For the inaugural installment of Positive Spin, I’m going to turn the spotlight on Matt Light of the New England Patriots. In case you didn’t know, I’m a die hard Pats fan. When I interned at the NFL Players Association, I had the amazing opportunity to interview a number of different players, and I truly enjoyed every conversation. However, I’ll be honest and say that I wanted nothing more than to talk to a member of my favorite team.

The interview with Matt Light ended up being the last one I did, and I barely snuck it in before my internship was over. Matt is a talented player, a two time Pro-Bowler, and a team leader, but what many people don’t know is that he is also someone who enjoys giving back. So, here’s an excerpt from my article on Matt Light, originally published on NFLPlayers.com, December 3, 2007.

Off the field, Light is giving children a chance to enjoy the outdoors just like he did growing up in rural Ohio. In 2003, he started The Light Foundation to help accomplish this goal.

“I think a lot of things motivated me, but probably the biggest reason was that I really enjoy working with young people, and I enjoy bringing people together to do great things and to give back,” Light said. “For me, there’s a lot of satisfaction in giving back, and there’s a lot of satisfaction in working with these different kids and getting to know them, and just showing them that there’s a positive message out there and that you can start with nothing and end up with a lot if you work hard and keep at it.”

This year, Light purchased land in his hometown and established the “Rules of 72″ Outdoor Learning Facility, what he calls “an outdoor playground.”

“It’s a place where kids can kind of get away and go do some kind of trail based activity, or just take a nice little woods walk, or do a youth hunt, and it’s a place that we established so that we could do some of our own programming,” he explained. “Hopefully down the road, we’ll eventually have some football fields and we’ll be able to do a football camp out there on our own facility.”

Light also plans on making the space available to other groups like the local YMCA, church groups, or other non-profits. He wants them to have a place to bring kids for a unique learning experience.

To support the facility and other programs run through his foundation, Light hosts The Matt Light Celebrity Shoot-Out, a clay shooting tournament. Celebrity participants have included some of Light’s teammates, who he convinced to participate in the event with words of assurance.

“Well, I think the biggest thing that I tell them is that we haven’t lost anybody yet. Everyone has survived from year to year,” he joked.

For those who are unfamiliar with clay shooting, Light compares it to golf.

“It’s a game of sporting clays, and it’s basically golfing with a shot gun,” he explained. “You have a course set up, and just like in golf where there are 18 holes, in sporting clays we have about 15 stations or ‘holes,’ and these teams of four get to go around and shoot the course, and we have a lot of things for them to see and do.”

The first two years of the event have been a success, and Light enjoys raising money for a good cause and providing his teammates with an experience unlike any other.

“I think everybody walks away telling themselves that it was a unique event, something they’ve never done before perhaps, and that they had a lot of fun” he said. “For us, we walk away saying ‘wow, we had another successful year, we raised a lot of money and we can do a lot of different programming and scholarships and we can do a lot with that money to help out the kids that we work with on a regular basis.’”

For more information on Matt’s Foundation, visit:  http://www.mattlightfoundation.org/

*Photo credit: Sports Business Daily

I’m a big sports fan. Football’s my favorite, and I’ve been a die hard New England Patriots fan since birth. As a journalism student, I was always interested in how athletes are portrayed in the media. In fact, I turned my curiosity into a research paper for my senior seminar, an awesome class called Sports, Media and Society. For the paper, I researched the coverage of NFL players in Sports Illustrated and People Magazine. I compared the subjects that were covered in each one, how the players were described, which aspect of their lives the stories focused on, etc., and I was very dissapointed (though not surprised) by the amount of coverage given to negative news.

In the fall of 2007, I spent the semester in DC, and had the absolute pleasure of interning with the NFL Players Association. My favorite project revolved around the Home Depot NFL Neighborhood MVP program, which recognizes players who dedicate their time to community service. About 15 players are selected as finalists, and each one is honored with a football field refurbishment or a playground build in their community. I would research each player and their community service involvement, and then interview them via telephone the day of their project. Not only was it ridiculously awesome to talk to these guys on the phone, but I really enjoyed learning and writing about the good things that they do.

When I spoke with Jun Loayza in my interview for Viralogy, Jun suggested that I start a website where I would highlight athletes doing good things in the world.  Since I don’t exactly have time to do that, I’ve come up with a compromise. I’m going to do a little series here called Positive Spin, starting with the players I interviewed for the NFLPA. Unfortunately, they gave the website a makeover after my internship, so my articles aren’t posted on NFLPlayers.com anymore. But, I figured that gives me the perfect opportunity to give athletes some well-deserved positive spin. Look for the first feature in the next few days!