Randy Moss

1977-

American football player

Minnesota Vikings receiver Randy Moss is one of professional football's star players, but he remains "the National Football League's biggest enigma," as New York Times writer Judy Battista described him. Though Moss's talents on the gridiron are extraordinary, his off-the-field escapades and pronouncements have landed him in trouble on more than one occasion dating back to his high-school days.

Expelled from School

Moss was born in 1977 and grew up in a small West Virginia mining town called Rand. As a student in the nearby Belle school system, Moss emerged as a phenomenally gifted young athlete. He led the DuPont High School Panthers

to two state football titles, and as a basketball player was named West Virginia's high school player of the year. He even excelled in baseball and won track titles at the state level. Legendary Notre Dame University coach Lou Holtz called him "the best high school player I've ever seen," according to Sport 's Curry Kirkpatrick, and duly signed him to play for the legendary Fighting Irish after graduation. The full scholarship was rescinded, however, when Moss became involved in a school brawl and spent a month in jail after rupturing a fellow student's spleen.

Holtz suggested Moss to the Florida State University Seminoles, who allowed him to play as a "red shirt," or an off-the-roster player, during his freshman year in 1995. The following spring, Moss returned to Charleston to serve out the remainder of his sentence for malicious wounding on a work-release program, but tested positive for marijuana use. He was jailed again, and Florida State kicked him off the team. From there Moss enrolled at Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia, and helped make their football team, the Thundering Herd, a leader in its collegiate I-AA division. Moss's receiving and running talents led the team through a spectacular two seasons, and he was a fourth-place candidate in the Heisman Trophy voting for the best American college football player after his sophomore season.

Rookie of the Year Honors

Moss decided to quit school and enter the National Football League draft for 1998. He was widely considered to be a top-five pick, and heralded as the best receiver out to come out of the college level in thirty years. But Moss skipped the important scouting combine, claiming he suffered from an abscessed wisdom tooth, and rumors arose that he was avoiding the mandatory drug test. Wary that he had not yet shed his trouble-maker reputation, nineteen NFL teams bypassed him in the draft, but the Vikings selected him and offered a $1.4 million rookie contract.

Moss began his career with Minnesota as a third-string receiver, after Jake Reed and Cris Carter . Then, at a nationally televised Dallas Cowboys game on Thanksgiving Day, Moss caught three touchdown passes, each for more than 50 yards. The Vikings trounced Dallas 46-36, and Moss became an overnight celebrity. By the end of his rookie season, he led the NFL with touchdown receptions, and racked up several other impressive statistics, and the Vikings had a 15-1 season. He was named Rookie of Year by several publications, and his No. 84 became the best-selling Vikings jersey nationwide. "Beyond that," noted Sports Illustrated writer Jack McCallum, "Moss has—not single-handedly, to be sure, but preeminently—galvanized and glamorized the Vikes, giving them the league's highest phat factor."

Troubles On and Off the Field

There was much pre-season hype before the start of the 1999 Vikings year, with many predicting they could make it to the Super Bowl. Yet Moss's performance was spotty that year, and he paid a team fine for squirting an official with a water bottle. In 2000, the team finished 11-5, a small improvement over the past season. The onset of the 2001 football year began badly for Moss and the Vikings, when his teammate and friend Korey Stringer died of heat exhaustion after a pre-season practice. Moss stunned reporters when he wept openly about the loss. Then, a few weeks into the season, he was again fined for insulting the executives of some of the team's corporate sponsors over a seat on the bus. His most infamous moment of the 2001 season, however, came in November when he told Minneapolis Star Tribune writer Sid Hartman, "I play when I want to play." The remark was widely reported in the national media, but Hartman had written in the preceding paragraph that Moss's "veteran teammate, Cris Carter, will tell you there is not a player who goes 100 percent all of the time." As Moss reflected after his soon-to-be-infamous statement was made, "Do I play up to my top performance, my ability every time? Maybe not. I just keep doing what I do and that is playing football. When I make my mind up, I am going out there to tear some-body's head off," he told Hartman.

Moss's boast "made him the poster child last season for all that is wrong with professional sports," noted Sports Illustrated writer Michael Silver, and Vikings fans began to boo him on the field. The team finished the season with a dismal 5-11 record. The tension between Moss and Vikings coach Dennis Green was said to be the reason that Green did not finish out the 2001 season, and the team's offensive line coach, Mike Tice, advanced to the job. The Vikings failed to re-sign Carter for the 2002 season as well. Had Vikings owner Red McCombs been convinced by Tice that he could reign in Moss and make him the Michael Jordan of football, he was asked? "No," Moss told Silver in Sports Illustrated. "Mike Tice got the job because he and Randy Moss can get along. Nobody controls me but my mama and God."

Career Statistics

"Bumped" Officer with Lexus

A few games into the 2002 season, Tice had already heralded what he termed the "Randy Ratio"—a vow that forty percent of the team's passes were to be caught by Moss. The receiver seemed to have settled down and showed far more leadership promise than in past seasons, but at the end of September, Vikings quarterback Daunte Culpepper screamed at Moss on sidelines for failing to go after a pass with both hands. Two days later, Moss spent a night in jail after disobeying a traffic control officer in downtown Minneapolis. The officer, on foot, attempted to stop Moss in his Lexus sedan from making an illegal turn, and he was said to have nudged her with the car until she fell over. Authorities found marijuana in the car, and Moss was charged with misdemeanor drug possession.

Moss remains one of the Vikings' most talented players, though skeptics note he has not yet lived up to the promise of his athletic prowess. He claims to have learned to speak more carefully, as he told Sports Illustrated 's Silver. "I guess that I'm a bad guy, which I'm not," he says. "I know I have a reputation to protect, and it's not just me—I'm also representing a multimillion-dollar franchise and my family. So if sometimes I say things I regret, I've got to pay for it."

Chronology

CONTACT INFORMATION

Address: c/o Minnesota Vikings, Winter Park Administrative Offices, 9520 Viking Dr., Eden Prairie, MN 55344. Phone: (952) 828-6500. Email: info@vikings.com. Online: http://www.vikings.com.

FURTHER INFORMATION

Periodicals

Attner, Paul. "Ugly solution to Moss hysteria." Sporting News 225 (January 15, 2001): 18.

Battista, Judy. "Moss Presents a Challenge To Jets and Vikings Alike." New York Times (October 17, 2002): D3.

Hack, Damon. "Officials Find No Felony Against Moss." New York Times (September 26, 2002): D4.

Hartman, Sid. "Moss: I play when I want to play." Star Tribune (Minneapolis, MN) (November 23, 2001): 3C.

Kirkpatrick, Curry. "Does this guy look like trouble?" Sport (October 1997): 58.

McCallum, Jack. "Moss Appeal." Sports Illustrated (January 18, 1999): 54.

"Moss Fined $15,000 Last Month." New York Times (December 14, 2001): S6.

Pompei, Dan. "Trying to get answers on Moss is like pulling teeth." Sporting News (February 16, 1998): 51.

Scott, David. "Moss Hysteria." Sport (August 1999): 50.

Silver, Michael. "How Good Can Randy Moss Be?" Sports Illustrated (September 2, 2002): 68.

"Traffic Arrest for Randy Moss." New York Times (September 25, 2002): D4.

"Vikings Star Admits Nudging Officer with Car." New York Times (December 12, 2002): D4.

Sketch by Carol Brennan

Awards and Accomplishments