The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
High school athletes can be role models as well
Bart Tanski just stood back and smiled. The look on his face was somewhere between being honored and maybe being a little embarrassed.
Maybe both. Standing a few feet away was Mitchell Trubisky, talking about being the ballboy for the Mentor football team in 2005 when Tanski was the Cardinals’ quarterback.
Trubisky studied Tanski’s every move, both on and off the field.
“I still look up to Bart to this day,” said Trubisky, who like Tanski was in Mentor for The NewsHerald Senior Bowl. “He is the perfect example of how the quarterback position should be played, both on and off the field as a leader, teammate and decision-maker.
“Everything he did, I tried to instill into my game back then and to this day. He has been a great role model for me on how to do things.”
If Tanski didn’t know before, he knew now. Someone was watching. That’s also a lesson for all athletes.
Someone is always watching.
On the college and professional level, it’s expected. Those high-profile athletes are always going to draw a crowd.
Where it isn’t always noticed is on the high school level.
But rest assured, someone is always watching.
Young sets of eyes are always watching their heroes, just like Trubisky looked up to Tanski, and how Tanski likely looked up to those standouts who shone brightly before him, such as Thom Abbott.
Local heroes are important, so much more important than those seen on television or read about in the newspapers.
The heroes so revered across the nation can’t hold a candle to the ones grown right in the backyard of every neighborhood across the area.
For every prima donna NBA player who is seen holding his arms out in disbelief whenever he is called for a foul, there is a local high schooler who raises his hand when the whistled for a foul.
For every NFL player who spikes a football in the face of a defender who just got burned for a touchdown, there is a high schooler who hands the ball to the official and runs over to the linemen who sprang him for the score and gives them high-fives for thanks. For every ... Never mind, you get the idea.
There is nothing wrong with professional athletes acting the way they do. There are hundreds of them who do the right thing and act the right way.
Some care that they are being watched by impressionable eyes. Some could not care less. That’s perfectly OK. The point here is while finding professional role models can be a difficult task, finding local role models — guys or gals you want to grow up to be like — is easy if you look hard enough. For instance:
• While playing in the News-Herald Classic basketball all-star game, VASJ senior David Lighty sat on the end of the bench, taking a breather from game action, and signed autographs for kids who came to see the future Ohio State star play before he headed off to college.
• This spring, Chagrin Falls softball player Meghan McKeogh took part in the “Stay in Softball” program, raising money for charity. She came up with the idea after her softball team helped her family by providing meals and other assistance when her mother was recovering from surgery.
• This past week, Riverside’s Brandon Horn (fractured foot) and NDCL’s Ryan Labanc (double root canal) gutted through pain to take part in The News-Herald Senior Bowl just for the ability to play high school football one last time before entering adulthood.
That is a small sample size of the local role models here. Every town, every school district, has them.
With all due respect to the millionaires seen nightly on “SportsCenter” Top 10 highlights, people like Lighty, McKeogh, Horn and Labanc are the local heroes who should be followed and modeled after more closely.
So as the graduating Class of 2017 moves on to the next steps in life and the Class of 2018 steps into the limelight — remember this:
You are a role model, even if you don’t know it.
Someone is always watching.