As I dug around tonight for something to write about, I went through my normal agitation-distraction routine and visited Facebook, and then checked my email again for the twelfth time in the last hour, and then I hopped on over to ESPN online to check hoop scores. Once I saw that Illinois was losing to Northwestern and that their glowing record was about to be smeared and that all of their hype was hemorrhaging, I popped over to the NFL news, just to see if there was anything new there. It was there I stumbled across an article on Ryan Leaf that made me pause and, in a bit of sadness, shake my head. Ryan’s news seemed to fit perfectly into the slate of macabre sports stories that have come out in the last twenty-four hours.

—

In 1998, Ryan Leaf was a darling in the sports world.

Ryan grew up in Montana and played his football there, leading his high school team to a state championship in 1992. Noting his acclaim as a quarterback, Mike Price came over from nearby Washington State University and asked him to come play ball with his team. Leaf agreed, and after thin playing time as a freshman, he saw spot minutes in his sophomore year grow into the starting job his junior year.

And his junior year, it was stellar.

Averaging over 330 yards passing a game, Leaf set a Pac-10 conference record by throwing 33 touchdowns on the season, taking the Washington State Cougars to a 10-2 record that year, and to the Rose Bowl- which was Washington State’s first appearance in that game in 67 years. In 1997-1998, Washington State won its first Pac-10 championship ever, and as a result, the team’s quarterback was a celebrated Heisman candidate. When all the votes came in, Leaf finished third in the count, behind winner Charlie Woodson of Michigan and some other quarterback named Payton Manning. Leaf ended that season with the second highest quarterback rating of any player that year. Leaf was hot.

With his stock riding high and a whole bevy of hardware surrounding him, Leaf decided to forego his senior year at Washington State and entered the 1998 NFL draft, and in a short time he was picked by the San Diego Chargers as, well, the second pick in the draft. Indianapolis looked at Leaf highly, but after seeing Manning work out, they saw a few things with Manning that made them select him first in the draft. Besides the fact Leaf didn’t show up for his interview with Indianapolis execs. San Diego, hungry for a quarterback, had traded up to have pick number two, and so they were pleased to land either of the two. Ryan was signed to a four year contract that was worth $31.25 million dollars, which included an $11.25 million dollar signing bonus, the largest ever paid to a rookie at that time. Ryan was an “It” guy.

In a short time, though, the Charger staff and players discovered some problems with Leaf. At times moody, at times lazy, at times intolerant, Leaf bumbled through preseason games and his first year in the pros in and out of trouble, either with his coaches, teammates, or the press, and his skills on field were dismal. In the ten games he played in his first year as a pro, he threw two touchdowns and fifteen interceptions, and was benched.

In his second year, he missed much of the season due to a shoulder injury. In 2000, he had a decent enough preseason that the Chargers thought he might be putting it together, but as soon as the season started, his talent disappeared. Finally, in 2001, he was waived by the Chargers.

In time, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Dallas Cowboys, and the Seattle Seahawks looked to give him a chance to grow up, to heal, and to become a feasible quarterback in their systems, but in the first two cases, poor performance, injuries, or personal issues led to Leaf’s releases from that team. In the last case, Ryan decided he was done with pro football, and right before the start of the Seahawks training camp in 2002, Ryan announced his retirement.

Ryan left the league as the noted “biggest bust the NFL had ever seen.”

And after his NFL career ended, Ryan went a little erratic.

In 2001, Ryan had married a Charger cheerleader, but by 2003 they were separated and eventually divorced. Ryan bounced from a job as a financial consultant in San Diego to return back to school at Washington State to finish a degree in 2005. In 2006, he yearned for the high times of his college football years, so he volunteered to coach quarterbacks at West Texas A&M. He looked like his life was stabilizing, until in 2008 he was confronted by the coaching staff for asking a player for a pain pill to help comfort his hurting wrist. What came out of that conversation was Leaf’s placement on indefinite leave, which ended up with his resignation the next day. And then Leaf’s real problems began.

In 2009, Ryan was indicted for a burglary and possession of controlled substances from an incident in Texas. Living in Vancouver at the time, Leaf was participating in a drug rehab program, but the temptation for the robbery was too great. Pleading guilty to charges stemming from both indictments in 2010, Leaf ended up paying a fine but receiving 10 years probation.

And then last year in March, while visiting his hometown in Montana, Leaf was arrested twice in four days for breaking into two residences to obtain painkillers.

On a plea bargain deal, Ryan ended up sentenced to 7 years in the Montana Correctional Department, with 2 years removable if he would work cooperatively with the system. Ryan began his sentence in the Nexus Treatment Center, a lockdown addiction treatment facility, and was scheduled to stay there for nine months so he could work through addiction issues, but things quickly went south for him there as well. In a short time, he gained a reputation in the facility as agitated, uncooperative, and a regular security risk. And then he threatened a staff member. Several times.

—

And so at the end of December last year, Ryan ended up being taken out of the Nexus facility and moved into a state prison where he awaited a disciplinary hearing- a hearing at which he was also uncooperative and combatant, swearing at court officials and throwing documents.

And so Ryan has returned to prison, where he will sit for six more months before he goes before the parole board again. If, by some stroke of fate he ends up being paroled in June, Leaf then will have to deal with another possible conviction posed by Texas officials who recognize he broke his probation with them with his current convictions.

—

I felt I needed to tell the bulk of Ryan’s life story to underscore the tragedy that occurs when someone of great talent, like Ryan, who excels in an arena of life we value so much here in America goes from hallowed to hell-bound because they become trapped in their celebrity and either do not, cannot, or will not reach out for help when they need to. Whether it’s their pride or their shame or their need to preserve their own self-perception of being the hero people have made them to be, they choose to shut off their humanness and instead sustain an image of themselves that is larger than life, which for some reason they need to.

Ryan’s story on ESPN today is small, but is another ugly moment captured of a once magnificent life gone awry. And it is a snippet in an ongoing story that has just picked up steam for one bad development after another.

What happened, Ryan Leaf? What happened to you?

What happened, Manti T’eo? What happened to you?

What happened, Lance Armstrong? What happened to you?

Today has been a good reminder to me that those we often make into heroes are still human beings, with broken hearts and defective decision-makers.

Today has also reminded me that real life encompasses so much more than athlete worship and the pursuit of celebrity. We all have to ultimately live with the truth we know about ourselves, our decisions, and our lives.

Everybody has to eventually face “real life”, and either live it with honor or live in it with shame.

At least the clock, the real clock, is still running for each of you.

What will you do next, Manti T’eo?

What will you do next, Lance Armstrong?

What will you do next, Ryan Leaf?