Dying young

 Perhaps his gift was just too dazzling. There's a thought for this winter's morn, among many.

There's a thought, because NFL wide receiver Rondale Moore is dead by his own hand at 25, and as always we are compelled to wonder why. He shot himself in the garage of his New Albany home three days ago, and we want answers, because we are human. We crave resolution -- and never mores so than when a fellow human takes his own life with so much of it still spread out before him.

In the meantime, English poet A.E. Houseman enters stage left again, because how could he not? One-hundred thirty years ago he penned "To An Athlete Dying Young", an ode to youth and vitality and the mirror images of triumph and tragedy, and now here is another athlete dying young.

Thus, we think of Housman. And of the twin edges of dazzling gifts. And of what happens, maybe, when fate or circumstance or plain old bad luck shows a young man the mean edge of those gifts.

The key word there being "maybe."

Because, listen, it's all maybes right now with Rondale Moore, all could-be's and here's-a-theory's and perhapses. And so, yes, maybe Rondale Moore's gift was too dazzling. And maybe it had nothing whatever to do with why he picked up that gun the other day.

 Know what's not a maybe, though?

That Moore had a gift. And that, piece by piece, hit by hit, it seemed to be dimming.

The Rondale Moore who came to Purdue University in 2018 was, after all, a blinding talent who lit up football fields all over the Big Ten from the moment he showed up. In his first game as a true freshman -- his first game -- he broke the school record for yards in a single game with 313 against Northwestern. Not only that. but he put up 192 of those yards in the first quarter of that first game.

Hell of an entrance, in other words. And it only got better after that.

 In October, against No. 2 Ohio State, Moore caught 12 balls for 170 yards and two touchdowns as the Purdues delivered a shocking 49-20 upset for then-coach Jeff Brohm. He went on to lead the nation in receiving with 114 catches for 1,258 yards and 12 touchdowns; averaged 10 yards per carry and scored two more touchdowns rushing; and averaged 20.8 yards on 33 kickoff returns.

For all of that, the diminutive Moore (he topped out at just 5-7) was named an All-American and the Big Ten Receiver of the Year. And he won the Paul Hornung Award as the most versatile player in the nation.

That was the best it ever got for him, however.

Across the next two seasons, Moore played just seven games thanks to injury and the COVID-19 pandemic. Arizona took him with the 49th pick in the 2021 NFL draft, and he caught a 77-yard touchdown pass in his second pro game. In three seasons with the Cardinals, he caught 135 passes for 1,201 yards and three touchdowns, and ran for 249 more yards and another score.

And then ...

Ah, yes. And then.

And then, the Cardinals traded him to Atlanta, where he dislocated his right knee in training camp and never played a down. After that came the Minnesota Vikings, where he again never made it to the season, suffering another knee injury while returning a punt in the first exhibition game. For the second year in a row, he spent the season on injured reserve.

Who knows what went through his mind, sitting out one season and then another, two precious years of his career slipping through his fingers? Who knows what goes through anyone's mind when extraordinary athletic gifts are betrayed by an ordinary, too-mortal body?

Maybe it was nothing. Maybe it was everything. I don't know, and neither do you. 

But here is one more thing we do know.

Rondale Moore is dead. At 25. And the athlete dying young has another sad, sad verse.