Gridiron Stoicism

But the play I will always remember was on Dec. 4, 2017. It was a regular season game against division rivals the Cincinnati Bengals, in their house. It happened so fast. And everyone who was watching knew it was bad. After what appeared to be a standard tackle, Ryan Shazier, the Steelers’ third-year linebacker, lay on the ground motionless.

A few hours later, the worst was confirmed. Shazier was paralyzed, and no one knew if he would ever walk again.

I had mixed emotions about reading Shazier’s new memoir, Walking Miracle: How Faith, Positive Thinking, and Passion For Football Brought Me Back From Paralysis…and Helped Me Find Purpose. His story is an inspiration but also a terrible reminder of the fragility of life. Shazier’s book, like his injury, is about much more than football, or even about Shazier himself.

Shazier knew he wanted to play pro football since he was 5 years old. At about the same time he found his love for the game, he was also diagnosed with alopecia areata, a condition that caused most of his hair to fall out. While the teasing from other children was relentless, his mother would not allow him to feel sorry for himself. She told him, “There is nothing wrong with you… you just don’t have hair. Most kids do. That’s it.” It would not be the last time Shazier needed to draw on the resilience his mother instilled in him.

Vernon Shazier was called to be a pastor when Ryan was in middle school. The elder Shazier was already fully involved with his son’s football dream, starting to coach him years earlier. Vernon had a difficult childhood and entered the Navy after high school. Now, he wanted to shape his son’s moral compass and character, challenging him to excel in the moral arena as well. We learn that Shazier immortalized his father’s teachings in a tattoo when he was just a freshman in college: “Faith. Discipline. Integrity.”

That faith is the backbone of the Shazier family, as well as the book. Shazier talks openly about “God’s plans” and how he has learned to realize those may be different from his own. He shares favorite prayers, Bible verses, and mantras that have helped him over the years. He invites the reader into his intimate relationship with God.

He talks about the night of the injury and the call to his father: “Daddy, I can’t feel my legs,” his insistence that he could, however, feel the prayers being said all over the country on his behalf. He takes us through those first shock-inducing days after they carted him out of Paul Brown Stadium and how, when everyone around him was preparing for the worst, he believed he would not only walk again but play football again, too. His spirit would not be broken.

I learned that this injury was tied to an earlier condition that Shazier had been diagnosed with in high school: scoliosis, a sideways curvature of his spine. Weakened by the condition, it couldn’t absorb the impact of the collision.

Shazier welcomes the reader into his personal struggles throughout his three-year rehabilitation and attempt to return to the NFL. His father Vernon created a “First Down” plan to celebrate each sign of progress, from the first day that he was able to wiggle his toe to the day he took 28 steps at the NFL Draft just months after his life-altering injury to announce the Steelers’ No. 1 pick for the organization.

“What does inspiration mean?” Shazier asked his father during one of his darkest days in recovery. He had been hearing for over a year how much he had inspired others and yet found himself most inspired by those he met at the hospital. His father explained that inspiration was contagious and that through Shazier, those inspiring him were connected to those he inspired. These moments of doubt are glimpses into the humanity of professional athletes, especially football players, who loom like gladiators or demigods among men. They’re also an important and honest reflection of the reality of these comeback stories, filled with setbacks and crushing doubt.

Thomas Tull, part owner of the Steelers, movie producer, and billionaire businessman, dropped by to visit Ryan in the hospital. He introduced Shazier to Stoicism, putting a name to a worldview he had all but adopted in practice already. Shazier peppers his account with quotes from famous Stoics throughout.

The book is also a love letter to football, his coaches, his teammates, and the fans, and it’s an insightful look into two men that are legends in the sport yet remain a mystery to the public, Urban Meyer and Mike Tomlin, the former having coached Shazier at Ohio State.

Tomlin was on the field with Shazier that night in Cincinnati, and it sounds like he never left, becoming something of a second father figure to Shazier. And that’s where the book really has some extra shine if you’re part of the Steelers Nation. Shazier goes to great lengths to set the Steelers apart from other franchises. He shares some of the recent history of the Rooney family, the team’s longtime majority owners, as though he is talking about his own flesh and blood family. His love for the organization from top to bottom is apparent in every word he writes. As a lifelong member of the Steelers Nation, it validated so many of my own feelings. These guys aren’t just players to me. They’re a part of my family. He is a Steeler for life.

Shazier is focusing on the future, with the Ryan Shazier Fund for Spinal Rehabilitation, an organization created to help those who have suffered a spinal cord injury. Shazier wants more people to have access to the treatments and care that he believes helped him walk again.

In many ways, this memoir is a public thank-you letter to his family, friends, doctors, supporters, and teammates. Shazier’s audience goes beyond football, as does the impact he intends to make.

Mickey White is a lifelong Steelers fan, originally from western Pennsylvania. She now lives in Virginia with her family.