Warner and the Rams’ Greatest Show on Turf turned 1999 into their own personal fantasy season, coming just one last second, goal line stand away from taking home Holy Grail (well, Lombardi Trophy anyway) as well. It was also this year that Warner took home another accolade, Most Valuable Player of Super Bowl XXXIV.
Kurt Warner Who?
Kurt Warner’s football career is one of the most unlikely “rags-to-riches” stories ever to come out of sports. Passed over by major college programs and at one point working the graveyard shift stocking shelves in a supermarket so he could keep himself in football shape during the day, 28-year-old unknown backup Warner burst onto center stage in 1999. During his second full year in the NFL, he drove a high-powered St. Louis Rams offense to a Super Bowl victory and collected MVP honors along the way. Warner indeed lived up to the aspirations that he himself had set a decade ago when now the Arizona Cardinals’ senior citizen—Tom Brady must hope to fill his shoes (though no one’s betting on that). He captained two other teams to Super Bowl, registered another MVP season and threw by the time his career belatedly wound to a halt over 200 career touchdowns.
Teenage Years
The youngest of two sons born to Gene and Sue Warner, who divorced when Warner was four years old, was born in Burlington, Iowa on June 22nd 1971. From that point forward his mother, who held some grueling low-level position or other at any given time and occasionally had three as many as three of them simultaneously, ended up being more his father than if she had stayed married to one man. And not only did young Kurt Everett Warner struggle throughout his formative years to find an affinity with his new father, whose marriage with Kurt’s mom lasted for only five years and at times was far from harmonious.
Where Warner really found himself was in sports. He attended Regis High School in Cedar Rapids, where basketball, baseball, and football were his three loves. After earning the starting quarterback position his junior year, Warner’s high school coach–noticing this QB’s know-on the-field-it lives in intelligence-let his QB call some plays himself at times.
Early Career
Warner’s senior year at the University of Northern Iowa Ancient Tall Tales earned him a trip to Iowa Shrine Bowl, an annual contest played between high school seniors that ranks as one of America’s top all-star events on any level. There, he led his team to victory while taking home the MVP trophy.
Disappointed by a lack of interest from any larger schools, Warner ended up at the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls — hardly a Division I-A or NFL talent breeding ground. At first excited about being closer to home, Warner gradually lost interest in the college where he majored in communications and its football team. After sitting out his freshman year because he redshirted, quarterbacking duties were passed over to someone else for the next three seasons. He even considered quitting the game, and only stayed on after his parents prevailed upon him to hang in there.
Then, in the fall of 1993, Warner won the starting role and led the Panthers to an 8-3 record along with accolades later as Offensive Player Of The Year for the conference league.
Life At Northern Iowa
In addition to finally getting the football recognition he deserved, Warner’s spell at Northern Iowa was influenced by the meeting with Brenda Meonio, a 25-year-old single mother of two small children– one of whom was Zach, her son who’d suffered brain damage as an infant. Brenda and Kurt quickly became close friends, and when they were married in 1997, Warner legally adopted her children. They’ve since brought five more kids into the world together, including a pair of twin girls who arrived on the scene in December 2005.
Despite his senior year accomplishment, Warner’s hopes seemed dim for an NFL career after graduation in 1994. There was no draft call for Warner, and while the Green Bay Packers all star club invited him to training camp, he was cut just five weeks after signing.
Still, Warner fixed his eyes on the dream. He got a job stocking the shelves at a Cedar Falls grocery for $5.50 an hour, took classes during the day in the college town, and told anybody who would listen that he’d be an NFL quarterback one day.
NFL Career
Warner was asked to play for the Iowa Barnstormers of the Arena Football League in 1995. Not only did he break a host of records for league passing, but also it was here that his arm’s accuracy and strength finally caught the eye of struggling NFL franchise the Rams, who sent him overseas to play in the NFL’s European league from that spring on through 1998.
Again Warner put up video game numbers, leading the league in auries and touchdowns. The performance was good enough to help him land the third-string job for the Rams themselves that fall, a season in which club turned in a record 4-12.
That all changed the next year, when the starting quarterback for the team went down with a season-ending knee injury in late August. The Rams turned to Warner, who had played well enough in camp to be listed behind him as backup.
Chalk up another major triumph for the Cardinals. Warner ended 2007 as the NFC’s leader with 4,830 yards passing and 56 touchdowns, also joining Phil Simms (1986) as only other QB to throw a pair of touchdown passes last month for two different teams. The football talking heads and fans were curious — not just amazed that Warner could build himself into a quarterback, but also at how so many scouts and coaches missed this fellow’s talent.
There’s no way to quantify Warner’s commanding in the pocket, his ability to release ball just before the rush arrives or the amazing array of passes he can throw with chilling accuracy, wrote Sports Illustrated.
The NFL minimum salary for each player in his second year is a pittance to a pittance by league standards-$250,000-and Warner was on that level of pay last year when his club, led by the top-scoring offense in the NFL, finished 13 games with three losses. In the Super Bowl after it won and became nfl champions for 2000, the pass-throwing quarterback racked up 414 the most yards ever thrown in post-season competition, earning himself Most Valuable Player honors.
“People think this season is the first time I touched a football; they don’t realize I’ve been doing this for years, just not on this level, because I never got the chance,” Warner reported. “Sure, I had my tough times, but you don’t sit there and say,”Wow, was stocking groceries five years ago look at me now.”‘You don’t think about it, and when you do achieve something, luck has nothing to do with it.”
Over the next few seasons Warner, who signed a 4-year, $46 million contract in 2000, confirmed his place in the ranks of league MVPs, throwing for more big yardage and touchdowns. Then two years later, the same man who is pretty certainly prime to be winner in this year’s races led his Rams to their second Super Bowl appearance (in 2001) where heavily favored Warner-led club lost surprisingly and ignominiously to Tom Brady and the New England Patriots. That same year, Warner was named the league’s Most Valuable Player for the second time.
OFF THE FIELD
In a league where quite a number of players have quite a lot to say about their faith, Warner is one of the more outspoken. Every time he comes before an interviewer, this man who has been born again makes sure that he lets the newsmen know credit (or blame) God alone for everything good in what is still his career. In 2001, Warner and his wife, Brenda, set up a charity called First Things First * to aid those in need.
The Warners’ giving extends well beyond their own dining pleasure. Oftentimes, Kurt picks up the tab for a family at another table. Children of the Warners pick the one or two diners closest to the table, who are never informed who paid their bill That number was to show his disdain for superstition and other things that didn’t make sense with his faith. On the Field and With the Rams
After the 2003 season, injuries, costly turnovers, and the club’s talent all going in reverse led to Warner’s departure from the Rams. Far from feeling like his career was over, Warner signed a one-year contract with the New York Giants in 2004. The team had this spring traded for rookie Eli Manning, who came from the same school as Warner’s backups. But the club needed a veteran quarterback to lead them until a younger player would be able to take over. Warner had problems with the Giants, however, and ended up leading them to an eight-game losing streak. In the end, he was just a backup player. ?
The CardinalsIn March 2005, Warner signed a four-year contract with the Arizona Cardinals, the NFL’s worst organization. This hapless franchise had put together only one in the last two decades. After a bumpy three years, where he split playing time with Leinart, who was chosen third overall in the 2006 draft and regarded as the strongest quarterback out of college since Manning, Warner seized control of the position in 2008. Running offense, he Atlantae another 37-year-old Warner led the club to a 9-7 record, the playoffs, and an improbable run in January 2009 surprising Super Bowl before losing to Pittsburgh Steelers 27-23. On the big stage Warner once again shone, throwing for 377 yards and three touchdowns.
Warner, a free agent again after the season,sought opportunities elsewhere. He nearly signed with the San Francisco 49ers.Seventies on the In accordance with Richard Weiss, Our Foreign Services are Overrun having a very good year,right? Warner proved at 38 to all doubters that he still had plenty in the tank. He completed 24of 26 passes in the second game last year a single-game record for completion percentageand became just the second quarterback to accumulate 100 touchdowns for two different teams. After leading the Arizona Cardinals to the NFC West title, he enjoyed one last hurrah by throwing for 379 yards and five touchdowns in anexciting 51-45 playoff breaker in Green Bay against the Packers last weekend.
Warner abruptly closed the book on his rags-to-riches pro football career in January, 2010, even though he still hadone year remaining on his contract with the Arizona Cardinals. Shortly afterwards, Warner joined the NFL Network as aanalyst. He was inducted into the NFL Hall of Fame in 2017.
QUOTE “Sure, I’ve had some tough stretches, but you can not sit there and think, ‘Man, five years ago Iwas bagging groceries, and now look at me.’. Tbought of that, and when you do achieve something youfeel that luck has absolutely nothing to do with it.”–Qurat Warner
