Jared Green Introduces His Father Into the Hall of Fame
Saturday, August 02 2008 by Tim
Virginia redshirt freshman wide receiver Jared Green had the honor of introducing his father, former “Fastest Man” in the NFL, Darrell Green at the latter’s enshrinement into the NFL Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio this evening.
I hadn’t originally planned to comment on this as its not completely U.Va. related (judging by the crowd at the event, I would say it was almost purely a Redskins event). But when I heard his speech, I thought it warranted being partially transcribed and posted given what is going on in college and pro sports these days (Charlottesville included).
Shortly before unveiling the bust of his father, he made this plea to current athletes:
Yesterday, my father and I tried to think of some current NFL players that could possibly become Hall of Famers.
I think we thought of two.
So, to my generation:
Our elders and our parents can set good examples such as my father's, but they can't live it for us.
Its up to us to stop the violence, sex abuse, drug abuse, alcoholism and the many more things that are plaguing our generation.
And in the same way my father was great, let’s live lives that our kids will be willing to come up on stage one day and honor.
Bravo, kid. Bravo.
The speech wasn’t all seriousness though. He did manage to get in a timely Favre reference combined with a dig at his father’s age:
Before I introduce my dad, i just want to let you guys in on a little story.
I've been holding his cell phone this week. You know, he's been busy and all that.
Last night, [he] got a text message. From a Green Bay number.
And it said "Hey, Darrell. One more time."
I clicked delete.
No.
Well played.
Overall, Jared made The University proud in his speech (even if there was no mention of U.Va. during the whole segment).
Edit: It looks like the Hall of Fame website is posting transcriptions of all of the speeches. Whenever they get the one up that includes Jared’s speech, I’ll add a link to this post.
Edit 2: As promised, here’s the link to the full transcript.