OurTupelo

Jim Biever, AP

Chicago Bears Hall of Fame running back Walter Payton (34) runs upfield during an NFL game against the Washington Redskins in Chicago, on Sept. 29, 1985.

Our task today? We’re going to put together Team Mississippi, an All-Time, All-Pro football team of native Mississippians. We are going kick rear ends and take names. We’ll mess with Texas and anyone else who wants to try us.

Rick Cleveland

Before we get started, I’ll emphasize: These will be native Mississippians and will not include imports from other states who played college ball here. That leaves out Pro Football Hall of Famers such as Gene Hickerson and Ray Guy, not to mention future Hall of Famer Patrick Willis. Today’s team will be Mississippi born and bred.

We’ll start with the offense. And why don’t we start at quarterback where we’ll go with Brett Favre (Kiln), a three-time league MVP who retired as the NFL’s all-time leading passer and now ranks fourth. Not bad for starters. We’ve got Steve McNair (Mount Olive), Charlie Conerly (Clarksdale) and Archie Manning (Drew) if Favre needs a break, which, famously, he never did. He started 321 consecutive games, a pro football record.

With arms like that we’ll need lots of wide receivers. Not to worry. We’ll split Jerry Rice (Crawford), the NFL’s all-time leading receiver and scorer wide to the left. We’ll flank seven-time Pro Bowler and Hall of Famer Lance Alworth (Brookhaven), Bambi himself, wide to the right. In the slot? Take your pick: Harold Jackson (Hattiesburg), Eric Moulds (Lucedale), Willie Richardson (Greenville), Ray Perkins (Petal) and we could go on and on. This is fun, no?

When we run, we’ll give it to Sweetness, Walter Payton, No. 34 on his uniform, No. 2 on the all-time pro football rushing list. He’s only the best football player these eyes have ever seen. The quarterbacks will appreciate his blitz blocking, too. Ready in reserve will be Wilbert Montgomery (Greenville) and Deuce McAllister (Ludlow).

Jimmie Giles (Greenville), the first offensive player chosen for Tampa Bay’s Ring of Honor, is one tight end and Wesley Walls (Pontotoc), Carolina Panthers Wall of Honor, is the other. Between them, they caught 95 touchdowns. Both ought to be in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Buffalo Bills

Kent Hull was “the heartbeat” of the Buffalo Bills.

The old saying is that it’s what’s up front that counts. Kent Hull, a Buffalo Bills Wall of Famer and three-time Pro Bowler from Greenwood will snap it, flanked on either side by Pro Football Hall of Fame guard Billy Shaw (Vicksburg) and Gabe Jackson (Liberty). For offensive tackles, we’ll trot out maybe the best ever Jackie Slater (Jackson) on the left side and Walt Suggs (Hattiesburg) on the right. Tom Goode (West Point), who famously snapped for Jim O’Brien’s winning field goal in Super Bowl V, will handle long snapping.

And now for the defense. We’ll be nasty on this side of the ball with L.C. Greenwood (Canton) at one end and Ben McGee (Durant) on the other. Both were Steelers and both were splendid. At defensive tackle, we’ll go with the great Bruiser Kinard (Pelahatchie), another Pro Football Hall of Famer and Fletcher Cox (Yazoo City), presently one of the best in the business and surely a future Hall of Famer. Have you noticed how many small-town guys make this team? Amazing.

New York Jets

Ole Miss great Larry Grantham is part of the New York Jets Ring of Honor.

We’ve got linebackers galore. The only problem is deciding whom to start. Hugh Green (Natchez) gets one nod. Run away from him, and you’ll find Larry Grantham (Crystal Springs) on the other side. In the middle, I’m going with tackling machine Johnie Cooks (Leland). And then there are present day stars K.J. Wright (Olive Branch) and Jamie Collins (McCall Creek), both All-Pros.

youtube.com

With NFL Films camera zooming in, Willie Brown rambled into NFL history in the 1977 Super Bowl.

No state, anywhere or any size, can match us at cornerback. Yazoo City’s Willie Brown and Gulfport’s Lem Barney are two more Pro Football Hall of Famers. If they aren’t the best two ever to play the position, they are in the first sentence of any conversation about it.

For safeties, we’ll go with Jimmy Patton (Greenville), a five-time Pro Bowler for the New York Giants and Jim Marsalis (Pascagoula).

On special teams, Stephen “Beaver” Gostkowski (Madison) ranks as one of the most accurate placekickers in pro football history and is money when the game is on the line. Most will assume that Ray Guy, who kicked at USM and lives in Purvis, is the punter. He would be except that USM recruited him out of Thomson, Georgia. Jerrell Wilson? Born in New Orleans. Not to worry, Chunkin’ Charlie Conerly could punt it just fine. So could Sweetness Payton for that matter. So could Julian Fagan of Laurel and Jim Miller, the barefoot wonder from Ripley.

But keep in mind, with our offense, who really needs a punter?

The post This Mississippi All-Time, All-Pro team will mess with Texas or any state, for that matter appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Eric J. Shelton/Mississippi Today

Mike Espy, center, attends the Black Lives Matter protest in downtown Jackson, Miss., Saturday, June 6, 2020.

Jarrius Adams, a 22-year-old Mississippi activist, looked over the crowd of at least 3,000 people gathered in downtown Jackson on Saturday for a Black Lives Matter protest and grabbed the microphone.

Adams welcomed the politicians who were in attendance but quickly requested that if they were approached by the media, they should refer questions to the young people — all in their late teens and 20s — who organized the massive event.

“We, our truth and voices must be the focus of this narrative we are crafting,” Adams said.

Standing about 15 feet from the stage was Mike Espy, the 66-year-old Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate election this November. When Adams made the request, Espy looked over at a reporter and appeared to smile behind his mask and shrugged his shoulders as if to say he was there for the protest, not the media.

When Espy announced last year that he would again challenge Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith after losing to her by eight points in a 2018 special election, he said to be successful this year he had to attract more young voters to the polls.

Espy must have viewed Saturday as a step in achieving that goal. Espy’s strategy, he has said, is not only meeting and engaging young voters on the issues of today, but tying his history to their goals.

On Saturday, many protesters wore Black Lives Matters t-shirts and other attire highlighting the current issue of the police brutality that many contend is unfairly affecting the African American community.

Espy, who donated drinks and protective gear to the protest organizers, wore a blue T-shirt proclaiming “Black votes count.” It was a shirt from his historic 1986 campaign when Espy, a Yazoo City native, became the first African American elected to the U.S. House from Mississippi since the 1800s.

Before his Senate race in 2018, Espy had not been on the ballot in Mississippi since 1992. He served as secretary of agriculture during a portion of Bill Clinton’s first term as president. Other than that, Espy had been practicing law primarily in the Jackson area before he jumped back into politics in 2018.

“The millennials did not know me (in the 2018 election.) It was clear,” Espy said when he announced he would challenged Hyde-Smith again.

While Espy might not have literally spoken to that younger generation on Saturday, he said he hopes he figuratively did as he marched in the protest from the Governor’s Mansion to the state Capitol and back.

“Our young people led this protest with love, energy and a momentum for change that makes me hopeful for the future of our state and our country,” Espy said.

While no politician spoke at the event, Adams and other organizers did urge attendees to vote. The November election was a focus of the event, and several organizers walked among protesters with voter registration forms.

“We must vote in November, or none of this means anything,” Adams said, inspiring seeming nods of approval from Espy, his wife Portia, and others standing near them.

Espy invited Hyde-Smith to join him at the protest. The incumbent senator did not respond, though she has commented on the event that spurred the protests – the death of George Floyd, a black man who was killed by a white police officer who pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for almost nine minutes in broad daylight on a Minneapolis street.

“The civil unrest following the tragic and senseless killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis adds to our nation’s burdens in these unsettling times,” Hyde-Smith said in an earlier statement. “Americans are right to voice their objection to police brutality and lawless violence. The anarchy and rioting occurring around the country only overshadows and diminishes the peaceful protests and ongoing national struggle for equal justice and equal protection of the law.”

She continued: “The past few months have not been easy for our nation and the road ahead remains long. I know we will keep the faith and do what needs doing to stay safe, rebuild the economy, and overcome the challenges ahead of us.”

After Hyde-Smith did not attend the protest on Saturday, Espy criticized her in a tweet.

“(Hyde-Smith) said nothing of the protests,” Espy wrote. “Her silence shows Mississippi that she stands by her past comments supporting public hangings, voter suppression, and old symbols of hate.”

Espy was referring to Hyde-Smith’s 2018 comments, which caused nationwide controversy, in which she was only using a figure of speech when she said she had so much respect for a political supporter that she would be on “the front row of a public hanging” if he invited her.

On the 2018 campaign trail, Hyde-Smith also suggested that it might be a “great idea” to make it harder for some people to vote. Her campaign said both comments were made in jest, but national headlines garnered Espy hundreds of thousands in contributions, and several national corporations asked Hyde-Smith to return their previous campaign contributions.

Espy must not only garner the traditional Democratic voters as he did for the most part in 2018 and attract new young voters, both minority and white, but he also must do better with more traditional white voters. He estimated he received about 18 percent of their support in 2018.

On Saturday, Espy during a short interview said he was at the rally because of the “disproportionate” amount of violence directed at minorities by some law enforcement officers.

Asked if he had ever experienced such violence, Espy said no, though he said that he has been stopped by law enforcement for what appeared to be no good reason.

At one point, Espy whispered to his son Mike. He was asking him if it was OK to tell the story of when Espy Jr. was arrested for using profanity in a 24 hour gym at a time when only Espy, his friend and two others, one an off duty police officer, were in the gym.

Espy Jr., a former football standout at the University of Mississippi who played in the National Football League, was encouraging his friend to lift more weights at the time he used the profanity.

“He spent the night in the Ridgeland city jail,” Espy said in what appeared to be a lingering dismay about the incident that occurred around 2012. “As a dad to two young black men, it was important to me that I march alongside my sons.”

The post As young people pack Mississippi streets to protest, is this Senate candidate Mike Espy’s moment? appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Hurricane season throws out the first pitch eight days into the season. Tropical Storm Cristobal comes ashore, causing coastal flooding and some inland wind damage.

The post Marshall Ramsey: Cristobal Comes and Goes appeared first on Mississippi Today.

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The post A tour of Mississippi: Medgar Evers’ home appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Eric J. Shelton/Mississippi Today

House speaker Philip Gunn, from left, and Gov. Tate Reeves listen as Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann speaks at the start of Gov. Tate Reeves’ COVID-19 press conference at the State of Mississippi Woolfolk Building in Jackson, Miss., Thursday, May 7, 2020.

Gov. Tate Reeves and his staff had to feel good last week when the Senate leadership was unable to get the two-thirds super majority needed to pass a House resolution that would allow the Mississippi Legislature to remain in session for the rest of the year.

The resolution could be viewed as a direct affront to Reeves since it would strip away one of the governor’s most coveted powers – the sole authority to call legislators back in a special session once they adjourn the regular session for the year.

But if the Legislature never adjourns the regular session, then the chambers’ two presiding officers – Speaker Philip Gunn in the House and Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann in the Senate – could call lawmakers back into session. Gunn and Hosemann already have blocked Reeves’ effort to have sole spending authority of $1.25 billion in federal funds designed to help the state pay for the costs of fighting COVID-19.

Bobby Harrison

It should be no surprise that Reeves, not wanting another legislative defeat, was in the Senate expressing his opposition to the resolution a day after it passed the House with no dissenting votes.

That visit, no doubt, played a part in Hosemann not having the votes to pass the resolution and could be seen as a big win for Reeves – at least for now.

But the fact that Hosemann cannot pass the resolution now does not mean he won’t be able to pass it before the session ends. The Legislature is scheduled to be in session until July 12.

Reeves, who served eight years as lieutenant governor, presiding over the Senate, knows that the legislative leadership has at least one tremendous advantage when it comes to passing or killing legislation. The leadership – Hosemann – has the ability to call up the legislation when he wants – when he thinks or knows he has the votes to pass it.

In addition, the House leaders are placing a tremendous amount of pressure on the Senate to pass the resolution.

Both House and Senate leaders say the ability to stay in session is needed to deal with coronavirus-related issues. Hosemann said he wants the Legislature to be able to return to spend funds, if for instance, the federal government provides money to help state and local governments offset revenue shortfalls caused by the COVID 19-induced economic shortfall.

“That (COVID-19 and budget issues) are the only reasons I would want to come back,” Hosemann said.

Some senators, though, said they want to finish their job and return to the private sector. They already are in the Capitol dealing with budget issues longer than planned. The session was scheduled to end in early May but legislators took a recess because of the coronavirus, putting them in session in the heat of the Mississippi summer.

““I think it is premature to extend the session for the remainder of the year,” Sen. Chris Johnson, R-Hattiesburg, said recently. “If we do our job now, it seems likely that we will not need to come back. The governor can always call a special session if the need arises.”

But perhaps there could be a disagreement between the legislative leadership and governor about when and if the Legislature should be in session. There already have been more disagreements between legislative leaders and the governor in the first year of the four year term than many anticipated considering all involved belong to the same Republican Party.

Even though the Constitution gives the Legislature the authority to remain in session with a two-thirds vote of both chambers, the power apparently has never been used to keep the Legislature in session for a year.

But legislative leaders on both the House and Senate side say while they would technically be in session they would not be in Jackson except under the rarest of circumstances to deal with COVID-19 issues.

Hosemann said the authority is needed because “we are in the most unprecedented time in this state since the Civil War.”

For whatever it is worth, it would cost the state less money, assuming legislators only come back to deal with those coronvavirus-related issues, to stay in regular session than to come back in special session. The Legislature receives a $10,000 base salary for the regular session. If the resolution passed, and legislators returned to Jackson in say September or October to deal with the budget, they would not receive any additional funds. If they are in a special session called by the governor, they receive an additional $75 per day. So it would cost the state an extra $13,050 per day for a special session.

Whether in special session or regular session, they receive expense payments for food and lodging, based on the federal rate, which is currently $151 per day.

The post Reeves holds off legislators’ push for year-round session – for now appeared first on Mississippi Today.