Baseball Toaster was unplugged on February 4, 2009.
scott@scottlongonline.com
So here's what we know about Marvin Harrison:
1. He's really good, perhaps the best WR of this generation.
2. He's ... umm ...
As TK would say, "that's it! That's the list!"
Harrison's jersey is everywhere in Indy, as much, maybe more than Peyton Manning. Still, to this day, I don't believe I've ever once heard the man speak. Commercials? Nope. Talk show? Nope. Radio? Nope. He shows up on Sunday, catches the ball, goes home. Sure, last season there was the injury, but it was never Harrison talking about it. Reggie Wayne said more about Harrison's injury than Harrison did!
I'm not sure there's ever been a more anonymous superstar in sports and certainly not one in the ESPN/Deadspin era. Try to find one thing not football related on his wiki page. (No, it doesn't count that he was a two-way player in high school.) Let's see ... he went to Syracuse. He was raised by his mother in Philly. He has a son, one seldom seen. He owns a car wash and a bar, called Playmakers, in his old Philly neighborhood. He likes custom Belgian guns.
Wait, what?
Sure, we can all appreciate a FN Five-Seven and the Second Amendment, but if you look above, two of those things we know are only known because of the police investigation. Some have questions Harrison's involvement in his old neighborhood. "Keepin' it real" just never seemed to be a priority for Harrison, but evidently it was. Heck, we don't even know who was killed in this shooting.
Killed? Oh yeah, no one was killed. A man was shot in the hand. A boy across the street was hit with some shrapnel. I'm not minimizing here -- any shooting is serious, especially one that could have had tragic consequences for an innocent child. I'm just mentioning it because we know so very little about everything in this case. The vacuum of information has led to wild rumors that Harrison's incarcerated father had offended a prison gang. If so, his father must be doing it from the grave; he died when Harrison was a child.
So I don't know if Harrison is the victim of bad judgement, bad luck, or bad friends. I don't know if Harrison is a secret gangsta running a front operation for the Bloods. I don't know if Harrison will be ready for the season in 2008 or if he'll be facing charges.
More than any athlete in this era, we don't know Marvin Harrison. He seems to like it that way.
FWIW, if there was any gang connection going back to his father, it certainly would be pre-West coast gangs. North Philly has its own homegrown gangs.
If "The Killer" has a .45, they got to have a .45 and not just one, but two of those motherf***ers
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