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This is the sixth in a series of stories on Outland Trophy winners from 2006 to 2020. From 1946 to 2005, the first 60 Outland Trophy winners were profiled in the book 60 Years of the Outland Trophy by Gene Duffey. In celebration of the Outland Trophy’s 75th Anniversary we are catching up with the last 15 recipients.
By Gene Duffey
It happened when Barrett Jones was only 12. He spent his youth in Germantown, Tenn., a toney suburb of Memphis. His father, Rex, was a successful car dealer.
Rex Jones decided that Barrett, and his other two sons, needed to see life on the other side of the tracks. He wanted them to understand that there were many people in this world who were not as privileged as they were.
In the summer of 2002 Barrett and his family traveled with a group from Bellevue Baptist Church to Honduras.
“We wanted to show them how big the world is and I wanted them to see kids who get up every day trying to find something to eat,” Rex Jones said of his sons. “I wanted them to be givers. That trip really rocked (Barrett’s) world. He realized that the world didn’t circle around him.”
The trip rocked Barrett so much that he decided he wanted to go on another mission. “It was an experience I’ll never forget,” he said. “It opened my eyes to the rest of the world, how fortunate we are in America. It’s something I have a passion for and want to do the rest of life.”
The perfect opportunity arose in 2010 when Haiti suffered a devastating earthquake that killed approximately 300,000 and made another million homeless.
Barrett called his father and told him that he needed to go to Haiti. He passed up a family ski vacation and followed his heart.
Haiti, one of the poorest countries in the world, needed help. It needed people like Barrett Jones. He worked in a refugee camp, mostly with kids whose parents had died in the earthquake. He even played the violin (started at age 3), entertaining the kids with hymns and spiritual songs.
“The attitude of the Haitian people (was remarkable),” he said. “These kids had lost everything. You wanted to just love them. It was very sad. A lot of them were surprisingly upbeat. I remembered thinking what if I had been in that situation, if I would have been as good.”
Jones was nearly thrust into a similar situation the following year. A tornado tore through Tuscaloosa, Ala., on April 27, 2011. Jones, who would win the Outland Trophy eight months later, literally saw the storm blow by him, watching from the balcony of his apartment.
“It's hard to describe something that massive and that powerful,” Jones told Ivan Maisel of ESPN.com. “I think the weirdest thing was knowing, having seen things like that on TV, that people were probably losing their lives.”
The tornado killed 248 people. Six of them were Alabama students. One was a teammate of Jones, offensive lineman Aaron Douglas.
Naturally, Jones helped organize the Alabama football players who took part in the massive cleanup effort.
When Alabama visited the White House in honor of winning the 2011 national championship, President Obama talked about the devastation caused by the tornado. He singled out Jones for lugging “a chainsaw around Tuscaloosa to remove tornado debris from homes and yards.”
Barrett returned to Haiti in the summer of 2011. Instead of bragging about Alabama’s 2009 national championship, he taught the gospel. Hardie Buck, a wide receiver for the Crimson Tide, went on the trip with him.
Jones had caught a taste of how the poor lived in the inner city of Memphis. But it couldn’t prepare him for the poverty that he saw on his two trips to Haiti. “It didn’t compare to what you see in Haiti,” he said. “It’s pretty rough over there. Very impoverished. It made me feel fortunate. Makes you appreciate more what you have.”
Jones had found his passion. He realized the missions were something he wanted to do forever.
During the summer of 2012 he took another trip with the same church group, this time to Nicaragua. Jones would not be just a member of the group. Rex Jones asked him to lead the delegation.
“I want you to organize all of it,” Rex told his son. “He led the whole trip. As a Dad, it was incredible.”
There are always bumps in the road on such ventures. One day the bus didn’t arrive to pick up the group. Barrett asked his father what to do. “You’re on your own,” Rex told him.
(...)
This is the sixth in a series of stories on Outland Trophy winners from 2006 to 2020. From 1946 to 2005, the first 60 Outland Trophy winners were profiled in the book 60 Years of the Outland Trophy by Gene Duffey. In celebration of the Outland Trophy’s 75th Anniversary we are catching up with the last 15 recipients.
By Gene Duffey
It happened when Barrett Jones was only 12. He spent his youth in Germantown, Tenn., a toney suburb of Memphis. His father, Rex, was a successful car dealer.
Rex Jones decided that Barrett, and his other two sons, needed to see life on the other side of the tracks. He wanted them to understand that there were many people in this world who were not as privileged as they were.
In the summer of 2002 Barrett and his family traveled with a group from Bellevue Baptist Church to Honduras.
“We wanted to show them how big the world is and I wanted them to see kids who get up every day trying to find something to eat,” Rex Jones said of his sons. “I wanted them to be givers. That trip really rocked (Barrett’s) world. He realized that the world didn’t circle around him.”
The trip rocked Barrett so much that he decided he wanted to go on another mission. “It was an experience I’ll never forget,” he said. “It opened my eyes to the rest of the world, how fortunate we are in America. It’s something I have a passion for and want to do the rest of life.”
The perfect opportunity arose in 2010 when Haiti suffered a devastating earthquake that killed approximately 300,000 and made another million homeless.
Barrett called his father and told him that he needed to go to Haiti. He passed up a family ski vacation and followed his heart.
Haiti, one of the poorest countries in the world, needed help. It needed people like Barrett Jones. He worked in a refugee camp, mostly with kids whose parents had died in the earthquake. He even played the violin (started at age 3), entertaining the kids with hymns and spiritual songs.
“The attitude of the Haitian people (was remarkable),” he said. “These kids had lost everything. You wanted to just love them. It was very sad. A lot of them were surprisingly upbeat. I remembered thinking what if I had been in that situation, if I would have been as good.”
Jones was nearly thrust into a similar situation the following year. A tornado tore through Tuscaloosa, Ala., on April 27, 2011. Jones, who would win the Outland Trophy eight months later, literally saw the storm blow by him, watching from the balcony of his apartment.
“It's hard to describe something that massive and that powerful,” Jones told Ivan Maisel of ESPN.com. “I think the weirdest thing was knowing, having seen things like that on TV, that people were probably losing their lives.”
The tornado killed 248 people. Six of them were Alabama students. One was a teammate of Jones, offensive lineman Aaron Douglas.
Naturally, Jones helped organize the Alabama football players who took part in the massive cleanup effort.
When Alabama visited the White House in honor of winning the 2011 national championship, President Obama talked about the devastation caused by the tornado. He singled out Jones for lugging “a chainsaw around Tuscaloosa to remove tornado debris from homes and yards.”
Barrett returned to Haiti in the summer of 2011. Instead of bragging about Alabama’s 2009 national championship, he taught the gospel. Hardie Buck, a wide receiver for the Crimson Tide, went on the trip with him.
Jones had caught a taste of how the poor lived in the inner city of Memphis. But it couldn’t prepare him for the poverty that he saw on his two trips to Haiti. “It didn’t compare to what you see in Haiti,” he said. “It’s pretty rough over there. Very impoverished. It made me feel fortunate. Makes you appreciate more what you have.”
Jones had found his passion. He realized the missions were something he wanted to do forever.
During the summer of 2012 he took another trip with the same church group, this time to Nicaragua. Jones would not be just a member of the group. Rex Jones asked him to lead the delegation.
“I want you to organize all of it,” Rex told his son. “He led the whole trip. As a Dad, it was incredible.”
There are always bumps in the road on such ventures. One day the bus didn’t arrive to pick up the group. Barrett asked his father what to do. “You’re on your own,” Rex told him.
(...)