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Dungy's visit can only help Vick in eyes of NFL

Tribune, Associated Press file photos

Tony Dungy's meeting with Michael Vick was no photo op. The former coach has a history of reaching out to prisoners.

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By MARTIN FENNELLY | The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 6, 2009

Updated: 05/06/2009 02:34 pm

TAMPA - Meet the Odd Couple.

On Tuesday, Tony Dungy — Tampa's Tony, America's Tony — visited with Michael Vick, who remains the top-rated quarterback prospect at the federal prison in Leavenworth, Kan.

Vick is finishing up a 23-month sentence for dogfighting, and Tony D. is doing what Tony D. does: reaching out. You know the former Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Indianapolis Colts coach isn't doing it to promote his latest book.

Refreshing, isn't it?

Dungy is believed to be the first former NFL coach to visit Vick in prison, though Jon Gruden did mail Vick a cake which was confiscated at the gate because it had three plays inside it.

Now that O.J. Simpson has come up just short in his comeback, Vick is the longest shot still on the board. He is nearly out of chances and just about out of money, too. How he'll make it back from his dogfighting days is beyond me.

But it isn't beyond Tony Dungy.

And that's good enough for me.

The meeting with Dungy can only help Vick in the eyes of NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, who has said Vick must show "genuine remorse" and that he has changed to have his indefinite suspension from the league lifted.

We're not saying Vick is ready to become a judge at the Westminster Kennel Club dog show, but meeting with Dungy can't hurt.

I mean, is there a more respected person in America than Dungy? Outside of President Obama and the "American Idol" finalists, who embodies our values and what we aspire to as a people better than Dungy? Who crosses more political, religious and racial lines?

I still don't think Vick should be allowed to hop right back into football when he is released from prison. He'll serve the final bit of his sentence under home confinement in Hampton, Va., and work a $10-per-hour construction job. I wonder how many people who didn't kill dogs would kill for that job.

But does Vick deserve a second chance?

Yes.

He has paid his debt as decided by a judge and jury.

What? He's supposed to be punished for the rest of his life?

True, I'd make him work Saturdays at the humane society until the end of time, but I'd give him the chance, even though that's more than he gave those dogs.

If I'm Goodell, I let him play football, eventually.

If I'm an NFL general manager, I say let him play for somebody else.

Thank goodness Raheem Morris is already married to Josh Freeman. He doesn't need a freed man, too.

But someone will give Vick a chance, and, frankly, I hope he makes it. Why would we want him to fail? Why would we want this guy on the street? If he can make it, he might be able to help someone else make it, and so on and so on.

That sounds all sorts of gooey, but then you hear that Dungy is on the case, and you know he's not doing it just to do it.

Maybe he and Vick aren't an Odd Couple after all.

Dungy has long been involved in prison ministry.

I've talked to him about it a lot over the years.

A few years back, while he was with the Colts, Dungy explained it this way:

"Prisoners are people that not many people view as important. And nonimportant people, well, I kind of have an affinity for them."

He went on:

"Maybe it's because I grew up in a prison town. Most everybody I knew growing up knew someone who worked or lived at the prison. I had relatives who were guards.

"When you talk to prisoners, you talk about what's important, what you draw your identity from. We're obsessed with winning, and here are guys who most people think aren't winners. Our tendency is to say, 'If you're not a winner you're nothing.' I want to tell guys you can be something. That's why I like to visit them as much as anything."

Dungy has tried to save young men in deeper holes than this.

Tuesday's prison meeting wasn't a photo opportunity — at least I hope it wasn't. I hope ESPN didn't secretly film this thing. I hope Stuart Scott wasn't hiding in a laundry bin.

Please, God, no.

I hope it was about one man trying to rescue another.

Anyone who knows Dungy knows that was his only intention in meeting with Vick. I bet football never even came up.

Vick will get his second chance — at life and, yes, maybe at football, too.

He better not mess it up.

That doesn't mean we should want him to fail.

Tony Dungy doesn't. And that's good enough for me.

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