his automobile while he attended spring training in Lakeland, Florida. Holmes was happy to oblige. “That