Art Monk Story Investors Business Daily Article

Fantastic read. I think every Pop Warner coach should read this to their team at the start of every season. Hell, I think every coach and every teacher should read that to their kids!

Here's an awesome story that I've never told this site before. I wouldn't be surprised if people didn't believe me because it's so awesome but I swear on everything I hold dear this is all true. This is why I really think Art Monk is a true role model:
The summer after 4th grade, so it was 1992 which made it all that much cooler, I got to go to Art Monk Football Camp for the second year in a row (my username comes from the warm up that we had to do before every practice). That year I shared a room with my friend from school and next door were two other kids from our boys’ club team back home.
Early one night towards the end of camp, which was only a week long, we got a knock on our door from one of the counselors saying that he needed to talk to us about something. We were worried because it seemed like we were getting in trouble even though we couldn’t think of anything bad that we had done. The counselor said that someone needed to talk to us after he was done talking with the two kids next door. After about 5 nervous minutes the other kids’ door opened up and who should walk out but Mr. Art Monk and our floor’s counselor. Art smiled at us and told that we weren’t in trouble or anything but that he needed to talk to us for a minute.
Basically, one of the kids next door, Steve, started picking on his roommate, Ed: he’d lock him out of the room; he’d throw his clothes out the window; he’d hide his pads right before practice; he basically just made the other kid’s life miserable. Being that we were only about 8 or 9 years old Ed got really upset wanted to call his parents so they could come and pick him up. The counselors decided to bring up these problems to Monk himself and he decided that he’d like to have a word with both kids to see if he could work everything out between them. During their conversation Ed said that my roommate and I knew him from home and that we had been nice to him, so Art decided that he’d like to talk to us about their situation to see if we could help out a little bit. Art wanted to make sure that we tried to help Ed have fun at camp, especially since it was our second year there. He also wanted us to remind Steve that everyone was there for fun and that he needed to stop picking on his roommate and start showing him more respect.
It was so cool because here was our hero, sitting in our dorm room, trying to make sure that we were all learning football and having a great time. Can you imagine some of the prima donnas in the NFL now taking time out of their night, their only alone time the entire week, to make sure that one of their campers doesn’t feel like crap?!?! The man made it a point to come and talk to Ed and Steve, and then to me and my roommate and teach us to treat one another with respect. I bet he did this sort of thing the entire week because he really did seem to care about everyone at the camp. I swear that to this day that night was one of the highlights of my entire life.

Maybe I should send this story to Dr. Z, because I’m sure that in Michael Irvin’s playing days he wouldn’t have put down the pipe long enough to teach some little kids about respect.


Good story - not many guys in the NFL care too much like Art did.

The thing that kills me is that so many idiots commenting over at FoxSports about the induction of Irvin to the HOF say that off-field actions shouldn't impact someone's acceptance into the HOF. Yet the reason Irvin is in and Monk is not is because of off-field actions.

Monk didn't talk much (including to the press) so they didn't pay much attention to him (and didn't like him too much either, I guess.) And, as a half on-field, half off-field item, he didn't nag about not getting the ball. As a result he got less passes thrown his way after we got the rest of the Posse. (How long was it before someone matched the 106 passes he caught in one season before the Posse got there?)

On the other hand, Irvin was loud, always saying (like my 5-year-old) "look at me, look at me!" Then he topped it off by becoming a member of the "press" himself. He set himself up perfectly.

So the bottom line is what you do off the field impacts heavily if you get into the HOF or not. It's just not the desired impact. Very sad.

The thing that kills me is that so many idiots commenting over at FoxSports about the induction of Irvin to the HOF say that off-field actions shouldn't impact someone's acceptance into the HOF. Yet the reason Irvin is in and Monk is not is because of off-field actions.

Monk didn't talk much (including to the press) so they didn't pay much attention to him (and didn't like him too much either, I guess.) And, as a half on-field, half off-field item, he didn't nag about not getting the ball. As a result he got less passes thrown his way after we got the rest of the Posse. (How long was it before someone matched the 106 passes he caught in one season before the Posse got there?)

On the other hand, Irvin was loud, always saying (like my 5-year-old) "look at me, look at me!" Then he topped it off by becoming a member of the "press" himself. He set himself up perfectly.

So the bottom line is what you do off the field impacts heavily if you get into the HOF or not. It's just not the desired impact. Very sad.

I know what you are saying. Until the NFL Hall of Fame inducts Monk I, like many fans of the game (not just Skins fans) won't take it seriously. In fact when I was flipping the channels the night of the Hall induction this past week I couldn't watch it as Irvin was being introduced by Jerry Jones - Monk has been waiting like 7-8 years? Injustice if you ask me.

I think the thing that says the most about Art Monk is that he doesn't really give a damn what Peter the Pig King or Dr. Z or any of those HOF voting clowns think of him and really isn't bothered by not being in yet.

He isn't desperate to be liked or noticed like Michael Irvin and isn't so pathetic that he needs to set up lobbying efforts to get himself in.

I trully think that the tide is turning though and more and more former players and coaches and media outlets outside of the Redskin fan base are beginning to see how outrageous this is.

I just don't want Dan Snyder to take a page out of the Jerry Jones book and lobby it to death. What Jones did was sickening, cheap and obnoxious to watch and it looked corrupt. Art Monk is to good for that.

Besides King and Z are so phoney and pathetic that as soon as the majority want Monk in they will flip flop like all of the other phoney HOF voters and he'll get in.