The Harrington Family Foundation

Metro Detroit and Joey Harrington these days have a little too much in common. Jobs are disappearing. People aren't sure about their futures. Everyone seems tense, worried that Delphi and Northwest Airlines and GM's junk-stock status -- or Jeff Garcia -- could spell an end to old dreams and security.

It explains why Harrington's appearance Tuesday at an inspiring place called O.W. Best Middle School in Dearborn Heights was so neatly timed. The Lions quarterback lost his job last week, replaced by Garcia. It was an inordinately public, and humbling, sacking of a Detroit football celebrity.

Dearborn Heights, likewise, is a community dealing with anxiety, mostly attributable to wobbles in an auto industry that keeps middle-class families middle class. The principal at O.W. Best understands the relationship -- and the heartbreak.

"Every week," John Znamierowski said, "another parent comes in. They've lost their job. They're losing their house. They have to ask us if their child can get reduced-charge lunches."

Community economics weren't why Harrington could deal with Tuesday morning's clock-radio greeting.

Although Tuesdays are the NFL's version of Sabbath -- the closest thing to a day off an NFL player knows -- Harrington was revved for a date with a school full of kids.

One of them, a cinematic sixth-grader with shaggy blond hair named Dylan Brown, had won a trip to school in a limousine with Harrington as part of a promotion by retailer J.C. Penney and the NFL designed to boost after-school activities.

"I was in astonishment," Dylan said, wearing -- of course -- a Harrington jersey as he explained how he felt when the sweepstakes entry his mother, Jodie, filled out became one of 54,000 that was selected.

A few minutes later, Brown and Harrington stood in a hallway leading toward a gymnasium filled with teenagers. If Harrington was the star, Brown was his school's hero for having brought a genuine Lions quarterback to O.W. Best.

"My legs are like shivering," Dylan said to Harrington, who now was slipping his personal Lions game jersey over a brown T-shirt.

"I'm nervous right now, too," Harrington said as the two prepared for their grand entrance -- and more cheers than either of them has known, at least recently. "I'm gonna go over my notes right now.

"It's like playing on Sunday."

Znamierowski introduced the two as O.W. Best's gymnasium erupted. Harrington and Brown entered to cheers and to the sight of an archway built with silver-and-blue balloons. Ford Field must have seemed as distant to Harrington as it did to his young buddy.

Questions to Harrington poured in from Brown's classmates in the bleachers. The children were curious -- and unfailingly polite. Many wore jerseys: Harrington and Roy Williams were favorites.

And, no, there wasn't a single smart-aleck with a "Garcia" shirt among the crowd.

Harrington stood at a podium, holding a microphone. The news conference was under way.

"When did you first begin playing football?"

"Were you always a quarterback?"

"Did you play other sports?"

"What's the farthest you've ever thrown a football?"

The children never quite got around to asking about Chicago Bears blitz packages Harrington might be anticipating Sunday at Ford Field. Nor, amazingly, did the Harrington-Garcia issue surface. There were other concerns, teenage topics, of relevance to O.W. Best's students.

"Do you have any unusual hobbies?" asked a girl named Victoria.

Harrington paused.

"Well, it's not an unusual hobby by itself," Harrington responded. "But there are not many athletes who are musicians, as well. I've played piano for 23 years and I love it."

Harrington met later with O.W. Best's football and basketball players, girls and boys. It seemed, again, both parties had their common ground. Best had not won a football game in four years until the Royals won this season. Harrington has lost games -- and his job.

He stayed two hours Tuesday at O.W. Best and enjoyed more than the limo ride to school.

"The kids don't care," Harrington said, speaking of why he enjoyed a day with teenage students who had, say, a different agenda from radio talk-show callers.

"They like the fact you play for the Lions. That the Lions are your team. But they're innocent, open -- sometimes too open. And that's what makes it great."

Harrington conceded Tuesday was an off-day. He could have handled another hour or two of sleep.
"This was a chance to get away -- not get away, because I've still got to go to the facility -- but a refresher," he said. "You get so wrapped up in boos, and in having microphones shoved in your face -- and then you get to see some kids, and they're stoked. They care about you."

Caring was a mutual experience Tuesday.

A school filled with the kinds of kids America aspires to raise celebrated a special visitor. He has had rougher days of late than they realize, or would have detected, by Tuesday's appearance.
But the Lions' newly designated backup quarterback was pretty good. Quarterback rating? The kids at O.W. Best would put it at 100.