Some might ask what exactly does this picture have to do with an English class. Well, on the surface, not much. But, I figure I can rhetorically analyze anything. So, here goes. I came to school at Tennessee for the sports teams. I’m not going to lie. I have been coming to football games in Neyland Stadium since I was a little kid. I’ve been coming to basketball games for seemingly forever. I would have done anything to be talented enough to be a Tennessee Volunteer athlete. The person in this photo felt the same way. This person is Chris Lofton. He graduated two years ago, and he graduated as the all time leading SEC 3 point shooter of all time. This is an impressive feat. After his junior year, he was diagnosed with testicular cancer. He was told he needed to take his redshirt season and come back the following year. He refused to do this. He wanted to play with his fellow seniors one more year no matter what. He would take his chemotherapy and then go practice. He talked about how he would lay in the bed with a garbage can beside the bed and he would vomit continually into it. This picture symbolizes how Chris Lofton beat cancer. He beat this deadly disease and was able to play his senior season. It shows all his hard work paying off. He gave his all for the University of Tennessee. That is something we can all appreciate. Whether we are a sports fanatic or not.
the lofton story is one that will be remembered for decades to come. he sacrficed so much to be a major part of the UT program that he will be a legend in the mind of the up and coming stars soon to be part of the Volunteer family. it is quite an inspiration to the rest of us whol think life is so hard, look at what he went through to achieve his goal. we can all learn and grow a bit just from this one man's story.
ReplyDeleteI have been a life long UT fan and I absolutely love athletics. I actually never knew he had cancer until after his senior season was over. I was wondering why he wasn't as good of a player his senior year as he was his junior year. Lofton is a special person because he could have gone pro and made a whole lot of money his junior year, but he decided to stay at UT for his last year, and since he got cancer, he wasn't drafted to play in the pros. He sacrificed a NBA career for his Volunteer teammates and the University of Tennessee and that was inspirational to me.
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