Michael Vick's One Shot at Redemption

Michael Vick begins his road back to the NFL on Wednesday once he is released from federal prison to home confinement. Vick is set to begin working out with a trainer upon his release to begin getting back into playing shape.

However, it's going to take a lot more than success on the field for Michael Vick to find his redemption.

Vick is going to be a difficult sell to the fans of whichever team signs him. Eighty percent of employers polled nationwide said they would not hire a convicted felon to work in their company. If NFL teams follow that same convention, Vick has a shot to catch on with six or seven teams.

The team that signs him will have to have the benefit of the doubt with its fans that it makes the right decisions in personnel moves and that Vick can help the team. There are going to be protests and a boatload of hoopla surrounding Vick wherever he goes. His teammates will have to deal with consistent Vick talk and the circus-like atmosphere that is sure to follow. It's a lot to ask of a team.

Michael Vick can turn to a familiar face to help repair his public image. He recently met with former Colts head coach Tony Dungy within the walls of Leavenworth. 

Dungy has spent much of his time working with prison inmates since retiring from coaching. He can provide guidance for Vick in two pivotal areas: dealing with adversity and exhibiting humility in the public spotlight.

Despite the completely different nature of the adversity both have publicly faced, Dungy can still counsel Vick on how to make a positive situation out of the negative one he created. Dungy could have spiraled downward after the suicide of his son James, but he persevered and became a resource for families dealing with similar tragedies.

While Vick's situation is entirely of his own doing, there is still a possibility he can become a positive influence for people. He can be an example of someone who did wrong, indefensible things, but served his time, learned his lesson, and became a better person because of it. Dungy can help guide him in that respect.

Michael Vick will also need consistent reminders of humility. Losing a fortune, making 10 cents a day working in jail, and being confined to a cell for two years would be humbling for anyone, but we're still talking about someone who was a multi-million dollar athlete at one point.

Vick will get out and find that he still has the million-dollar arm and the blazing speed. He believes he can still be a star in the NFL. His ego will return, and he'll need to learn to keep it in check.

Dungy has never been one to put himself before anything. He can provide Vick consistent reminders that it's not always about him.

Vick also needs to be honest with himself and others. It would go a long way if he would partner with the Humane Society or the SPCA and give talks about what he did and why it was wrong. 

Vick needs to put the facts on the table; he was foolish, he was involved in things he shouldn't have been involved in, he continued to let bad people influence him, he made some awful decisions, and animal cruelty is never, under any imaginable circumstance, acceptable.

Michael Vick needs to show genuine remorse for his actions. That's the key issue. He is certainly remorseful that he got caught and sent to jail, but does he think what he did was wrong? If the answer is yes, he needs to make that point abundantly clear.

The odds are certainly against him. Forty-two percent of felons return to prison within three years of their release. Vick showed consistently bad judgment prior to the dog fighting conviction. 

Whether it was the Ron Mexico fiasco, flipping off his home fans, or trying to bring a trick-bottom water bottle, used for transporting marijuana, through security at an airport, Vick's decision making skills have been poor.

Vick has one shot at redemption. His margin of error is small. We should all be rooting for him to succeed.

There was a time when the off-field exploits of athletes were kept quiet and the athletes were just celebrated for their on-field performance. Thanks to our ever expanding information, the curtain has been lifted and the warts of professional athletes are magnified.

Can you imagine if Babe Ruth or Mickey Mantle had to deal with high speed internet, wi-fi, blogs, camera phones, text messaging, and all the other technological advances we've seen in the last two decades alone? How would their legacies be different today if some of their uncouth behavior was publicly documented?

We've seen some very public falls from grace. Whether it's steroids, drug use, or violent crimes, we see egomaniacs and fake contrition. 

Roger Clemens is such an egomaniac that he honestly believes he never did steroids. O.J. Simpson didn't think what he was doing was wrong by robbing someone at gunpoint. Alex Rodriguez gets up in front of the media and lies through his teeth.

It leaves us with an uneasy feeling. We want to root for athletes and care about them, but it's getting harder and harder to root for the name on the back of the jersey instead of the name on the front. We want to believe that the good guys like Warrick Dunn and Tony Dungy are the rule, not the exception.

We've never seen a public fall from grace as dramatic as Michael Vick's. His redemption can be just as dramatic. 

If he follows the steps I outlined above and makes a considerable effort to show remorse for what he's done, most people will forgive him. If people don't forgive him for taking every step imaginable to clean up his image, then it says more about those people than it does Michael Vick.

I don't have a great deal of faith it will happen, given his past transgressions, but I hope Vick will do the right thing. We need someone to make us feel good about professional athletes, and hopefully it will come from an unlikely source. 

Good luck, Michael; here's hoping you can find your redemption.