A Symbol of Unhappiness

By Tom Callahan

Marcus Dupree runs back home to Mississippi

Once upon a time, a dark time in a mean place, a child was born, a black child, born to be a running back, born to be a metaphor. His name was Marcus Dupree. The place was Philadelphia, Miss., and the year was 1964, less than a month before three civil rights workers were murdered there and then buried 15 feet under a dam.

When Marcus Dupree was five, his mother enrolled him in the first grade on the opening day of total integration for the Philadelphia public schools. His father, a man named Connors, was gone. "Dupree" is the surname of his maternal grandfather, a truck driver and occasional preacher. "Marcus" came from Shakespeare, Marc Antony.

By the time Dupree reached the fourth grade, the town was already aware of a 60-lb. "flag" football player who scored touchdowns whenever he pleased. In the South, promising athletes, particularly football players, are natural resources. Dupree also played basketball, ran track and pitched for several baseball teams, though he was banned from Little League for being "too good." But his specialty was running with a football. The first time Dupree touched a football in a high school game, he returned a kick 75 yds. for a touchdown.

Before long, he was the leading citizen of Philadelphia, a 6-ft. 3-in., 220-lb., 17-year-old legend who, under his helmet, wore a red net knitted by his mother, and horn-rimmed spectacles. Shreds from his tearaway jerseys became religiously kept relics. The townspeople said things like "Remember, he was born in 1964, the same year as the murders. I think he's a gift." And "He's gonna shine for us. He won't never let us down."

Dupree said things like "I get tired of all the fame." And "I sometimes wish I could be average."

He was, in the collegiate phrase, "highly sought after." The recruiting process provided Southern Author Willie Morris a hefty new book on sports and sociology, well titled The Courting of Marcus Dupree. U.C.L.A. brought Marcus to Los Angeles to visit the mayor and make the acquaintance of Farrah Fawcett and Cheryl Ladd. The University of Oklahoma invited him to place a telephone call from an airplane. "They say I'm 41,000 feet in the air somewhere over Oklahoma," Dupree, full of wonder, told his high school coach. "It seems like I'm almost to the moon."

In the lineage of running backs, he followed Herschel Walker, who also came from a small, once racially troubled town, Wrightsville, Ga. Walker scored 86 high school touchdowns, Dupree 87. "You'll get tired of all the attention," Walker warned the next great player when they were introduced in the locker room one afternoon after a Georgia game. "I already have," Dupree said.

He selected Oklahoma. Philadelphia had a day for him. The local paper published a commemorative "Marcus Dupree" issue. Highway signs were mounted to declare a new identity, "Philadelphia, Mississippi, Home of Marcus Dupree," and dismiss an old one. "I never thought about being a symbol until everybody started talking about it," he said. "I just thought I'd be another regular running back."

At Oklahoma last season he was much more than that, gaining 905 yds. rushing, the record for a Sooner freshman. But it was not enough for Coach Barry Switzer. Dupree scored on runs of 63 yds. against Texas, 75 against Kansas, 30 against Oklahoma State, 80 against Kansas State, 70 against Missouri and 86 against Nebraska. He also returned a punt 77 yds. against Colorado. However, Switzer judged Dupree to be fat (233 lbs.) and lazy, and the coach seemed to blame him personally for a 32-21 loss to Arizona State in the Fiesta Bowl. "He gained 239 yards," Switzer allowed, "but if he was in shape, he might have had 400."

Injured and abused this season, Dupree quit the team two weeks ago and went home to Mississippi. It was not until after he left that the academic counselor for the Oklahoma athletic department, Jin Brown, told a reporter that Dupree had essentially attended no classes this year. In any case, then, why was he still on the team? "When we give a kid an athletic scholarship, it's to represent us in games," Brown said bluntly. "Because he doesn't cut it scholastically, how can you hold him out of games?"

Evidently considering Dupree a student worth saving, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi State and Southern Mississippi asked Oklahoma's permission to resume courting Marcus for themselves. Switzer gave it bitterly.

"I've told them all," he said.

"The world can go after him. I don't care." Last week Southern Mississippi got him. Dupree will be eligible to play college football again in 1985. "A 19-year-old quitter left us," Switzer said. No, a 19-year-old symbol.

-- By Tom Callahan This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.