A strong showing in perseverance at BHS

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Former University of Houston defensive lineman Dominic Miller laid flat on his chest in the Baldwin High School gymnasium last week while one-by-one students of varying size stepped on his back.

Miller lifted each of the five students with relative ease, including the last pushup with two students on his back, to demonstrate two things: he’s very strong, and, more importantly, the bigger the dream you wish to achieve, the harder you have to work.

The feat of strength/metaphor was part of the Winners Inc. assembly on May 15 that featured two former collegiate and National Football League players speaking to the ninth grade class about perseverance and achieving success.

Keith Davis, a former defensive standout at the University of Southern California who signed with the New York Giants in 1988 before blowing out his knee, runs Winners Inc. and speaks professionally at schools and businesses all over the world. Last week marked the fifth consecutive year he spoke to freshmen at BHS.

Both Davis and Miller spoke about their childhoods and the tough environments they were brought up in.

When Davis was 4, his father committed suicide, which led his mother to become an alcoholic. He attended 19 schools by the time he reached 10th grade, and was routinely placed in remedial reading classes.

Once at USC, Davis excelled in the classroom and on the field. When he graduated college, he did so with the highest grade point average on the Trojans football team. “You don’t have to be great to get started,” Davis told the Baldwin students, “but you have to get started to be great.”

Davis recounted a story from his collegiate football days when his team, playing on national television, had a brutal first half and walked into the locker room to a chorus of boos. But his team came together, tweaked its strategy and went on to win the game. “No matter what’s happened in your first half,” he said, “everybody here can have a great second half.”

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