Vacchiano: NFL's brotherhood suffers tragic loss

The phone rang earlier than usual on Monday morning, which should have been the first clue that something was wrong. A few hours earlier, the Washington Redskins had lost a crucial game in Tampa. At that moment, that’s all that was on Redskins defensive coordinator Gregg Williams’ mind.
 
As soon as he answered the phone, though, that changed. Life changed. And the Redskins would never be the same.
 
“Most people came into work today thinking about how to get over a tough loss, a real hard-fought loss down in Tampa,” said Gregg Williams, the Redskins defensive coordinator. “But things like this put things into perspective in a hurry. I haven’t had much sleep. And as a father, as a coach, as anybody, you don’t like getting those very, very early morning calls with news like that.”
 
The news Williams got that morning was that his safety, Sean Taylor, was in a hospital in Miami in serious condition after he had been shot in the leg in an apparent robbery attempt. One day later, the 24-year-old died.
 
“It’s one of those things that happens in your family and your heart breaks,” Redskins coach Joe Gibbs said. “It’s a tragic thing that took place. It kind of takes your breath away.”
 
Taylor’s death took away the breath of the entire league this week, as the NFL paused to honor a member of the brotherhood of players. And that’s exactly what it is to them – a brotherhood. They share a bond that’s impossible to understand unless you’re one of them.
 
All week long they prepare for games as if they are war – life and death struggles that they often put in those unfortunate terms. They focus on inflicting pain on one another. They celebrate hurting their opponents. They play with anger and hate in their souls, moreso than in any other sport.
 
Yet maybe no group of athletes shares the type of respect football players have for one another. Blood enemies on the field, they are blood brothers off of it. The death of Taylor was undeniably felt by them all.
 
“I competed against him and we had our disagreements on the field, but that’s OK,” Giants running back Brandon Jacobs said on the day Taylor was shot. “That’s what you’re supposed to do. Off the field, you just never want to see anything like this happen to anyone.”
 
Make no mistake: Taylor wasn’t a popular player, nor was he a choir boy. He began drawing fines from the NFL before he even started playing -- $25,000 for skipping the league’s mandatory rookie symposium. He had a drunken driving arrest. He once pleaded no contest to waving a gun at someone during a fight. On the field, he was fined at least seven times for a series of violations, including several late hits and an infamous $17,000 fine for spitting at an opponent during a playoff game.
 
But he was still one of them.
 
“From the Sean I know, I see a player and a person who has grown so much,” said London Fletcher, a linebacker who was new to the Redskins this season. “You have heard things about Sean being standoffish, but he hadn’t been like that with me at all.”
 
The details of this horrific incident are still emerging, but the important details are these: Taylor was just 24 years old, with the whole world in his hands and decades in front of him. He leaves a one-year-old daughter, Jackie, behind.
 
“This is the worst imaginable tragedy,” Redskins owner Daniel Snyder said in a statement. “Our thoughts and prayers are with Sean’s family.”
 
“The entire NFL is deeply saddened by the death of Sean Taylor,” added Roger Goodell, the NFL commissioner. “This is a terrible tragedy involving the loss of a young man who leaves behind many people struggling to understand it.”

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