Learning to become a team player comes with costly lessons

Brandon Arnold stands with his mom Shirley Arnold-Moore, sister Brittney Washington, and dad Carl Moore at Senior Night Oct. 28.

Casey Casselberry

Brandon Arnold stands with his mom Shirley Arnold-Moore, sister Brittney Washington, and dad Carl Moore at Senior Night Oct. 28.

Brandon Arnold, Staff Writer

I wasn’t supposed to play football in high school.

At least that’s what my middle school coach thought because I was not a team player.

But football was my destiny. In third grade, I hit 100 pounds on a 4-foot-8 frame – Big B would be my nickname for most of my life.

But they also called me the class clown. In seventh grade, I was so caught up with being the class clown and being disruptive in class that I forgot what the coaches were trying to tell me. Finally, they got tired of my behavior and kicked me off the team. I blamed everybody except myself.

Next year, I was accepted back into the program, but I had to promise I’d clean up my act.

Right before the third game against Legacy Middle School, I stretched my neck too far during math and was not able to move it the rest of the day. I visited the nurse multiple times to put numerous massaging cream on the spot, but nothing would work.

After school, I tried to put on my shoulder pads, but it was too much of a struggle. So I told my coach I could not dress out. We ended up losing the game.

The next day, he called me into the office.

“Son, you are cancer to this team,”  he said. “I watched you run with the chains on the sideline like you weren’t hurt.”

Then he dismissed me from the program – again.

This time, I really thought I was just getting picked on and I would have no future in football.

High school came along, and I played football again, this time for Coach Larry Hill.

But I was still the class clown, acting up, enjoying the laughs I was getting from my classmates and driving my teachers crazy.

Coach Hill pulled me aside during my sophomore year. He reminded me that he took a chance on me by letting me into the program. Whatever I did reflected on the program, and he was not going to let anyone, even me, mess that up.

I have not been perfect since then. Just ask my teachers. But I have learned to be accountable for my actions in the classroom and on the field, where I was a starting defensive tackle for two years.

The things I do reflect on my school, my team and myself.

So when I sign my letter of commitment to play football at Lamar University tomorrow morning, I do it as a reflection of those lessons I have learned from football, Coach Hill and those middle school coaches who tried to teach me what it meant to be a team player.