There are those people that just leave their mark on life. Somehow almost always, they leave soon, some sooner, some a bit later, but soon. Like they live everything they can as fast as they can and then don’t waste more time on earth. Today, November 25th 2020, a Legend left us.
Model Athlete.
Diego Armando Maradona is one of those rare cases in sports and life.
He is by all means the exception to whatever rule you want to think of. Was he a model athlete? C’mon now…
When talking of role model athletes for your son to look up to, he was the last choice, or no choice at all.
An athlete involved in drug scandals, too often being in the headlines for getting in fights with antone imaginable, attacking reporters, not giving a @#%*& about his public image, declining big contracts to go play for relatively unknown teams, being friends with the West’s #1 enemy, Fidel Castro. Smoking like drinking water. Maybe the shortest player out there.
Somehow Diego could never been imagined as the hardest working guy on the team, rather the one that would skip practice because he was drunk somewhere or sleeping.
But…
When he stepped out on that football field, he was poetry. I mean absolute grace with the ball between his legs, the stuff of legends.
That was a gift, the stuff that you are born with, and cannot be taught no matter how hard you train. The ball was a body part for him; that natural it was for him. Yes, you could make a defensive strategy to stop him, but I don’t think that any coach that played against him thought for a minute that his team can stop him.
At best what you could do is try to piss him off and then maybe, just maybe his temperament would stop himself.
Model citizen.
We are talking about a guy that when in Vatican, publicly said: “I’ve been to the Vatican and seen the gold ceilings. And then I hear the Pope saying that the Church was concerned about poor kids. So? Sell the ceilings, mate!”
Hey, we are talking about an Argentinian who is referring to the Pope as “son of (you know what)”.
An idol for the young that is publicly seen with wine and vodka bottles and who knows what else.
Private life? Scandals upon scandals. A Che Guevara and Fidel Castro tattoo?
But…
if my daughter would bring him to the house as her boyfriend, I would be happy. Why? Because he is authentic. He is the real deal.
A Man of his word, an oldschooler. A man with a little boy’s heart. No doubt he was always there for anyone who needed him.
The Shadow.
Maradona was a textbook case. About what happens to a man that cannot control his shadows and addictions and they slowly start eating him away.
Again, we don’t know if he couldn’t control them or he didn’t want to, that is only for him to answer.
He had all kinds of health problems caused by his lifestyle. Some battles he fought and won, others he lost. The sure thing and that is why everybody love him, is that he lived by his own heart, with his rules, with his pace. For sure he knew what he was doing, he just didn’t care enough, he found his meaning in living exactly that way. His way of life didn’t impact negativeley anyone else but himself, he was like a hero from an ancient greek tragedy, and we must accept that was his choice,
I do picture him right now with that huge cigar in the mouth, a glass of wine, and the stereo playing “My Way”… He is smiling. He knows that is his way. The only way.
One is not sad about his death, although I confess a tear came in my eyes.
But then I thought about it better; we must celebrate his life! We must be happy that he lived the way he wanted, under his own rules`and by doing that he gave joy to millions, along with a goal to follow: to try and be like him.
He sucked everything there was to suck from life and that is enough. By doing it, he became a legend, a God as they say, and left a solid legacy behind him.
And while this seems a not politically correct legacy, nobody actually cares about Maradona outside the football field because it is exactly as the in-field legacy: too hard to follow.
It was made by him, for him and himself only and only he can answer how many lives did he actually live during this short one here on earth.
So, Diego we thank you from the depths of our heart for showing us your way and for making us fall in love with passion in sports, for showing us there is Man in what seems a boring routine. For presenting us your art, because ultimately, you were an artist of the highest rank.
Adios Maestro!
