"I appreciated the game, and I wanted to play it with my best effort, but I didn't want it to define my life." -Lee Roy Selmon
A Florida community grieves for someone whose performance was legendary and whose word was golden.
Early on Sunday morning, following a head's up from a friend in New York who works for a TV network, I read this terrific column online and knew that it captured perfectly the man and the sad mood of people I know throughout the U.S. who know and love college football and the NFL, and who know the real deal when they see it. And Lee Roy Selmon was the real deal.
St. Petersburg Times
The measure of Tampa Bay Buccaneers' Lee Roy Selmon's greatness is off the field
By Gary Shelton, Times Sports Columnist
In Print: Saturday, September 3, 2011
The measure of a man is not in the games he plays. Deep down, to the twisted pits of your soul where you feel pain over Lee Roy Selmon, you know that. He was a great football player, a terrific, inspired football player. There is no arguing that. Selmon was perhaps the best to play in Tampa Bay, and perhaps the best to play in Oklahoma, one of the best to play anywhere. He won awards, and he reached halls of fame, and he defined excellence. You can choose that definition of Selmon, if you wish. Or you can remember something greater about a man who has been far more than a football player.The measure of a man is not in the money he makes. It is not whether he has an expressway named after him, or a restaurant, or if his name is in the Bucs' Ring of Honor. It is not a bust in the Hall of Fame, or a statue that may be built on his college campus, or in the memories of a thousand black and white photographs from his playing days.In the case of Selmon, the measure of him and his meaning should be measured by the shadow he has cast. By the lives touched. By the grace shown.
Read the rest of the column at
The sad cover story in today's Times, at top, was penned by Rick Stroud.
St. Petersburg Times
Former Tampa Bay Bucs great Lee Roy Selmon dies two days after suffering a stroke
By Rick Stroud, Times Staff Writer
In Print: Monday, September 5, 2011
TAMPAAs stunned as his loved ones, friends and colleagues were about the suddenness of his death, it was the graceful, dignified and exemplary life of Lee Roy Selmon that they remembered most on Sunday.The first player drafted by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and their only member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame died at St. Joseph's Hospital on Sunday afternoon (Sept. 4, 2011) surrounded by family and friends, only two days after suffering a stroke at his Tampa home. Mr. Selmon was 56.
NFL Films video: Top 100 Greatest Players #98 Lee Roy Selmon - HD, HQ
I shudder to think about what this area will be like the day legendary former Dolphins head coach Don Shula passes away.
This area will be convulsed and I have no doubt whatsoever THAT will be the biggest Memorial/funeral in the recorded history of South Florida.
By far...
