Athletes - Randy Moss

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	Athletes - Randy Moss

Randy Gene Moss (born February 13, 1977 in Rand, West Virginia) is an American football wide receiver for the Oakland Raiders NFL franchise. He was drafted by the Minnesota Vikings in 1998, and played the first stage of his career in Minnesota before a trade in 2005 brought him to Oakland. He is 6 ft 4 in. tall and weighs 210 lb.

Family

His parents are Maxine Moss and Randy Pratt, but Moss does not have much contact with his father. He has a sister named Lutisia and a brother Eric, who had a short stint in the NFL as an offensive lineman with the Minnesota Vikings. Moss has 4 children with his girlfriend, Libby Offut (two daughters-Sydney and Senali, and two sons-Thaddeus and Montigo).

High school

As a high school sophomore at DuPont High School, a now-defunct institution in Belle, West Virginia (near Charleston), he helped lead his school to the state AAA football title (West Virginia's highest class), starred in basketball alongside current Miami Heat point guard Jason Williams, and also won the state title in the 100 meter and 200 meter dashes. He played center field in baseball, which some argued was his best sport. He played wide receiver, safety, punter, place kicker, kick returner, and punt returner in football. He finished his high school football career with 109 catches, 2,435 receiving yards, and 44 receiving touchdowns, along with rushing the ball 75 times for 843 yards and nine touchdowns. He ended his basketball career at DuPont with 1,713 points scored. He was named the state's Athlete of the Year once in football and twice in basketball.

Along with his State Athlete of the Year awards, Moss was named to USA Today's All-USA high school football team in 1994, and was named to USA Today's 20th anniversary All-USA high school football team.

College years

Moss' dream was to play for Notre Dame, but he also considered going to Ohio State, where his half-brother, Eric, had played offensive tackle.

According to Lou Holtz, Moss was the greatest high school athlete he had ever seen because "he was just a bigger Deion Sanders."

After originally signing a letter of intent to play college football with the Notre Dame Fighting Irish in 1995, Moss took part in a racially-charged fight at his high school that left one person hospitalized. He pled guilty to battery and received probation along with a 30-day suspended jail sentence. Notre Dame revoked his scholarship, but this setback did not stop another high profile college football program from giving him a chance. Notre Dame officials suggested Florida State due to the esteemed reputation of its coach, Bobby Bowden, for handling troubled players. However, because of his signed letter of intent at Notre Dame, the NCAA considered him a transfer student, which made him ineligible to play for the Seminoles in the 1995 football season. He was redshirted in his freshman season. While at Florida State, Moss ran a 4.25 40 yard dash (only Deion Sanders, with a 4.23 40 yard dash, did better).

In 1996, while serving his 30-day jail sentence in a work release program from 1995, Moss tested positive for smoking marijuana, violating his probation, and was let go by Florida State. He served 60 extra days in jail for the probation violation.

Ultimately, Moss transferred to Marshall University, about an hour's drive from his home. Because Marshall was then a Division I-AA school, NCAA rules allowed him to transfer there without losing any further eligibility. In 1996, he set the NCAA Division I-AA records for most games with a touchdown catch in a season (14), most consecutive games with a touchdown catch (13), most touchdown passes caught by a freshman in a season (29), and most receiving yards gained by a freshman in a season (1709 on 78 catches). Those records still stand. Moss was also the leading kickoff returner in Division I-AA on the season, with 484 total yards and a 34.6 yard average. Marshall went undefeated and won the Division I-AA title in its last season before moving to Division I-A.

In the 1997 season, Marshall's first in Division I-A, Moss and current New York Jets quarterback Chad Pennington were the centerpiece of an explosive offense that led the Thundering Herd to the Mid-American Conference title. Moss caught 26 touchdown passes that season, at the time a Division I-A record, and was a first-team All-American. For the season, he had 96 receptions for 1820 yards, and 26 touchdowns. He won the Fred Biletnikoff Award as the nation's leading wide receiver, and was a finalist for the Heisman Trophy (finishing fourth in the balloting, while cornerback Charles Woodson, now his teammate on the Oakland Raiders, won the award).

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Athletes - Randy Moss

Family

High school

College years

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