A soldier's life

Tillman distinguished himself in the Army as much as he did on field

By Mark Beech, SI.com

Cover photograph by Gene Lower/Slingshot Pat Tillman 1976-2004 Smith: Code of honor throughout Tillman's life Reilly: The star who wanted to be a nobody • Dr. Z: A football player who always stood out • King: Readers' ideas on honoring a fallen hero • Beech: Tillman achieved as a soldier and player • Layden: An indescribably rare pro athlete • SI Flashback: Service first | A cut above

It was the wish of former Arizona Cardinals safety Pat Tillman that his friends and family not talk to the press about his service in the U.S. Army. As a result, in all that has been written about him since his battlefield death in Afghanistan last week, there has been very little discussion about what kind of soldier he actually was. Indeed, in researching this article, I was able to unearth just one story that sought comment from anybody who served with him. The observations came from his drill instructor at Fort Benning, Ga., Sgt. 1st Class Craig Mussatti, who guided Tillman through basic training after he enlisted in June 2002. "He was an excellent soldier," Mussatti said of Tillman in an interview with the local Columbus (Ga.) Ledger-Enquirer. "He was motivated. He had great leadership styles. He was definitely dedicated to everything he did -- and he didn't bring up his football career, ever."

The renowned military-affairs writer Drew Middleton once observed that those who see the parallels between war and sports know little about either. And since Middleton was once a sportswriter himself -- before he covered World War II and other global conflicts for The New York Times -- it's safe to assume he'd seen enough of both pursuits to know what he was talking about.

But while the point is well taken, it's not the end of the argument. Certainly, nothing in sports approaches the life-or-death stakes of combat. There are plenty of similarities, however, between military service and participation in sports, especially football. With its emphasis on discipline, organization, planning, repetition and attention to detail, football perhaps better than any team sport mirrors the dynamics of a military unit. Add to that the senses of shared sacrifice and camaraderie that are the result of such a life, and it becomes less and less of a mystery why martial cliches about our "gridiron warriors" have always seemed so appropriate.

You don't have to take my word for it. General Douglas MacArthur -- West Point class of 1903 and a man who knew a thing or two about, as he called it, "the strange, mournful mutter of the battlefield" -- made such comparisons all the time. The general, an enthusiastic booster of the Army team, believed that there was a direct line between the military and football. His statement about this connection is taken as gospel on the Hudson, and is still required knowledge for every plebe at West Point:

UPON THE FIELDS OF FRIENDLY STRIFE
ARE SOWN THE SEEDS THAT
UPON OTHER FIELDS, ON OTHER DAYS
WILL BEAR THE FRUITS OF VICTORY.

I've thought of those lines quite a bit since I first learned of Tillman's death, news that still shakes me a great deal. As a 1991 graduate of West Point, I had the privilege of serving with men and women like him every day for five years. While I was never in combat, I do know a little about how hard it is to do what he was doing. The soldiers of the 75th Ranger Regiment are just about the best collection of leaders in the U.S. Army. Ranger school is a tough, eight-week forced-march of misery and deprivation designed to produce graduates who are both mentally strong and tactically proficient. I never attempted it, and there's a reason only about 25 percent of those attending the school are able to graduate on the first try. By almost any standard then, it would seem that Tillman was not only a fine soldier, but an exemplary one, and I'm sure his experiences in football only helped him.

Another hero of WWII, British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, sent a message to the troops invading Normandy that included an old quatrain from the Earl of Montrose, a 17th century Scottish commander:

He either fears his fate too much,
Or his deserts are small,
Who dare not put it to the touch,
To win or lose it all.

Those words, spoken by a soldier, ring just as true when the are applied to sports. If you think I'm overstating the case, think about the enormous effort it took the undersized Tillman just to reach the NFL. In my opinion, they are a fitting epitaph for him, as a soldier, as a football player and as a man.