PURSUING HIS PASSION: FOOTBALL
As a young boy, Coach Michael Blair’s father shared a few very wise words with him.
“I will support you in anything you do,” his father told him, “as long as it’s not illegal or immoral.”
Coach Blair remembers those words as being “a huge instrument in his life,” because he knew that if he failed, his parents would still love him.
“That gave me the safety net of knowing that I can try anything, and still know that my parents love me,” Blair said.
That “safety net,” has done wonders for Blair thus far.
“Now I have no fear to look at new sights. I have a quote on this wall. It talks about standing on the shore always and looking out into the ocean, but never leaving the shore to see what’s out in the ocean. So you have to be able to want to go out there to explore as opposed to just standing on the shore and dreaming and wondering.”
Having played football all throughout high school and college as a runningback, Blair has always had dreams, but instead of standing on the shore and wondering, he went out and achieved them.
After attending Thornwood High School in South Holland, IL, he received a scholarship to Ball State University where he majored in journalism with an emphasis in graphic design.
From there, Blair earned the opportunity to be in the NFL.
The world of professional athleticism came as no surprise to him, since his father played professional soccer in Jamaica.
“It was a major influence,” Blair admitted. “It was a lot of professionalism from him because he played at a high level, so I tried to emulate that as much as possible even when I was a youngin’.”
The emulation went as far as Blair wanting to pursue soccer like his father, but boys football and soccer seasons were at the time in high school.
“American football and soccer [are] played at the same time here in the U.S., so because of that, I just chose to play football instead… I spent more time with football, so I knew it more. the only way that I played soccer was when I followed [my dad] to his practices when he was coaching, or if I was just kicking the ball around the house,” Blair said. “So I never signed up to an organized team to get those skills brought up to learn the game and to love the game. It was more of kicking the ball around the house, following him to practices, and just playing with grown men as a young kid.”
Blair’s choice to pursue football did him well. He played professionally for 10 years; beginning his rookie year with the Kansas City Chiefs. After that, he experienced playing for the Greenbay Packers, the Cleveland Browns, and even a team in Frankfurt Germany called the Galaxy.
“[Playing football in Germany] is the same,” he said. “The only difference is where it’s played at, and the culture.”
From Germany, Blair signed with the New Orleans Saints, from which he was released. His release brought him to begin his path with arena football and the XFL.
“The owner of WWE started a league up and started XFL, and 95% of those players were former NFL players who still wanted to continue that career and went into that league,” Blair said.
Blair is no longer playing for the NFL, and he admits that “it’s never any players decision not to be in the NFL.”
LIFE AFTER FOOTBALL
Unfortunately, other things got in the way.
“When you get to that level, there’s a large business component. The NFL is a multibillion dollar cooperation,” Blair said. “Players can get hurt and get released. Players from another position get hurt, and so they have to make room to bring in other players, and so there’s a roster count — 53 men — and general managers and owners have to juggle those things around. So there’s a lot of juggling that the general managers and owners have to do to fit into the 53 men roster,”
After being released, Blair had some decisions to make.
“Here it is, something that you’re doing all your life. You excel at it. You’re at the top all the time, and your ability is getting you to this level, but all of the sudden, someone takes it away from you and says ‘Hey, thanks for coming out. We really appreciate everything that you’ve done for us, but we’re not gonna be able to keep you.’ I couldn’t understand that. I couldn’t understand why that happens,” Blair said. “That’s why I said the business side of it is how you get out of the game, because you keep going from team to team, and then what?”
“After a while, you gotta start making a decision because that [professional] life is very small.”
Though an experience like that can be potentially devastating, Blair didn’t allow the initial shock to take over his whole life.
“A number of my friends have had that separation anxiety. A lot of guys don’t know what to do so they turn to drugs, they turn to alcohol, they turn to all these other things that are not good vices to them. If you love sports, I say stay in sports, make the transition easy by going to coach a feeder school, or little leagues, or high school, or try to get into college [coaching], but try to get in the sport where you still get the high or the endorphins you get by being surrounded [by it], because you can still get it by coaching, and you don’t have to worry about getting beat up or bruised up anymore,” he said.
Though it was a difficult time for him, Blair got through it with experience under his belt, support from his family, and a fresh, positive outlook on his future.
“I said, ‘okay, what am I going to do? What am I supposed to do?’ And at that time I’m thinking I can’t do anything else, because all I’ve done my whole life was play football, but the fact that you have done the one thing for so long [turns you] into an expert on that thing. I was talking with my brothers, and they said, ‘okay, why don’t you just start coaching?’ and I said, ‘well that makes sense.'”
And from there, Blair began his coaching career at Thornwood High School. He’s now here at Niles West as the head coach of freshman football and an academic advocate who teaches students executive functioning skills such as organization, time management, and setting goals.
His coaching methods have not only been effective, but have also inspired his players.
Sophomore Dylan Fleites has looked up to Blair since his freshman year as a football player.
“You’ll never find a coach like him. He’s one of the only few still out there that care more about as a a person than who you are as a football player,” Fleites said. “His passion to make everyone around him better is unbelievable, and he’ll go with you step by step, day by day, to get you where you want to be. He’s the man.”
Blair’s method to his coaching and compassion is simple.
“I tell [the kids I coach] the same thing [that my dad told me],” Blair said.
He passes on the same support and care that was shown to him while he was pursuing his passion.
“I had a coach tell me, ‘When you have kids one day, you’ll understand this statement, but until then, treat your kids like they’re your kids.’ So the only relationship that I understand about kids is what my parents taught me,” Blair said.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Blair has not only used the lessons that he’s learned in life on the football field and in the classroom, but he’s also succeeded in and continues to pursue other aspects of life.
He had the opportunity to be in two films: “We Are Marshall” alongside Matthew McConaughey (who Blair claims is “awesome”), as well as “The Game Plan” with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, who Blair also got to know on set.
“In ‘We Are Marshall’ I did have a speaking role, but it didn’t make the cut,” Blair said. “But he majority of my role was an expert at football, so it was all the plays. In every scene out there you can see me running around, and in ‘The Game Plan’ it was the same thing.”
Being in two films was not Blair’s only experience on screen, though. He also was the host for a show not he Travel Channel called “Five Takes Latin America,” a show that tests whether or not you could travel through South America on only 50 dollars a day for food and lodging.
Blair found out that yes, it is possible.
“With ‘Five Takes Latin America,’ I was in eight countries in South America, and we stayed in each country for a week. Every country had its own special thing that it brought to the table and not one stood out more than the other,” Blair said. “We stayed in hostels, and that was fabulous, because that’s when you get to more people who have more experience, and that’s more wisdom that you gain.”
For Blair, one of the perks of hosting the show was being able to use his degree in journalism while traveling the world and experiencing amazing things.
“Every week I had to write a blog and shoot a vlog. So every show we had to write something about our experiences and what we did, and shoot a video log which was cool too,” he said.
“It was a great experience because I got the full gamut of actually writing and the full gamut of producing my own small video.”
PLANS FOR THE FUTURE
With all of his experiences, Blair has seen and done more than some of us accomplish in an entire lifetime, and he plans on passing on those lessons and experiences to anyone who may be interested in acquiring them through going back to his parents’ native land, Jamaica, and teaching American football to to Jamaican kids.
“I feel like at times, there’s criteria that are put on kids, and they kind of get tunnel vision,” Blair said.
He aims to reduce the potential “tunnel vision” that some pressured kids may feel through 90/10 sports, an idea that began formation about four years ago to teach adult learners, parents, and coaches the sport that their child is playing through cerebral thinking.
“At 90/10 sports we answer the why factor for you. We teach you about the end goal and how you’re going to get there.”
The program is for anyone for little to no experience, or even with a lot of experience in a particular sport.
“Wouldn’t it be great to have a program where it’s unbiased, and the parents can learn the game, and they can put the equipment on so they can see and understand what it is? They always say to walk a mile in a man’s shoes and then you’ll know whats going on, well at 90/10 sports we want to put that to truth for you, so you can walk in the kid’s shoes and understand,” Blair said. “So now at the dinner table you and your kid can sit down and have that conversation because you are invested in your child’s passion, and so because of that you can have a discussion at the dinner table. It’s nothing strenuous. We’re not gonna send you out there and tell you you have to run through a brick wall, but go through it, have an understanding, and say, ‘Okay now I understand why his neck is so big, because he’s walking around with a 5 pould helmet on his head!'”
