Dockett’s foibles don’t diminish his passion, loyalty and ability to overcome odds
Jul 25, 2016, 6:25 PM | Updated: Jul 26, 2016, 11:32 am
(AP Photo/Matt York)
TEMPE, Ariz. — Darnell Dockett’s backstory is a tragedy that would have defeated most of us.
By now you’ve probably read the grim details of a 13-year-old Dockett coming home on Fourth of July weekend to find his mom, Cheryl Hambrick, murdered, execution style, with blood splattered all over the walls and furniture.
Four months later, Dockett’s father died of pancreatic cancer and his uncle, Kevin Dockett, took him in to save him from a criminal life Dockett freely admits he would have embraced.
“Most people in those situations don’t make it,” he said. “They aren’t supposed to make it.”
Instead, Dockett sat at the podium on Monday at Cardinals headquarters, signing a one-day contract to retire with the only team for which he ever played an NFL game — the one with which he became a defensive force and a Valley icon.
It would be easy to point out all of Dockett’s foibles over the years, like the pet alligator and pet tiger that may or may not have existed; or the time he may or may not have spit in teammate Kerry Rhodes’ face; or the time he streamed himself live in the shower; or his bizarre social media near-stalking of Katherine Webb that was without question over the line.
“There’s heroes, there’s villains and then there’s Dockett,” former teammate Adrian Wilson told him. “You were a great mix of the two.”
In spite of his sometimes-inappropriate behavior, it was hard not to feel a tinge of admiration for the 11-year Cardinal. Dockett’s actions and words weren’t always well planned, but his backstory is a big qualifier in anything that comes afterward, and there was no questioning his passion for the game, his motor on the field or his loyalty to his team and community.
“All I ever wanted to do is make everyone in Arizona happy,” he said.
Dockett will probably be inducted into the Cardinals Ring of Honor one day, and whatever bad blood existed after the team released him 17 months ago was hidden from view when team president Michael Bidwill told Dockett Monday, with coach Bruce Arians sitting beside him, that “this will always be home.”
Dockett was charming on Monday. He drew laughter when he chided Arians for stealing his only shot at a Super Bowl ring by calling great plays for the Steelers. He was appreciative of the Cardinals gesture, and he thanked the former teammates like Wilson, Antrel Rolle, Antonio Smith, Bertrand Berry, Josh Scobee and Frostee Rucker who showed up for his special day.
As you listened to Dockett spin those mesmerizing yarns that are a large measure of his stark reality, sprinkled with some fiction, you remembered why every interview session he held was a must-attend event, and why lockerroom sessions without him are less interesting.
“All your interviews, everything will be boring from here on out,” he told a small gathering of reporters after the press conference had ended. “I’m not a duplicate of someone else. When I walk away and somebody says, ‘That’s Darnell Dockett, tell me about Darnell Dockett,’ [it will be], ‘Oh man, sit down I’ve got some stories to tell.’
“It won’t be ‘well, he was a good guy. He did everything he was supposed to do.’ Nah, that’s not how I wanted to live my life, and in my next 20 years, it’s going to be the same thing, it’s just going to be more exciting because I don’t have rules.
“Those people that walk the thin lines in life can easily fall off, but I took a thin line for 10 years. I said what I wanted to say, I did what I wanted to do, I voiced my opinion. I was never going to be tamed to the NFL ways; the way they want you to do things, the way they want you to dress, the way they want you to talk…
“I beat the odds in a lot of ways.”