Thanks to Hollywood, we are familiar with the stories of numerous athletes who have overcome tremendous odds to succeed. The Blind Side, Rudy, Remember the Titans, The Rookie, and even A League of Their Own were all blockbusters that told the stories of amazing athletes. Of course, for every story that has been brought to the big screen, there’s another that has yet to be told. Here are five lesser known players that deserve movie biopics of their own.
Billy Miske
It doesn’t get much more heartbreaking than this. Billy, a 6’0” heavyweight boxer was told in 1918 that he had five years to live due to his deteriorating kidneys. However, Billy was more than $100,00 (in 1918!!) in debt and couldn’t stop fighting. Instead, he fought another 30 fights. By 1923, he realized there was no way he could continue to fight, but he also knew that he wanted his children to have presents on his last Christmas. Fighting was the only way to get the money to make this happen. On November 7, 1923, he went up against Bill “KO” Brennan. In the fourth round, Billy knocked Bill out. There was no fix. When Billy died on January 1, 1924, he had a record of 74 wins (30 by KO) and 13 losses. He was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame 87 years after his death, in 2010.
George Eyser
Olympic gymnasts have to be incredibly flexible, which has to be pretty difficult with a wooden leg. However, George Eyser didn’t let this stop him from becoming an Olympic gymnast. George lost almost all of his left leg after it was run over by a train. (How this happened is impossible to find.) Instead of feeling sorry for himself, he got a wooden prosthesis and started training for the Olympic Games. In 1904, he won 6 metals in a single day. They included 3 golds for the long horse vault, parallel bars, and 25-foot rope climbing, two silver (4-event all-around and pommel horse), and one bronze (horizontal bars).
Jim MacLaren
Jim was also left with a prosthesis after having his left leg amputated below the knee following a motorcycle accident in 1985. (He actually died during the accident, but paramedics were able to defibrillate him.) Prior to the accident, he was a college athlete, something he picked back up after his recovery. Instead of football, he began to train as a triathlete. Before long, he was a record-breaking marathon runner and Ironman triathlete. Tragedy struck again when he was hit by a van while taking part in the bike portion of the 1993 Orange County Triathlon. Left a quadriplegic, he reinvented himself as a motivational speaker and was awarded the Arthur Ashe Courage Award in 2005.
Alice Marble
A member of the International Tennis Hall of Fame, Alice won 18 Grand Slam championships (5 in singles, six in women’s doubles, and seven in mixed doubles). However, her world was shattered when her husband, a pilot, was killed in World War II. She also miscarried what would have been their only child. Instead of feeling sorry for herself, she agreed to become a spy for U.S. intelligence. While little has been released about her operation, it is known that she was responsible for obtaining Nazi financial data. She was later shot in the back by a double agent and the data she had stolen was destroyed. Not only did Alice survive, but thanks to a photographic memory, she was able to recall most the information that had been lost.
Herschel Walker
Herschel is considered one of the most powerful running backs in college football and the NFL. In 1982, he was awarded the Heisman Trophy, along with a long list of other awards. In 1992, the versatile athlete competed in Winter Olympics as a member of the U.S. bobsleigh team, while also competing in mixed martial arts and earning his fifth-degree black belt. What makes his story unique is the fact he was struggling with dissociative identity disorder (DID) the whole time. In his 2009 book, Breaking Free: My Life with Dissociative Identity Disorder, Herschel told the story of life with 12 “alters,” or alternate personalities that would frequently take control, leaving him unaware of what was going on around him.
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