A Brief Glimpse of the Randy Moss We Don't Know

We judge people on moments. Sometimes less. Snippets. A tweet. In sports, full conclusions come from three packaged seconds on SportsCenter or maybe one comment. That's how we got to know Randy Moss.

Superstar, self-absorbed, cocky, mooner-of-crowds, disrupter of team chemistry.

We got to know him so well. We got to know everything we needed to know.   

But then two weeks ago, he did something that didn't compute with the conclusions already formed. You might have seen the story: He fulfilled a promise from years ago, showing up at a girl's high school graduation in Pelican Rapids, Minnesota, to give her her diploma. It turned out he had befriended her when she was two years old and yelling out his name. He noticed. And he stuck by her for 17 years, through her serious health issues and the family tragedy when her dad died.

So what does this tell us?

Was Moss really just a great guy all along? Well, he's probably a great guy in some ways. Probably not in others. We judge way too much human complexity from the things we learn in slivers.

"Without a doubt, he loves kids," said Tyrone Carter, Moss' best friend and a former Minnesota Vikings teammate. "He has the heart of a lion. Everybody always thought he was an A-hole or something.

"But he loves kids and would give the shirt off his back for them. He doesn't want them to make the same mistakes we made. He's really a humble kid."

I'm sorry, but I must have just blacked out for a minute. Randy Moss is "a humble kid"?

Moss doesn't talk about this stuff, though Carter said he was thrilled when Moss finally did for an ESPN 30 for 30 documentary.

That was an aberration. Moss didn't open up about going to Pelican Rapids. And the girl, Kassi Spier, and her family declined to talk for this story.

The other thing Moss didn't talk about was what he did the rest of that weekend. The graduation was on a Friday, and on Saturday and Sunday, he went for a wild party, and...

No, he didn't. But maybe that's what you expected me to say? Instead, Moss got in a rental car in Pelican Rapids and drove 255 miles to Redwing, Minnesota, to see Carter and then sit for an autograph-signing session that raised money for Carter's youth football camp, TC Elite Training. Carter used the money to provide scholarships to kids, some of whom couldn't afford the camp without it.

After that, Moss worked with the kids on the field throughout the weekend. He wasn't paid for the autographs or his time, Carter said. No cameras set up for PR shoots, either.

"He's actually really, really wise," said DeAnte Bronson, a high school sophomore receiver Moss worked with that weekend. "A lot of people think he's cocky or knows it all. But he's focused on making you better and doesn't talk about himself at all.

"He's not at all like I expected. He was really focused on us. He was trying to instill responsibility in us, too. He'd try to get us to take a leadership role."

How did he do that?

Tony Avelar/Associated Press

"He pulled me aside a couple times and talked about being a leader and leading the younger guys and making sure they do things right. Some of the younger guys were a little afraid of going one-on-one against older guys. Like freshmen going against seniors. He wanted me to get more involved with them."

Bronson said Moss was also demanding precision among the receivers, insisting that they not step inches out of their planned routes.

I must have just blacked out again. Moss talked about leadership and not stepping out of line, even by inches?

"He was coaching us, and it was extremely exciting," said Brock Annexstad, a receiver who is finishing his sophomore year at Mankato West High School. "As a receiver, he's the guy you want to be. He seemed really genuine and wanted to help out. He talked about all sorts of details of the game: how to read coverages, run routes better and how to fool a defensive back.

"It was details of the game I don't usually get. We had a film study, and he kept talking about different coverages. He talked about how to move the defensive back, juke at him, make him move out of the way and create space. He said the most important thing for a receiver is geometry."

Turns out, there is a side to Moss that we don't know. We don't know it because he doesn't typically let many people in, Carter said.

But that also doesn't mean the side we do know is wrong.

It just means there's more to the whole man than snippets and highlights.

"You've got to put yourself in that person's shoes and realize and understand how he's able to do what he's doing," Carter said. "At a young age, he was accused of doing something he didn't do and was put behind bars. That's tough, man. It continues to have an effect on your life.

"He trusted people who hurt him, and it took time for him to trust people again. And I grew up in the same kind of setting he did, so I can relate a lot."

This isn't about excusing Moss for his past or even judging whether he did or didn't do the things that built his reputation—and there have been plenty of things. It's also not about making up for those things or giving second chances.

Morry Gash/Associated Press

But what we need to remember as we consume this information—some of it positive, some negative—about players is that there are complexities to stories. We're not getting the whole picture.

Moss is not a cliche or a cartoon character. He grew up in Rand, West Virginia, in a hardscrabble town with serious racial divides. Carter said Moss didn't have much family surrounding him. And that, Carter said, leads to why Moss might have stayed close to Spier, the girl who just graduated from high school, and why he might help out with Carter's camps.

"We touch these kids in the right way," Carter said. His camps, he said, include some kids who need scholarship money and some who do not. "Keep them off the streets, let them hear what it took for us to make it. That's what the whole thing is all about. It's about the decisions they make to work toward their goals and dreams. Their dreams can become reality, and we're living proof."

Greg Couch covers football for Bleacher Report.