On Monday, as the media machine swirled around Tiger Woods, New York Yankee baseball star Derek Jeter was quietly tapped by Sports Illustrated as their sportsman of the year.
Some years ago, I attended a conference in New Orleans for families involved in philanthropy, and met a cherubic-faced woman whose name badge read "Turn 2 Foundation." I asked how her foundation got that name, which is shorthand for a baseball double play, mentioning that my young son was named after Satchel Paige. She quietly said that her son plays baseball, and handed me a baseball card of her boy... Derek Jeter.
"Okay, your son REALLY plays baseball," I said, seeing the resemblance in Dorothy Jeter's face. I flipped the card over expecting to see baseball statistics. Instead, I read the story of how Derek Jeter idolized former Yankee star Dave Winfield, who had set up a foundation to help kids. Ten-year-old Derek thought that was cool, and vowed to create his own foundation if he ever made it to the major leagues.
Since establishing the Turn 2 Foundation during his rookie season in 1996, Jeter has donated more than $10 million in grants for programs that motivate kids to turn away from drugs and alcohol and rewards those who show high academic achievement.
In announcing the magazine honor, Sports Illustrated Group Editor Terry McDonell said, "Derek Jeter has always presented himself with class; he does numerous good works for the community with his Turn 2 Foundation, which is one of the most efficient, effective foundations of its kind; and he's extremely generous with not just his money but with his time, which in many cases is more valuable."
Like many dads parenting in this age of sports scandal, I have talked with my kids about their often sullied sports heroes. When my son Satchel was 10, I sat in his room and gazed at the posters pinned up on his walls. Above his bed, Barry Bonds swung his powerful forearms to launch another juice-powered moon shot. Jason Giambi, the Oakland homerun star, smiled across the room, another soon-to-be-discovered poster boy of baseball's steroid era.
When I was a kid in the early 1970s, my walls were also surrounded by baseball gods like Hank Aaron, Brooks Robinson, and Roberto Clemente. However, the most shocking sports headline of that age appeared on New Year's Day in 1973, after the great Puerto Rican right-fielder Clemente was killed in a small airplane that he chartered to deliver relief supplies to earthquake victims in Nicaragua. It was my first time I really thought about death, but it was also a wake-up call that there were things in life more important than baseball.
In October, Jeter won the Roberto Clemente Award as the most generous and giving person off the field (a short time before leading the Yankees to another World Series championship).
There are many other gifted athletes who care and do genuine good deeds off the field. For example, basketball star Tracy McGrady traveled to Darfur and is helping American school kids support Darfuri refugee camps. Philanthropy is core to the life of college quarterback star Tim Tebow, who has helped to start orphanages in the Philippines where he was born.
Star athletes can never be perfect role models who avoid very human failings. This was no less true 40 years ago, as I discovered when I read Jim Bouton's bawdy baseball classic "Ball Four".
Rather than dwelling on the off-the-field shortcomings of our athletic heroes fed by the "build them up, tear them down" media culture, perhaps we should celebrate those stars who can inspire our children to also give of themselves to others. During this Giving Season, let's honor those who serve as engaged public citizens, rather than obsess over imperfect private lives.