Recently, bleacherreport.com came out with a list of the top 25 careers derailed by injury; As I perused this list I couldn’t help but wonder about an athlete by the name of Julian Madison who all but fell off the face of the Earth. I remember covering Julian Madison when he was in high school, he’d always been one to practice humility and patience, so when everyone was saying things like “You have the strongest arm I’ve ever seen.” or “Dude, you can be the next great quarterback.” and “Were you bred in a lab? Because you’re so cool, attractive, a physically gifted freak of nature and totally not fat!” he just smiled and thanked them for their kind words and focused on whatever it was he was doing. When the scouts from all the major programs started calling him up, texting him, and paying a visit to his modest New England boarding school, he greeted them genuinely and told them he was flattered but wanted to focus on school for the time being. I’m not gonna lie, this kid was a piece of work. Scouts had to make up adjectives to describe how transcendent his game was. Yet the pressure never got to him, here he was being recruited and presented with the opportunity to do something that only a small percentage of athletes in America have the chance of doing and at no point did it seem that he was flustered. I remember going into his senior year of high school his decision came down to Ohio State and Oregon State; many believed that he would go scarlet and gray. However, the Buckeyes decided to invest in some random dual threat quarterback out of Texas by the name of J.T. (I haven’t been keeping up with the Buckeyes but I’m pretty sure this J.T. kid didn’t pan out at all). This made Madison’s decision easy and he verbally committed to Oregon State. So what happened to him?
Madison eventually committed to Oregon State.
I remember it like it was yesterday, it was a crisp New England Saturday and the matchup was an exciting one between the Exeter Crimson (how original) and Northfield Mount Hermon (their mascot is the “Hogger” but because of his play, most people referred to them as ‘The Madisons”). Julian was looking to build off a successful junior year behind center where he ended up passing for over 2500 yards and 25 TDs in 8 games while rushing for 1000 more and 15 TDs. On this particular day, the defense wasn’t faring so well and the score was knotted at 30 points apiece (the kicker went down for Northfield so Madison ended up kicking 3 field goals himself) and Julian was leading his team down the field. With 2 seconds left in the game, he was flushed from the pocket and was running for his life behind the line of scrimmage trying to extend the play; He broke two would-be-tacklers and reversed field desperately looking for an open receiver. As Exeter’s top linebacker came at him full speed, Madison fired the ball 38 yards into the endzone, on a rope, right into his receiver’s hands for the win. However, Julian wasn’t able to celebrate the victory because of the late hit delivered by the Exeter defensive player.
The late hit was impossible to truly "walk off"
The hit injured Madison’s right ankle which left all the scouts in such disbelief that the linebacker automatically got a 5-star ranking and committed to Alabama the next day. The ankle injury affected his play so much that he only matched his numbers from the previous year and Oregon State started having conversations with Kyle Kempt, a less mobile QB out of Ohio.
Madison's coach told me that after the season was over, Julian took a long look in the mirror at himself. After three hours of staring at himself in the locker room mirror, his teammate told him that “looking at yourself in the mirror” isn’t a literal suggestion but a proverb about self-reflection and evaluation. After that useful bit of information, Madison came to the conclusion that it wasn’t a life of fame and fortune that he wanted, not by a long shot. Going to Oregon State and the NFL wouldn’t provide him with the kind of fulfillment he was pining for, even if he rewrote every record and collected every single accolade. No. What he realized he wanted was to go to a medium-sized private university and major in Liberal Arts and Humanities while playing a completely new position at the division three level.
Some say that he went on to fight crime as a vigilante, that football didn’t work out because he’s been nothing but injured since that fateful day in 2012. There are whispers that he joined a fraternity and became fat. Others say that he actually suffered from amnesia and is only just starting to recover the memories of his glory days, often muttering the phrase “I could’ve gone to state.” I believe that it’s all of the above and that wherever he is, he’s happy and doing something he loves.
