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KLMNO PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL McNabb’s competitive clan keeps him humble mcnabb from D1
Nabb explains. “You get a B in class, you get excited, [but] that’s notgoodenough.YougetanAin a class—‘You don’t have allA’s’.You get out on the basketball court, you win and you hit the game- winning shot—‘Well, you missed five shots.’ You go to a football game, you win — ‘You threw this many incompletions.’ “Just things like that, where
nothing is ever good enough. We don’t settle just to be satisfied,” McNabb says. “That’s the house- hold I come from.” Neitherparentwasshywhenit
came to discipline, and they didn’t mince words when it came to expectations. Sean described their parenting style as “no-non- sense, straight at you with a lot of constructive criticism.” “I guess bothmy wife and I, as
parents, we just wanted the best in our kids,” saysSamMcNabb, 57. “So in the upbringing stages of it, I thinkwejustkindofimparted in them, when you do something, you have to try to do it the best way you can and be the best at it. Even if it didn’t materialize, at least they understood that there was still work to be done and that they just couldn’t be satisfied if something is just good enough.” Now married and with four
kids of his own, McNabb says he has a newfound appreciation for that approach.He still counts his family, including wife, Roxie, among his toughest critics and says he wouldn’t have it any other way. “After a loss, we know when to
approach and when not to,” says Wilma, 55. “We were gonna be the biggest critics hehadthatday, but we’d wait. You wouldn’t just go right into it and make him crazy. We’d wait until he kind of cooled down, showered and ate. And if he brought it up, we were like, ‘Okay, good, now let me tell you what I saw.” “The bottom line is, if you
stunk up the house, you stunk up the house,” his father says.
Making every game Before they were parents of a
Pro Bowler, SamMcNabb was an electrical engineer for a Chicago power company and Wilma was a registered nurse. It allowed the two to give their children a com- fortable childhood, short on ex- travagance but filled with atten- tion. McNabb can’t remember his
parents missing any of his athlet- ic pursuits. “He probably can’t remember us missing because we were there for 99.9 percent of them,” Sam says. Sam, in fact, coached both of
his sons in youth basketball. As the McNabb boys entered high school, Sam and Wilma — called Mama McNabb by many in the NFL but simply “Char” by friends because her middlenameisChar- lotte — were regular fixtures in gyms and stadium bleachers. Wilma credits Sam’s genes for
her children’s athleticism and hers for their intellect. “There’s noproof, but that’swhat she says,” Sam says. Attending their events was es-
sential, ifnoteasy.McNabbcycled throughfivesports inhighschool, including football, basketball and baseball. “I had to tell him, ‘You’re kill-
ing me!’ ” Wilma says. “Between volleyball and track, I would just die. It was like watching paint dry.” Perfect attendance became
more difficult when McNabb en- rolled at Syracuse and played both basketball and football. The McNabb parents would get off work at 5 p.m. on a Friday and catch an Amtrak train to New York. About 11 hours later, they’d reach Syracuse and take a nap before kickoff. Then they’d go back to the station to catch a midnight train before pulling into Chicago late Sunday morn- ing. “There was just no way we
were going to miss anything,” Wilma says. They’ve stayed true to that throughoutMcNabb’s profession- al career. Home and away, his parents and brother, Sean, are always there. Infact, after 11 years in the league, his family has visit- ed all but two NFL stadiums. “As I continue to get older, you
look back on all that and just understand that you see some of these kids nowadays who don’t have mom and dad in the house together, to have that support that they definitely need,” Mc- Nabb says. “Because you need that. You have tough times that you have to battle through, you havenoone to talk to. Ihadtwoin the house that I could talk to, as well as my brother, to make sure
TOP PHOTO JOHN SMIERCIAK FOR THE WASHINGTON POST; BOTTOM FOUR PHOTOS MCNABB FAMILY
“There was just no way we were going to miss anything,” WilmaMcNabb, top with husband Sam, said of her family’s life, which centered on attending sports events for her two sons, Redskins quarterback Donovan and Sean, seen at bottom right with Sam. Juggling the sports schedule wasn’t easy as a teenage Donovan, bottom left, excelled in five sports, including football, top right, at Mount CarmelHigh in Chicago. Donovan eventually signed a letter-of-intent, top left, to play football and basketball at Syracuse, which meant 11-hour family train trips from the Windy City toUpstateNewYork to watch the youngerMcNabb inNCAAaction.
“We’ve always been a close-knit family, where no matter what situation someone is in, we’re all going to rally together and make sure it comes out for the better.”
—Donovan McNabb on his supportive family members
that I’d be able to handle the situation correctly.”
Sibling rivalry Sports dominated the young
McNabb’s daylight hours. At home, his bedroom was wallpa- pered with newspaper clippings and Sports Illustrated covers. Even before high school,McNabb played in organized leagues, on playgrounds and just about any place where his older brother would allow him to tag along. “I always wanted to be that
guy, to lead in anything,” he says. “If it was walking, I wanted to be first. If it was basketball, I’m go- ing to make sure we win this game. If it was football, hey, I’m going to get the troops together; we’re going to get out there and make this thing happen. Whatev- er itmay be, I felt like that wasmy job and I was entitled to do that.”
McNabb’s competitive in-
stincts were also instilled at a young age. By now, after six Pro Bowls and five trips to the NFC title game, everyone in the NFL knows McNabb’s name. Growing up, though, they calledhimsome- thing else. “I was always known as ‘Little
Sean,’ ” McNabb says, “and that bothered me. . . . That’s some- thing that gives you that extra push because you don’t always want to be recognized as ‘Little anybody.’ ” “I always wanted to be better
than my brother. I wanted to make a name formyself.” With a four-year advantage,
Sean McNabb was always bigger, cooler,smarterandmoreathletic. To a young Donovan, his brother wasn’t someone to emulate. He was someone to beat. “It was cool bringing him
around, but as a little brother, he was definitely a pest now and then,” Sean said. When McNabb was 13 or 14,
the two brothers were on the same neighborhood basketball court, playing one-on-one. Sean had never had a problem with his little brother. He’d usually talk trash all the way home, and when they walked in the front door, Mom and Dad would mix in a couple of jabs, too. But on that day, as Sean was
preparing for college, the two took the court andMcNabb final- ly got the better of his big brother. Looking back, McNabb’s grin grows as he recalls that day as “one of the most exciting mo- ments ofmy life.” “That right there felt like I was
on top of the world,” McNabb says. “I remember after I scored the winning basket, I remember
throwing the ball across the court and walking off. Because I don’t want him to go get the ball and now we’ve got to start over. I rememberwinningandjust walk- ing off.”
Class clown In Philadelphia, McNabb’s
smile was often misconstrued. During tense moments of big games, cameras would catch Mc- Nabb with a grin and passionate fans would spend the week light- ing up talk-radio phone lines, complaining that McNabb doesn’t take thegameas seriously as they do. But that’s been his approach to
the sport and a key component of his leadership style since he was given control of his first huddle. That smile can still be seen today in the trophy case at Mt. Carmel High on the South Side of Chica-
go, where his No. 1 jersey and old photographs are preserved be- hind glass. “If I felt the team was kind of
tight, I could always grab Dono- van and say, ‘Hey, look, I need to loosen these guys up.’ And he’d do something silly,” saysFrankLenti, who is entering his 27th year as Mount Carmel’s football coach. “He might throw himself on the ground and breakdance, just something to get the guys loos- ened up. “Andthere were times where if
I felt they were too loose, I’d say, ‘Don, we need to have a serious day today.’ ” Years later, it’s still McNabb’s
strategy. In Philadelphia, he’d stand in front of a meeting room and address the team with his Andy Reid impression. He wouldn’t break character until Reid entered the room and Mc- Nabb would have to scramble back to his seat. “He was a clown at home, too,”
says Wilma McNabb. “I always told him if he didn’t make it in football, he could try to be a comedian. He thought he was funny.” McNabb’s comedic stylings
were the subject of plenty of par- ent-teacher conferences and en- suing punishments. While the classroom wasn’t always the best stage, his sense of humor has beenintegral tohimwinningover locker rooms. “That’s another side of leader-
ship that I think people overlook,” Sam says. “When you can make people around you in a tense and tight situation feel comfortable by being able to present humor or something that will take their mind off the stressfulness — there’s an art to that.” McNabb served asMount Car-
mel’s starting quarterback his ju- nior year.Onthe basketball court, he played alongside Antoine Walker,whowouldspend12 years in the NBA. McNabb said he didn’t settle on football until his junior year of college and told football recruiters that he wanted to continue playing both sports after high school. For some, that wasn’t the biggest concern. Football coaches from schools
such as the University of Illinois came throughMount Carmel and saw in McNabb a defensive back orawidereceiver—notaquarter- back. TheMount Carmel coaches told everyone who visited that McNabb had the tools to play the position and the character to lead a locker room. Syracuse listened, and McNabb started every game of his collegiate career with the Orangemen football team, hon- ing leadership skills developed at Mount Carmel. “He was the kind of kid that
everybody gravitates toward,” says David Lenti, Frank’s brother andMount Carmel’s longtime de- fensive coordinator.“He was such a natural leader. That kind of personality is infectious.”
“Why couldn’t you just be a kicker?”
McNabb left Syracuse as the
best quarterback in school histo- ry. After 11 seasons in Philadel- phia, Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie saysMcNabbis the best that orga- nization has ever had, as well. McNabb now brings his competi- tive streakandleadership skills to a newteam and a newtown. As trade rumors began chas-
ing McNabb through the offsea- son, his family clung to optimism. Even when speculation centered on the Oakland Raiders as a likely destination, WilmaMcNabb tried to wear a smile. “I was like: ‘You know, Holly-
wood isn’t bad. Let’s go to Holly- wood,’ ” she says. “I know it’s not really close [to Oakland], but I try to look at things on the upswing instead of look at it in a negative manner.” Afterwatching her son survive
in the spotlight for so long, she is familiar with negativity. When it becomes too much, she asks her son, “Why couldn’t you just be a [place] kicker?” “Ma,” he’ll tell her. “I don’t
want to be a kicker.” “Yeah, but I wish you were.” Just as McNabb is embracing
his new surroundings, the Mc- Nabb family is adjusting to a new team, burgundy and gold slowly overtaking green and silver in their closets and on their walls. It takes some getting used to.
When Wilma first saw photos of her son practicing in Redskins colors earlier this spring, she called him. “I told him he looks very strange,” she says. “He’s just like a rookie again. I kind of feel bad for him. I said, ‘You’re just starting all over again, huh?’ ” she says.
“He said, ‘It’ll be fine,Ma.’ ”
maeser@washpost.com
SUNDAY, AUGUST ,8 2010
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