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Since JFK and LBJ, I've heard it constantly in locker rooms. Strong, swift, gifted athletes talking of a mother, or grandmother, who made their lives. Perhaps saving them from a youthful wipeout. "Hi, Mom!" That's what they always say. A warm, dominating theme. A parent becoming, to a kid, a cornerstone for life.
Happy day, Moms.
It hasn't been hundreds of times, but thousands, maybe from a 320-pound football lineman or a 7-foot basketball center or a fiery baseball shortstop renowned for toughness, even arrogance.
Speaking of their mothers can be sobering, melting, revealing experiences even for overpublicized jocks known for anything but love and human compassion.
Half the first-round NBA, MLB, NFL and NHL draft picks cannot wait to clutch a first stack of money, allowing them to buy a sizzling motor vehicle and, more meaningfully, to create a sizable, comfortable, handsome new home for Mom.
Is there any jock more efficient at showing appreciation for his single working mom, one who lost her life on police duty, than Falcons running back Warrick Dunn, an alum of FSU and the Bucs? Creating down payments for women after struggling to get houses of their own.
Too often, we're talking physical phenoms who came from broken homes. Frequently without a father figure. Leaning hard on a mother, or Granny, who held two or three jobs to feed a family; searching for time to work at molding her children into solid adults.
Cubs slugger Sammy Sosa blows kisses from his dugout after hitting a home run, aimed south to the Dominican Republic and the woman who paved his way back in a dusty, nonaffluent village called Consuelo.
"My mother, Mireya, was working even as a young girl," Sosa wrote in his book. "She came from a humble family and had to quit school. She worked as a maid. A single working mom long before anybody called it that.
"My life is dedicated to her."
Darren Woodson, a smacker of a safety from the Dallas Cowboys, said, "Mother's Day is special because it reminds me to renew my appreciation and love from my wife and my mom, something I can take for granted."
Many mothers never get to see children lavishly succeed - suffering at times when some tumble into lives of torment - but Mom's efforts were nonetheless stout, generous and heroic. To all them, I pitch the world's largest rose on this Sunday of massive sports world meaning.
Hi, Moms!
BUDS FOR YOU: Wouldn't it be powerfully appropriate if pro football, which gives an NFL Man of the Year Award to a player for community work and strong citizenship, renamed the hardware "The Pat Tillman Trophy?" ... Hurrah for ABC's Monday Night Football for naming Michele Tafoya sideline reporter, teaming with Al Michaels and John Madden. She is a proven, diligent, purposeful, astute professional. It's fine that a woman has been demanded for the role, but the idea of making it a "looks over substance" is wrong, like with the punted Lisa Guerrero ... So you think it's expensive to be a member at the fanciest golf course in your neighborhood? Take solace because it's cheap compared with getting into the Bear's Club, home to the new base of Jack Nicklaus in Palm Beach County, where initiation is $350,000 with $16,000 in annual dues, part of a neighborhood where Golf Digest also reports that the average home price is $4.2-million.
THE FINAL WORD: If you've read me for more than a month of Sundays, you know I'm a devout Tiger Woods guy. Sold on his talents. Having seen the 28-year-old Californian turned Floridian prove it with eight major championships, dozens of other PGA Tour successes and income that may soon approach a billion.
At his best ... no weaknesses.
But ... oh, yeah, the big but ... Woods, in recent months, has not answered the enormous demands of ranking No. 1 in world golf. It can be quick-tweaked, back to an untouchable force. I mean, if Tiger's common sense could overwhelm his size X-LLLL ego and pride, he would quickly rehire the swing coach who built the mighty Woods machine, Butch Harmon.
I don't buy that T.W. can excel like old while having a girlfriend who will soon become his wife. He is smart enough and dedicated enough to emulate Nicklaus in combining family, business and golf while ruling the globe.
But for now, the Mizell Rankings: 1. Vijay Singh, 2. Phil Mickelson, 3. Woods, 4. Ernie Els. I hope Woods reads this. Hope he gets so ticked he tears apart Page 2C. Hope he calls Butchie. It'd be splendid if, by summer's end, the old king earned his way back atop the throne.