Jerry Rice

Crawford, Mississippi had 600 people in it, and he was the sixth of eight children. His father Joe laid brick, built houses by hand and worked other jobs on top of it. His mother Eddie B. raised the children and later cleaned houses for wealthy families. The boys worked the scaffold, catching bricks so their father always had one to lay, and Rice said what it taught him was what hard work meant. They picked corn, cotton, carrots and hay. His mother would not let him play football as a freshman because she thought it too rough. In his sophomore year an assistant principal caught him cutting class, and Rice panicked and ran, and the man was impressed enough by the running to call the football coach.

At Mississippi Valley State he and the quarterback Willie Totten ran an offense known as the Satellite Express — 112 catches for 1,845 yards in 1984 alone, 27 touchdown receptions that year for an NCAA record across all divisions, and 301 catches for 4,693 yards over four years. Bill Walsh saw the television highlights and traded up for him, sending San Francisco's first, second and third round picks to New England for the Patriots' first and third and taking Rice 16th. He dropped passes as a rookie. Then in 1986 he led the league in catches, yards and touchdowns at once. He retired with 1,549 receptions, 22,895 receiving yards and 197 receiving touchdowns, all still the record by a wide margin, plus 274 straight games with a catch and three Super Bowl rings.

The Hill is a two-and-a-half-mile climb in a park on the San Francisco peninsula, and he sprinted it every day in the offseason. He tailored his own uniform and combed his hair before the helmet went on. In 20 seasons he missed 17 regular-season games, 14 of them in 1997, when Warren Sapp took his face mask on a reverse in the opener and tore the anterior cruciate and medial collateral ligaments in his left knee. He came back on December 15, scored, and cracked his kneecap doing it. Then in January 2015, while criticizing New England over deflated footballs, he said on air that he had sprayed Stickum on his gloves, banned since 1981, and that everybody did. Cris Carter and Michael Irvin denied it. Later that year he retracted and said he never used it.

San Francisco released him in June 2001 to clear cap room for Terrell Owens. He went to Oakland for three years, lost Super Bowl XXXVII, was traded to Seattle in the middle of 2004, and finished in a Denver preseason for 790,000 dollars, the least he was ever paid, without playing a regular-season down. He retired on September 5, 2005 and later signed a one-day 49ers contract for 1,985,806.49 dollars, a figure built from his draft year, his number, the year and the team. First ballot at Canton in 2010. Runner-up on Dancing with the Stars. In 2016 he told Colin Kaepernick not to disrespect the flag and posted All lives matter, then said Kaepernick was right about the injustice.

Jerry Rice's life against the full span of the corpus — the fading end marks a life still in progress.

• The 1984 Mississippi Valley State season other
  112 catches and 27 touchdowns, an NCAA record across all divisions 1984
• Super Bowl XXIII other
  11 catches for 215 yards and the game's MVP award 1989
• The 1995 season other
  122 catches for 1,848 yards and 15 touchdowns, leading the league in all three 1995
• Rice book
  His first memoir, written with Michael Silver 1996
• Go Long: My Journey Beyond the Game and the Fame book
  Written with Brian Curtis 2007
• America's Game: The NFL at 100 book
  Written with Randy O. Williams for the league's centenary 2019

• October 13, 1962 aged 0 Born at Starkville, Mississippi, the sixth of eight children His father was a brick mason who built houses by hand.
• 1984 aged ~22 Catches 27 touchdown passes at Mississippi Valley State It was an NCAA record across every division.
• 1985 aged ~23 San Francisco trades up to take him 16th overall Bill Walsh had seen him only on television highlights.
• 1986 aged ~24 Leads the NFL in catches, receiving yards and touchdowns 86 receptions, 1,570 yards and 15 scores in his second season.
• January 22, 1989 aged 26 Named MVP of Super Bowl XXIII 11 catches for 215 yards against Cincinnati.
• 1997 aged ~35 Tears two knee ligaments in the season opener He returned on December 15, scored, and cracked his kneecap in the same game.
• June 2001 aged 38 Released by San Francisco and signs with the Oakland Raiders He was 38 and played four more seasons.
• September 5, 2005 aged 42 Retires after 20 seasons He later signed a ceremonial one-day contract with the 49ers.
• August 7, 2010 aged 47 Inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame at Canton First ballot, alongside Emmitt Smith and Dick LeBeau.

• Jim Brown 1936–2023
  Dominant football player who also became a prominent actor and activist for Black economic empowerment. the standard before him
• Vince Lombardi 1913–1970
  Coach whose Green Bay teams, championship record, and leadership mythology became embedded in American sports culture. built the system he came into
• Jackie Robinson 1919–1972
  First African American to play in Major League Baseball in the modern era, breaking the color barrier. opened the league
• Jim Thorpe 1887–1953
  Native American athlete who won Olympic gold medals and excelled in multiple professional sports. earlier record holder across sports
• Fannie Lou Hamer 1917–1977
  Civil rights activist whose testimony at the 1964 Democratic Convention exposed racist voting suppression. from the same Mississippi
• Medgar Evers 1925–1963
  NAACP field secretary whose 1963 assassination galvanized the civil rights movement. from the same Mississippi