Audio File
Transcript
My name is Nikhai Hill-Green.
My name is Zion McCaskill.
My name is Jerome King. I am 11 years old.
I am 13 years old.
I’m 15 years old.
We interviewed Darrin Walls,
Darrin Walls,
Darrin Walls,
On June 23rd, 2016.
Born June 20th, 1988… My childhood was kinda rough at times. I grew up in Garfield. I had both my parents in my life, but I struggled through a custody battle between the two. I would split time between both, and that was kind of hard for a child at my age. I also had a great childhood as well. I mean, I had a sister growing up and a bunch of cousins. We all lived together. So it was fun, but there was rough parts of it as well. I mean, we didn’t have the most money, so we struggled there. But you know, we always found a way to make it happen.
I was a good student. I had pretty much all A’s in elementary school and middle school, and I played for the Gators. I had a really good childhood. My family was very important in my life. And my father, he does a great job with me. He’s not only a mentor to me, but he’s also someone I can look up to, someone I follow and someone I wanna be like when I get older. My dad was probably the biggest factor in my life and seeing how hard he worked, I didn’t want to let him down as a person. I knew he believed in me and I knew he made some sacrifices for me to be the person I am today. Growing up, I always thought my dad was too tough when we always thought that he was too strict, but it was for the best. Growing up in a city like Garfield, there isn’t much to do, and football was the only outlet for a lot of people. I was fortunate to have a father in my life, but a lot of kids weren’t, and seeing their coaches raise those kids as a father figure, it definitely changed a lot of people’s lives. I always watch the Florida Gators because of the Garfield Gators, and I always envisioned myself playing for the Florida Gators, so I knew I had to make it to college. I don’t know if my dream was always the NFL, but I think once I made it to high school, I took it more serious. It definitely became a dream of mine. The biggest struggle that I dealt with was getting suspended from college for a semester. I made some bad decisions and I think everyone in life make bad decisions. It’s how you respond to them. And when I made the decision I made in college my sophomore year, there was no college for me. I was done. I had to reapply for school. I had to come back home and go to a Community College, which I’ve never seen myself going to. I had to find a job. I had to still continue to work out, and that was struggle for me because coming from being the number one player in Pennsylvania your senior year and then going to University of Notre Dame and starting a whole season your sophomore year like kind of humbled me, it kind of made me realize not to take things for granted. And I think once I got suspended, that was the biggest struggle I dealt with because I felt like I let myself down. I felt like I let other people down who were depending on me to do well and that was hard for me to deal with.
The best day of my life probably was graduating from College in 2010. My degrees were in sociology and psychology. Draft day kind of sucked for me. I didn’t get drafted. I was pretty sure I was gonna get drafted, but I got picked up as a free agent and that was very emotional. That was a great day. I was extremely happy and my family was happy. But those days, during a draft, you kind of doubt yourself. But I had a lot of faith knowing that I could play, and I knew that I was pretty good. So when the team picked me up as a free agent and I knew that I had to prove myself, and I tried to do that.
Football to me is secondary. My family comes first, before anything. I think I’m a great son. I feel like I’m a great brother and a great friend. Football doesn’t define me. I think if you ask anyone about me, they’d probably say, “Oh, he’s a great person” or “He’s this” or “He’s that.” They might not even mention football. That’s how I try to live my life. I try to make sure that people know that I care. People know that what I’m doing is just- it’s my job. I mean, I love to do it, but without football, I’d still be the same person I was. If I wasn’t playing football, I think I’d probably be in real estate and I like to fix up houses, you know, I wanted to sell houses. That type of thing. But I also wanted to be a football coach growing up because I’ve seen what the Garfield Gators have done to change people’s lives. I’ve seen what Coach Novac at Woodland Hills done to change people’s lives. So for me it’s just all about making sure people know you care about them and trying to change someone’s life in a better way.
The advice I give you is just be strong. Be confident. You know you’re smart. Be smart. Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t do something, or you can’t be anyone because of the society we live in. But we also gotta be careful of what we post on social media. We gotta be careful about any kind of crime we commit. Cause for black men, it’s looked down on more than any other race I think.
I have a foundation that I started last year and is pretty much directed towards African American male and female and trying to get them into academic programs, trying to get them into a healthier lifestyle. We have mentors that are doing mentorship. I just want people to understand that they have control over their life most of the times. They can surround themselves with good people. They can make better decisions and I just want people to know that it can be done whatever you want to do, just keep pushing until you get there. There’s so many opportunities in this world now and we can take advantage of those if we don’t put ourselves at a disadvantage.