Major
Impact
Written by
R.G. Yoho
The unauthorized Biography of Major Harris
This book is not sponsored nor endorsed by West Virginia University, its athletic department, or any of its affiliates.
Copyright 2010, RG Yoho, All Rights Reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.
Published by Yoho Publications, LLC
Printed in the United States of America
Cover design by Scott Tyree
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Dedication
This book is dedicated to all the heroes out there, the real heroes.
I’m not referring to those donning athletic uniforms or the celebrities who dominate our nightly news.
I dedicate this book to all those brave men and women of our Armed Forces, from wartime or peacetime, active or inactive, living or dead.
I dedicate this to all of those who purchased our freedom and who risk their lives every single day in the deliberate preservation of our liberty.
May God continue to bless the United States of America. And may God bless all of those who wear the uniform of this great and glorious nation.
For they are the real heroes!
Acknowledgements
I am fearful of including the names of all those who helped to make this book possible. No doubt I will forget somebody. Therefore, if I forgot to list your name, please accept my sincere apology in advance. The oversight certainly wasn’t intentional.
I want to thank Niles Eggleston and Donnie Young, who helped set up a couple of interviews for me.
Those who granted me interviews—in no particular order—were Don Nehlen, Rick Phillips, Lamont Harris, Sandra Harris, Damon Grose, Dave Lockwood, Mike Booth, Jamie LeMon, Ron Wabby, Tony Caridi, and Dwight Wallace.
Other assistance, observations, and insights were given to me by a trio of great sports writers: Mike White, Dave Poe, and John Antonik.
I also want to acknowledge the help of Greg Hunter, the editor and publisher of the Blue and Gold News, America’s foremost publication on West Virginia Mountaineer athletics.
The absolutely outstanding cover design for this book was done by Scott Tyree, a fellow Mountaineer fan and graphic designer in North Carolina. You can check out more of his work at www.TyreeDesigns.com.
I would also like to acknowledge the help of Attorney Bob Waters, of the Waters Law Group, in Huntington, West Virginia, who watches my back on all legal issues.
Of course I would be remiss if I failed to mention my friend, Skip Coryell, who provided me with the advice and technical expertise to make this project go.
This book, which initially began as a labor of love, has been the culmination of over two years worth of toil. Moreover, nobody will ever know all the trials, tribulations, and obstacles that had to be overcome in order to get this book into your hands.
Standing beside me, through it all, has been the love of my life, my wife of 29 years.
I have done my very best to bring to you a great sports biography of a superb athlete. I truly hope you are pleased with the finished product.
Foreword
It is my pleasure to write a foreword for R.G. Yoho’s biography of Major Harris. I coached college football for 25 years and was very fortunate to work with successful coaching staffs at all levels. I started at Division III and progressed up the ladder to coach in the Division I National Championship game while at West Virginia University against Notre Dame in the Fiesta Bowl after the 1988 season. We were fortunate to win conference championships at every career stop and also coach in five bowls along the way. We also had over 50 players make it in the NFL, so I feel fortunate that I was able to work with quite a number of good players throughout my career to offer good comparisons from the talent prospective.
As a society, we tend to look for the unique people in our world for biographical study of their lifestyles … and Major certainly was unique and very special in many ways.
I became aware of Major Harris during the recruiting process. Denny Brown, our defensive coordinator was the Pittsburgh area recruiter. I attended a high school basketball game with Denny to watch Major and came away very impressed with his overall athletic skills. Major attended our summer camp and had already made a big impression on the coaches. He was so athletic … and his team always won.
Most people remembering Major generally think of the dynamic and exciting plays that he made via his athletic prowess. I remember Major because of his relentless competitiveness. He not only loved to compete … it was his life blood. It was Major’s “need to compete” that allowed me to reach him as a player and help him improve.
This competitive desire of Major’s changed me as a coach. I grew up in the Woody Hayes, Doyt Perry, Bo Schembechler, Bill Mallory and Don Nehlen family tree of coaches. “Repetition breeds soundness” was one of our cardinal principles. Practices were efficient, fast moving, coach on the run atmospheres where we tried to simulate game tempo and game pressures. But during this practice, quality repetitions were a basic ingredient … over and over again until it is perfect.
Major didn’t respond well to repetition. He played the game for the competitiveness and for the fun of winning. Most quarterbacks are quite happy to run as many drills as you want with 5 step drops and throwing out-routes until the final whistle blows … not Major. I found that after about 3 out-routes Major would be going at about two third’s speed and we would not be accomplishing our timing goal.
I soon learned to make our individual drills competitive. The drill was on a stop watch with time recorded, or it was against a defender where we logged a win or a loss. Practice became fun … and competitive … and Woody would have been proud because it was still efficient, on-the-run and intense.
Major was never an academic problem and was a really a good student of the game. In his first year as a starter I was asked by Mike Jacobs if I thought he could handle some checks. We had protected Major early on by sticking with a pretty basic offense. I thought he was ready so we put a run check in for a specific alignment we expected from Penn State. We made certain Major spent one period in practice with the offensive line and scout team to see the alignment and then also introduced it into both group and team play scripts. He handled it fine.
When the Penn State game began we started a drive after a kickoff and marched across the 50 yard line. We made another first down near the 40 and as we approached the ball it became apparent from the press box that we were going to get the alignment that required the check that we had practiced all week. Mike Jacobs, offensive run coordinator and I were in the press box. Mike said, “There it is!” We could see Major’s head going up and down as he audibled. “He saw it and he’s checking,” Mike said. Then Major took the snap and went the wrong way breaking 5 tackles and running about 40 yards for the touchdown. At the start of the play Mike Jacobs said, “What the H_ _ _ is he doing! … (pause) … Great job!”
We had several of those “What the H_ _ _ is he doing! … (pause) … Great job!” comments during Major’s career. I usually just leaned back and after lengthy quiet said, “It’s in the coaching!” … and then followed with a laugh.
Major was not always a good student of football. During his redshirt year he became disgusted with the passing reads, hots, route conversions and sight adjustments. He was talking about transferring to a “black college, one that didn’t read coverages.” When I explained to him that all the colleges that I was aware of read coverages and that he just wouldn’t be able to escape that part of the game at the college level. He had always enjoyed “shooting from the hip” in his personal game of football and wasn’t certain this form of discipline was his cup of tea. However, once he bought in, he was a good student of the game.
Major was a good kid. I always gave the credit to his Mom. He grew up in a tough area in Pittsburgh with all the bad stuff around him, but I have a feeling she was responsible for keeping him focused and on the right road.
I gave the speech at the Fellowship of Christian Athletes meeting on Friday before a home game. Major was in attendance. After the talk I was completing my duty of bed checking my players when Major asked a couple of questions about my talk. Not wanting to keep his roommate up and also wishing to take advantage of this opportunity for a one on one, I invited Major into the hallway. We sat on the floor and he really opened up about his family life in Pittsburgh and his growing up. I gained insight into Major that I had never had before. This was a very meaningful moment for me and I always searched for such “moments of learning” with the players I coached after Major. These are great “teaching times” and you just have make yourself take the time when it presents itself.
It wasn’t always sugar and spice, however. In Major’s first year as a starter he overslept for the team pregame meal prior to the Virginia Tech game. His roommate was Ben Reed, another quarterback, good player and a terrific team player in his support of Major. The trainers, in game day fashion, knock on the players’ doors and offer orange juice in a room to room assembly line process that is quite efficient. Major and Ben had gone back to bed after the wake up. When I noticed he was not at the meal, I proceeded immediately to his room, arrived in a bad mood and read he and Ben the riot act. Coach Nehlen wasn’t very happy with me for chewing out his rookie starting quarterback on game day. Fortunately, Major responded competitively and had one of his best games in his rookie season. After the game, Denny Brown, defensive coordinator and Major’s recruiter, and I were the last coaches in the locker room, and Denny said, “Chew his a_ _ out before every game!” Maj was never late again for a pregame meal.
Two other areas that were not favorites in Major’s list of fun things to do were the winter lifting program and the timing days. I often had to run him down and escort him to a lifting workout. However, after arriving in the strength room he would take on his normal persona and begin entertaining the entire squad. Maj had a knack at humor and the squad loved him. The energy in the strength room picked up with Maj’s arrival … he had an effect on his teammates that I think he greatly underestimated.
Once I found that Major had entered a slam dunk contest. He apparently left the floor at the foul line, jumped over a chair and dunked. This won him acclaim from his classmates and spectators in attendance. Major’s vertical jump was certainly an asset when coupled with his strength and quickness. Major had great strength in his thighs, an attribute that allowed him to break a lot of tackles.
The slam dunk contest was not a problem, but the fact that it was during his lifting time was.
The timing days were “missing in action days” for Major. We did not get an official timing on Major during his entire 4 years until the pro timing his senior year. Major was always sick or had some conflict. We always thought he was about 4.7 or a little better… but he carried his pads well and was rarely caught from behind in games … some of that competitiveness again!
Boston College comes to mind as one of the times that Major did get caught from behind. We found ourselves in a long yardage situation and called the quarterback draw. Major ran into the end zone and distance of about 80 yards but he zigged and zagged and backtracked until he must have run two or three hundred yards. He was exhausted. There was a flag on the play … holding WVU. Having no good call for this down and distance situation, we called the quarterback draw again … this time from 10 yards farther back … and Major took off, but this time he was caught from behind at the 5 yard line going in. We eventually scored! Major had a huge day running and passing that day. I often wondered what the stats would look like with the lost penalty yardage added in to the total.
In the early stages of Major’s career, it didn’t take very long for the coaches to realize that we had something special in Major. The freshmen were involved in a variety show during August practice. This is a tough thing for a freshman to do especially when he has to face a varsity that was mostly interested in making it tough on each and every freshman. But Major showed what he was made of and stepped up to the challenge by being very entertaining with a rap while making a great impression on both coaches and players. At that same variety show, Browning Nagle, the other freshman quarterback and fine player, sang a love song from his high school musical from start to finish in another show of strong character among the quarterback group. Our position is in good hands.
Major and Browning Nagle both redshirted as freshmen. Browning later transferred to Louisville and went on to an NFL career. As I was walking off the field after a varsity practice I stopped and looked back at the field. I noticed both Major and Browning were still on the field … both having fun goofing off throwing footballs or kicking field goals when Browning grabbed a football, took a knee at the 50 yard line and threw a strike to Major at the goal line. Major then took a knee and threw another strike back to Browning who was still in a kneeling position at the 50 yard line. I slept well that night.
Major’s strong competitive desire became an issue at one point in his career. We were playing at Louisville in a tight game versus Howard Schnellenberger’s team with Browning Nagle, the same that redshirted with Major at WVU, at the quarterback position for Louisville. We had a time out with the ball at about the 25 yard line in the red zone on our way for a score. During the timeout I reminded Major that a field goal would put us in the lead and therefore he should be careful if forced to scramble so as not to take us out of field goal range. Major’s comment was, “Are we going for field goals, now?” Major was always thinking touchdowns … and on every play … he was constantly in attack mode. We had a little more discussion about that at a future time to make certain we were on the same page. We did manage to score against Louisville and put that game in the win column.
Major was very humble and quite open to being approached by any person. This was both a strongpoint and a shortcoming of his. He listened to everyone and near the end of his career became somewhat confused about what direction to go with his career and with his life. Some of the advice he received from casual acquaintances was not very good advice in hindsight and he probably should have relied a little more on those of us who really cared about him and his future for direction on the important issues.
From a coaching perspective I feel honored to have been able to coach Major Harris. It became apparent to me early on that my coaching style was not going to completely reach this player. This youngster had talent and great big play making potential. It was important that I coached him in a way that allowed him to build on this great potential … not stifle it by minor corrections that would make only minute differences in the long run. Certain fundamentals could not be violated but identifying his unique talents and helping him to develop those talents to their fullest was the challenge.
Major was indeed coachable and fun to be around. He lifted the enthusiasm in the meeting room or locker room with his presence. The confidence in the huddle could be cut with a knife because his teammates believed so strongly in him. His competitiveness was contagious … contagious enough to get us to a National Championship Game.
Looking back, it is clear to me that Major greatly appreciated his time at West Virginia University. He knows the love was real and the experience a once in a lifetime. And for those of us who dearly love WVU, we also realize that “the Maj” was a once in a lifetime for us too!
–
Dwight Wallace, Football Analyst
Mountaineer Sports Network –
Chapter 1 - Call Him “Major”
It was a bitter, cold, snow-covered January day in Pittsburgh when my wife and I made arrangements to meet Major Harris just outside the home of the Steelers, Heinz Field. The temperature was around 0º F. The wind chill made it feel much colder.
There was a flurry of activity around this NFL football stadium. In two days, the eventual World Champion Pittsburgh Steelers would be playing the Baltimore Ravens for the AFC Championship.
There was much work to be done in preparation for the devoted throng of black and gold-clad fans who would fill those thousands of seats and noisily boost their beloved Steelers into another victorious Super Bowl appearance.
As I watched them make preparations for this crucial play-off game, I turned up the heater on my truck and nervously waited for the arrival of one of the city’s finest home-grown athletes.
— m —
Exciting, dynamic, electrifying—the superlatives to describe the play of Major are endless! And it is doubtful that this largely unknown writer possesses neither the talent nor the word skills to adequately describe this gifted athlete’s manner of play or the lofty status he still holds in the minds and memories of every Mountaineer fan old enough and fortunate enough to have seen him play.
Major is truly a legend in Mountaineer history.
In his brief, three-year college football career in Morgantown, West Virginia, Major lifted West Virginia to another level, leading them to the national championship game against Coach Lou Holtz and the Notre Dame Fighting Irish.
Along the way, Major led his team to its first undefeated regular season. He would also become an All-American and a two-time finalist for college football’s most coveted award, the Heisman Trophy.
From factory workers in sunny Texas to Air Force personnel in frigid Alaska, people who had never heard of Coach Don Nehlen or the West Virginia Mountaineer football program suddenly became acquainted with the name Major Harris!
In a nationally televised game on CBS, Major showed the college football world what he could do on a busted play against Coach Joe Paterno’s Penn State Nittany Lions. Never were his improvisational skills more fully displayed than on that beautiful, sunny October Saturday in Morgantown.
On Penn State’s 26-yard line, the entire Mountaineer offense went left and Major mistakenly went right. Dodging numerous Nittany Lion tacklers, he ran, feinted, and scampered almost thirty yards to the end zone.
Nobody could catch him.
— m —
Then I saw him arrive.
As I stepped out of my truck, Major greeted me with a broad smile and a firm handshake. Standing beside me, the man is huge! His hand could have crushed me like an empty aluminum can.
Major asked me where I wanted to go. I said I would like to meet his mother.
He said that was fine with him—anything I wanted.
I followed him toward Pittsburgh’s Hill District, about a five-minute drive from the downtown area. For it was on these same streets a young Major Harris would acquire the skills to become a much-heralded high school athlete. It was on these streets where Major would first begin showing off the moves that would make college linebackers curse and defensive backs leave their coverage, only to get burned with long passes to the receivers they left unguarded.
It was on these streets where Major would become well, Major!
It is widely believed that this area of Pittsburgh, the Hill District, the place in which Major played on the streets, was the inspiration for the 1980s television series, “Hill Street Blues.”
Steven Bochco, the show’s creator, was educated in nearby Carnegie Institute of Technology, which is now known as Carnegie Mellon University.
The landmark television series with its tough and gritty focus was quite likely conceived during Bochco’s college days in the Pittsburgh area.
Following Major through the tough streets of chilly Pittsburgh, like a scene from that series, I noticed that the window glass on many of the lower floors had been broken out and replaced with plywood sheeting.
When we finally reached our destination, we found a special kindness and warmth in one of the poorer areas of the city. At the home of Joseph and Sandra Harris, I was introduced to Major’s mother, the delightful woman who brought this extraordinary talent into the world.
The Steel City is renowned for its blue collar image and its once-thriving steel mills, many of which have been silenced by changing economic conditions and brutal foreign competition. Yet there is some steel still to be found there. It can be discovered in the strength and backbone of Sandra Harris.
Living in an area that Major refers to as “The Hill,” Mr. and Mrs. Harris are raising their grandchildren. Their daughter, who tragically succumbed to the ravages of lung cancer at an early age, left behind seven children. Three of them were already grown. The four remaining children are being cared for by Major’s mother and father.
Upon meeting her, I was immediately shocked at how tall the woman was. Sandra Harris stands six feet tall. Her husband is approximately 6’ 2”. She clearly looks much younger than her sixty-five years.
“I married a tall man, my school sweetheart,” Sandra told me. “We’ve been together ever since I was fifteen.”
Despite some false information to the contrary on the Internet, Major was not born on February 15, 1968, in Spartanburg, South Carolina. He was born in Pittsburgh’s Mercy Hospital on February 6, 1968.
Sandra Harris remembers it well.
“His uncle’s name was Major, Major C. Harris. And he had passed, so I named Major after him.” Then his mother added, “Claybourn—he hates that name!”
For quite some time, Major didn’t care for his first name much either.
“When I was young I didn’t like it,” he told me. “It’s a little bit different. And when you’re young, you just want to fit in. But when I got older, I really didn’t mind.”
Major was the baby of the Harris family, the youngest of four children. He had a sister, Tywanda, and two brothers, Joseph and Lamont.
Sitting there in their small, living room, Major and I listened quietly while his mother commented on her son and brought the past back to life.
“Major was just like any other boy,” Sandra explained. “He was athletic. He was out there playing basketball and football with the older guys, from three on up—maybe from two on up,” she added. “I didn’t have any trouble out of my kids. Maybe it’s because they were all athletic. I never had any trouble out of my boys.
“Both of his brothers played basketball. They would all be out there playing. He always was playing with the older guys. But I didn’t know he was into football, though,” Sandra said with a smile. One day, I was at the sink washing dishes and he came in with his football stuff on. I said ‘Major, I thought you were playing basketball. I didn’t know you played football.’ That really shocked me.”
Growing up in Pittsburgh, a young Major lived his life in much the same way as any other kid in a big sports town. He played ball in the streets. He shot hoops on every street. He followed his big brothers around and constantly tried to emulate them.
Major’s mother may think her son was just like the other boys; Lamont certainly doesn’t share her opinion.
“He was different than the normal kid,” Lamont told me later. “Major was good with Pampers on! I’m not kidding. He would play baseball with a Pamper on,” added Lamont, enlarging on his point. “When he was younger, he was better than us. And I’m five years older than him. He used to play football and baseball with us. And he used to beat on us.”
— m —
Mr. Lovejoy was a 70-year old neighbor who lived close to the Harris family when Major was a child. The kindly old gentlemen loved to spend his time sitting outside, watching the neighborhood children participate in their street and sandlot sporting events.
The man could certainly recognize talent when he saw it starting to bloom!
As the elderly gentlemen sat and watched them play, he saw a number of children who showed some ability to excel in sports.
Yet the old man saw one child whose special talent and athletic abilities made him plainly stand out from the crowd. He would often comment on his observations for everyone around him to hear.
“Look at that little Major,” Mr. Lovejoy observed, while pointing at the youngest of the Harris’ children. “That Major is really going to be something special. He’s the one!”
Chapter 2 - The Early Years
In the writing of this book, Major was quick to make sure that I left nobody with the wrong impression about his childhood. He continually tried to downplay his athletic abilities as a youngster.
It was also important to him that, as much as humanly possible, we got the facts right concerning his life and early days.
“We never played against the older boys in basketball,” Major explained, “because they were older and jumped higher. We did compete with them in football and in baseball. And when they were saying I was playing in diapers, that was in wiffle ball.”
“I first met Major when I was kid,” former high school and college teammate Mike Booth told me. “We both grew up in the Hill District. He’s three years older than me. Then we went to West Virginia together too.
“We used to play neighborhood sandlot football on different teams,” Mike said, “and we played Little League baseball together. Major was a heck of a pitcher. Whatever he did, he played it well. If he knew it, he could do it. It came easy for him.”
Even at a young age, Major possessed an unusually bold confidence in his athletic abilities and to the future achievements for which those skills might eventually take him.
Some might have considered him cocky.
When Lamont Harris was playing for Brashear High School, his basketball team won the city championship. For his efforts, Lamont was named City League Player of the Year.
As he and his friends were at home celebrating Lamont’s basketball victory and his award, Major walked up to his older brother and said, “That’s nothing, Mont, because I’m going to be better than you.”
At the time, Lamont simply laughed off the boast of his younger brother and made fun of him.
Undeterred, Major repeated his statement, “I’m going to be better than you!”
But a few short years later, Lamont wasn’t laughing anymore.
“He won two titles and went to a state championship game,” Lamont recounted. “I never went to a state championship and I only won just one city championship. So Major was better than me.” Then he added, “He might not remember making that statement to me, but I remember it!”
“To be honest, I was pretty good in baseball,” Major said. “When I was young, if I were betting on what I would do in the future—and even though basketball was my favorite sport—I think I was probably better at baseball.”
The young Pittsburgh native attended Miller Elementary School, where Major would play baseball.
“When I was nine and played Little League, I really only played half the season,” Major explained. “I wanted to play on the team my brother played on, which was the Mets. Normally, your brothers always played on the same teams that you played on. But being that my brother turned thirteen when I was nine, they put me on the Giants.
“At the time, the Mets were one of the popular teams. They were a winning team. The Giants were pretty good, but they weren’t like the Mets.
“I was the backup catcher to Milton,” Major explained. “I thought that was a pretty big deal!”
Major is referring to the late Milton Redwine, who was several years older than him. A highly-recruited lineman in high school, Redwine would play for the Miami Hurricanes in football, but would eventually transfer to West Virginia.
“Backing up Milton—that was big time!” Major exclaimed. “That was a big deal to me because I was in second grade; Milt was in fifth. And that was the first time I was on a school team. There are certain things that stick out in your mind more than others. That was one of them.
“When I was nine and I played Little League, I got Rookie of the Year for the whole league and MVP of my team. That was unheard of in Little League.
“The thing that made me getting MVP and Rookie of the Year so special,” Major replied, “was that I only played the second half of the season. When I was ten, I was playing with eleven and twelve year olds on all-star teams. So looking back on it, baseball was really the sport that I had most of my trophies in.”
Major’s skills in baseball also allowed him to win a “Pitch, Hit, and Throw” competition in Pittsburgh because he hit all his balls over the fence.
“You basically throw the ball up for yourself and hit,” he said. “That’s really why I won, because I was hitting it further than everybody.”
Yet despite his obvious skills on the ball diamond, Major would soon give up the game.
“At that time, people knew me for baseball. That was my trade. But after I got line-drived, I was done with it,” said Major. “I was eleven.
“Normally when you’re hitting the ball around to the outfielders, the pitcher isn’t out there,” he explained. “But for some reason, I was out on the mound. The coach was trying to hit it to the centerfielder. And when I turned, the ball hit me right in the head.
“From that point on, I really gave up baseball. Even though I kept playing, I was scared of the ball. Even now in the softball leagues, I don’t even mess around with softball. I’m just done. I never could get over that fear.
“Football, I was just doing it to be doing it,” added Major. “But before that, baseball was the sport that I was really coming on in. Right then, I was just trying to find myself as an athlete.”
For a man known largely for his athletic prowess on the gridiron, it is not surprising that Major began his athletic career on the basketball court. The game required a basketball and little else.
“When I was growing up,” explained Major, “we didn’t have Midget League football around here. My first love was basketball. We played in the streets. But you can take a basketball and go anywhere. You don’t really need equipment. That’s why I think a lot of kids gravitated towards basketball. Now, they’ve got Midget League teams here.
“It was a new experience for a lot of kids, if you don’t have Midget League football. It’s an adjustment you have to make, playing with equipment. It’s funny, but when I went to high school, some guys didn’t know what went where,” he said with a laugh. “The hip pad—one guy thought it was a cup.
“They had a Midget League team near where the stadium is now, where I first met you. I was on the team one year there, but I didn’t play. The one year I played, I really didn’t play.
“In Midget League, if you aren’t there and they don’t know your parents, it’s going to be hard for you to get on the field. Plus, I wasn’t from that area anyway. So I really didn’t play my first year.
“The second year, I was going to start at quarterback, but they changed the age limit and the weight limit. So I went back to basketball. So there were a lot of things driving me away from football. And baseball at this point was out of the question, because I’d gotten line-drived.”
Major certainly wasn’t the only outstanding athlete to be produced from the streets of the Hill District.
“Booth and Milton grew up on the same street,” Major stated. “Milton was a top lineman when he came out and every school in America wanted Booth. I followed Milton to West Virginia and Booth followed me.
“Booth probably has more City Championships than anybody in basketball and football! And Booth was a hell of a swimmer too!
“Booth was bigger than most kids his age,” explained Major. We used to play in the streets. It would be our street against their street in football.”
“When Major came,” Booth observed, “we knew we weren’t going to win. Once he got the ball, nobody could really touch him—at all!”
“When I was little, we used to play football, the older kids versus the younger kids,” Major said. “My brothers were older. So the guys my age used to play against them. That’s what kind of helped me as far as improving in football. I think that really helps! You’ve got to get better to compete against the older kids.”
Their sibling rivalries were often played out on the court or sandlot.
It was during these sandlot games against the older boys when the youngest of the Harris children first realized he had been blessed with some extraordinary talent in the game of football.
“We used to play touch-tag football,” Major’s older brother, Lamont told me. “And the one thing about Major is that nobody could touch him. They used to beat us bad. We were five or six years older than him, trying to run over him and beat him up. But that didn’t work. It never worked!”
“At first, it was probably more of a joke,” Major explained. “I’m sure they thought we’ll play against these young guys and beat on them. But once you started being competitive, scoring on them and beating them, then they got serious. That’s why they kept playing us. They wanted to prove they could beat us.”
“We could not touch him. We couldn’t sack him,” continued Lamont. “It made us so mad, we tried to hit him. But Major was so good, he would make us hit each other. He was just something special!”
“Football was just something I did to bide time until basketball,” Major observed. “Finally I noticed I started getting more publicity in football. So I knew that’s what I was going to do.”
However, the revelation on Major that was totally unexpected was his early infatuation with the game of hockey.
Like many of those from rural America, perhaps I am also a victim of the stereotypes and misconceptions of society. Therefore, the sport of hockey didn’t seem to be the type of game played by kids growing up in inner city neighborhoods.
But Major loved it.
“We played hockey right on the court, right where we lived. This was when I was seven or eight years old,” explained Major. “Like the weather is right now, when the snow would cover the grass, we would be out there playing hockey. It was fun too. That was a big thing we used to do.
“So we just went out there and played in the grass. We were out there with tennis shoes on, running around and playing hockey.”
Talking to Major about the game of hockey, you immediately sense a passion and nostalgia for the game that he used to play as a child. He smiles often when he talks about the sport and the experiences he knew.
“We used to be out there with socks on our hands because we didn’t have gloves. And when I was little, I didn’t realize pucks were that hard. They’re like rocks!” Major explained. “We ended up getting a plastic puck and playing with it.
“When you see a hockey player pass, it’s almost like a stick to a stick. People don’t realize when they pass, it’s almost like a magnet. At first when we played with a harder puck, on a slap shot, you didn’t want to be hit in the head with the puck.
“A lot of times, guys would sometimes swing hard at the puck so people would get out of the way. Then they could get an easy shot on goal. You knew who the wild swingers were back then,” he observed, throwing back his head with laughter, “so you’d better move out of the way!”
But despite his enjoyment for the game of hockey, it was just another sport, another means to pass the time until Major could return to his real passion, knocking down hoops on the basketball court.
“As a kid, I wanted to make something out of it with basketball,” he said. “My brother, who was five years older than me, was in high school. He was always taller than most kids. My brother was like 6’5’’ from the time he was in the eighth or ninth grade.
“He was City League Player of the Year. At one point, he might have been the all-time leading scorer at Brashear,” Major added. “In fact, when Mont came out of college his senior year, he was something like the fifth leading scorer in the nation at St. Francis College.
“He was so big, he played as a ninth grader. He had a couple of years on most guys. Most of them only play their eleventh and twelfth grade years. Mont had a name for basketball and I was basically following in his footsteps. Now people knew me from playing football on the streets. But that’s a different thing from organized ball.”
But for Major, organized ball would soon be on the horizon.
“When I went to middle school, the seventh grade was when they started the bus thing, bussing kids to different places,” said Major. “Before that, you’re playing against people you really know, like the grade school guys from the Hill.
“Once they started bussing the kids, then you start playing against people you don’t know. That was a big adjustment! You really don’t meet too many kids unless you play AAU basketball or stuff like that.
“And in middle school, you really don’t have football,” he added. “You have basketball and soccer. So in a way, it’s really pulling me away from football, because things were basically geared towards basketball.”
Moreover, about the time that Major went to middle school, rap music was just coming to the Pittsburgh radio stations. Those days were also the pinnacle of Michael Jackson’s popularity.
“At that time, moonwalking was the thing. So moonwalking took up a lot of my time, trying to be a good moonwalker,” Major said with a laugh.
“I didn’t play sports in the ninth grade. I don’t even think my grades were good enough,” Major replied. “This was when rap music and break dancing were coming on the scene. At that time, I think I was getting caught up in the whole rap thing. That was my big thing as a freshman at Brashear, trying to be a rap star.
“I had a friend who did that and made it big in the business. This buddy of mine ended up in Los Angeles. He’s producing as we speak. He did a lot of beats for a lot of big artists, some of the top guys in the industry. He’s big-time really, when it comes to music!”
Mel-Man, currently a West Coast rap and hip-hop producer for Dr. Dre and others, was then known simply as Melvin Bradford, a friend and classmate of Major Harris, and another resident from Pittsburgh’s Hill District.
“It was during my ninth grade year that Mel and I formed a rap group called the M&M Crew,” Major said. “The initials stood for Maj and Mel. I was thinking I was going to be a rap star.”
Before a white rapper called Eminem first made a name for himself in the music world, Major and Mel already had their own version of M&M.
“Other than playing sports, my name really began to pick up buzz on this rap thing,” Major recalled. “I can remember when Mel and I would go to the local dances, everybody would tell us to get on the mic.
“The difference between rapping and moonwalking was that I wasn't scared to rap in public. Everybody could rap; but where I stood out, I was known throughout the Hill as a rip rapper.
“A rip rapper,” Major explained, “is a rapper that is comical. Melvin probably started that term, rip rapping, in our neighborhood. It's really like being a comedian on the mic. You had to be able to rap off the top of your head.
“I was always known as a jokester; so this was right up my alley. Other people might call it ripping, capping, playing the dozens, joking and teasing someone, but in our colloquialism, we called it ripping.
“The one thing I definitely realize today, that I didn't realize back then, was that the majority of the people in the Hill were comedians. Everybody could rip!”
Major’s musically gifted friend, Melvin Bradford, would continue pursuing his passion for music, a passion that would lead him to wealth and fortune as an award-winning producer in Los Angeles, California.
“As I began to refocus myself back on sports,” Major recalled, “Mel kept the rap thing going. He also got into the producing side of it. He began to make his own music and then rap to it.
“I can remember going over to his house and he would always throw on one of the new beats he made. Then he would pull out a notebook with all these different rap songs in it. He had so many songs it was crazy. He was so talented with making beats, he used to make some of them just for the hell of it.
“Even when I got to college, years later, he would call me late at night and say, ‘Listen to this new beat I made.’ At the time, I really wasn't caught up into the production side of the rap game; I was still into the rapping part.
“It really didn't hit me to how important the production side of it was,” Major said, “until he got to California. He has worked with Snoop Dog, Ice Cube, Eve, and even co-produced some tracks for Eminem.
“The weirdest thing about all of it is, when people from our neighborhood hear a song, they know right away if that's a Mel-Man beat. Mel’s got a certain style; and they know it when they hear it.”
But despite his love for music, the entertainment business would not be the focus of Major’s future.
“So, when I really look at my freshmen year at Brashear, I can say it was a year that I needed, just to get adjusted to being in high school. It was just like when a guy gets red-shirted his freshmen year in college.”
Chapter 3- Finding His Place
John A. Brashear High School was established in 1976 in Pittsburgh’s Beechview community. Home to approximately 1,100 students, the institution is one of ten high schools in the Pittsburgh Public School District.
Brashear’s nickname, formerly the “Bullets,” was later changed to the Bulls because of parental concerns that the original name might inspire violence among some members of the student body.
The school, named after the famous Pittsburgh astronomer, John Brashear, would soon become the home to another kind of star.
Major Harris, the budding talent that Mr. Lovejoy observed playing on the Hill, would eventually become a member of the Brashear Bullets.
As a high school athlete, Major was equally adept at football and basketball. But like any young high school athlete, he had some early growing pains.
“My most embarrassing moment in sports in high school,” Major recounted, “was during my sophomore year. It happened during a varsity basketball game.
“With about 10 seconds to go in the game, we were down one point. The opposing team was trying to run the clock out by passing the ball around.
“Deondre Smith, our starting point guard, stole the ball and was heading down court for the winning score.
“Just when he was going to lay up the ball, the guy, who he stole the ball from, chased him down and committed a hard, intentional foul on him. Deondre, as a result of the foul,” Major explained, “had to be taken to the locker room, because he was in a lot of pain.
“So Coach Guckert had to put somebody in to shoot the free throws. He looked at me. I tried to put my head down, so he would put somebody else in.
“He said, ‘Major get in there and shoot those free throws.’
“Being that time expired, the free throws were going to be the last shots of the game. If I made both free throws, we win; if I made one, we go into overtime.
“I missed both, so we lost the game. After I missed both free throws, when we went into the locker room, everybody on the team was looking at me funny.
“Even when I got on the bus to go home after the game, the fans who went to the game gave me the cold shoulder. I ended up playing in several varsity basketball games that year. I scored a couple of points when I got in, but none of them could compare to the two free throws I missed earlier in the season!”
That one incident may have been the last time that Major ever had any reason to be embarrassed by anything he did while playing high school sports. And the young star’s rare humiliations were far outweighed by his numerous triumphs.
Ron Wabby, who recently left Pittsburgh to coach football in Sarasota, Florida, was Major’s high school football coach.
“I got to know Major in the tenth grade when he was playing basketball. He was a real good basketball player,” Wabby observed. “As an athlete, he was pretty damned good. He could jump out of the gym.
“Major was an enjoyable kid to coach,” Wabby added, “because he never took anything real seriously. Football was just fun for him. Everything came easy.”
Former West Virginia Coach Don Nehlen also concurs with Wabby’s opinion of Major’s all-around athletic abilities.
“Major was such a good athlete,” Nehlen replied, “he would have been good at any sport.”
“I knew in high school he was good,” said Booth. “He really didn’t get a chance to start until his sophomore year. The things he was doing at a high school level, I’ve never seen anyone doing to this day besides Terrell Pryor [Currently the starting quarterback at Ohio State]. But that’s a different era.
“But the things Major used to do, you would sit back and say, ‘Wow, man! This dude is really good.’ Strong arm. He could run. He could throw, read defenses, and just do everything. I knew that back in high school.
“He was a heck of a baseball player. He was a heck of a basketball player, too,” Mike Booth observed.
Although Major would excel at football, not many are aware of his extraordinary exploits on the basketball court.
Major was a great basketball player, who won two city championships. In his junior year, he averaged over 15 points a game and helped to lead his Brashear basketball team to Pennsylvania’s AAAA Championship Game.
“We played Carlisle High school in basketball for the state championship,” he recalled. “That year, they had the top player in the country. His name was Jeff Lebo. He ended up going to North Carolina on a basketball scholarship.
“Michael and Billy Owens were also on that team. Michael ended up going to Syracuse on a football scholarship.
“West Virginia fans best remember him for scoring the two-point conversion against them in 1987. That was the year Syracuse went 11-0.
“Billy, Michael's younger brother at the time was only a freshman,” Major continued. “He also went to Syracuse, but on a basketball scholarship.
“Jeff was the number one player in the country that year. And four years later, Billy ended up being the number one player in the country.”
There was certainly a lot of talent on the court in that one Pennsylvania high school championship basketball game.
Jeff Lebo would play for the legendary, Dean Smith’s Tarheels and have a brief stint in the NBA. He currently is the head basketball coach of the Auburn Tigers.
Billy Owens, who led Carlisle High to four straight state championships, would later star for Syracuse University and play almost 10 full seasons in the NBA.
Yet when the subject turns to outstanding basketball talent in that state championship game, the cupboard certainly wasn’t bare for Brashear High School.
Playing alongside Major was Darelle Porter, who would later play basketball at Pitt and was the head coach at Duquesne University for three years, Tony Horne, a future two-sport star at Colgate, and Darrell White, who later received a basketball scholarship to Duquesne University.
“I had a pretty good game against Carlisle,” Major observed. “I think I had about 15 points.
“It's funny; our team had a height advantage over Carlisle. But when you look at basketball, you think the teams with the taller guys usually win. We beat all the teams that had a height advantage over us. But we had a height advantage over Carlisle and they handed it to us!”
Three of the starters graduated and Darelle Porter transferred to Perry High School the following year, leaving Major as the only returning starter in his senior season. He still averaged 23.6 points, nine rebounds, and six assists a game, earning him the award for City League Player of the Year and a member of the Pittsburgh Post Gazette’s “Fabulous Five.”
As good as he was on the high school hardwood, Major never lost a City League game in football. But it was through a strange series of events that resulted in Coach Wabby naming Major to be his starting quarterback his junior year.
“He got a chance to start,” Coach Wabby explained, “because a kid had a cyst on his butt.”
“The week we were going to play Mount Lebanon,” Major said, “the starting quarterback, Tyrone Fisher, got a bad case of hemorrhoids, so Wabby named me as the starter.”
“That kid, we moved him to tight end,” Coach Wabby said, seriously. Then sensing his unintended pun, he immediately started laughing. “He never started again at quarterback!”
Mt. Lebanon was one of the premiere high school football teams in Pennsylvania. A member of the Western Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic League (WPIAL), they were quite a challenge for the City League’s Brashear High School.
“Mt. Lebanon was a powerhouse at that time,” Major explained. “A couple of times they were ranked nationally. Their head coach was a legend up in this area.
“Currently, Mt. Lebanon’s head coach is former West Virginia great, Chris Haering for the past 13-14 years.”
“In a sense, you didn’t know football anyway because you never played organized football. So we had a bunch of strikes against us,” he added. “If we’d played them at the end of the year, we might have had a chance to beat them. But they were good!
One of the athletes for Mt. Lebanon was Kurt Angle, who would later win an Olympic gold medal and become a WWF superstar.
In an unfortunate accident, Angle’s dad died the week of the game. And in the midst of that tragedy, Kurt wasn’t sure he would even play that weekend. However, once the decision was made, Angle would go on to have the game of his life!
Major pointed out to me that the former Olympic champion, Angle, even took time to mention it in his book.
“I was reminded of it years later when I read about Dwight Gooden pitching a no-hitter for the Yankees the night before his father was having heart surgery, and then bringing him the game ball in the hospital the next day. I’m sure he would understand how I felt that night against Brashear High School and a great quarterback named Major Harris, who would go on to play college football for West Virginia and make them a national power while he was there.
“I had sixteen solo tackles, two touchdown runs, two fumble recoveries, and an interception. Basically, I kicked Major Harris’ ass and won the game for us. It was the first game I ever started on the varsity, and while I went to earn All-State honors, I never had another one quite like it.” 1
“He was really tough,” Major said, regarding the future wrestling star. “I think I threw two touchdown passes in that game. I had a couple of nice scrambles and long runs. If Kurt Angle felt he had a good game,” added Major, “I feel I played pretty good, also. We’d never competed against Mt. Lebanon at a level like that. I think we scared them a lot in that game.
“Their coach, Art Walker, and the Pittsburgh newspapers were singing my praises the next day in the paper. And after that game, there was no question who was going to be the starting quarterback.
“At that point, I started to get a little publicity in football. A week before that, I would have never expected that. You couldn’t have told me in a million years that would have been in the newspaper, playing against Mt. Lebanon, and them talking about how good I played! After that game, everything changed!”
Although Major would come out on the losing end of that game with Mt. Lebanon, it would be one of the few times when he would experience defeat.
“The game that really put me on the map as a football player,” Major recalled, “was the game against Indiana High School.”
“We were losing 21 to nothing at halftime,” Coach Wabby said. “I told the kids, ‘We’re going to come back and win this game 22-21.”
“In most high school games,” added Major, “the team that is down that many points would call it a night.”
“The second half, defensively, we played extremely well,” Wabby recalled. “Maj took over and we started scoring. So we had a chance for one more play. He rolls right; then he runs left. And then he runs right,” the coach said. “He throws it back across the field and the kid catches it with no more time on the clock. It was typical Maj.”
On the last play of the game, the receiver gathered in the pass and went for a touchdown. Brashear beat Indiana by a final score of 22-21.
“After that,” Wabby replied, “I could tell the kids anything and they would listen to me.”
Major’s game-winning pass was more than 70 yards in the air.
“I remember when we called time out with about three seconds to go in the game. Wabby called the receivers and me over to the sideline. He basically said, ‘Let’s throw a Hail Mary.’
“I remember when I ran back to the huddle, the Indiana announcer was saying Indiana is going to be 5-0 with this victory and Brashear will be something like 4-2. I also could remember most of the fans were leaving the stadium. Being that we were on our own 29-yard line, everybody thought it was over.
“All the receivers were lined up to the right. I took the snap and scrambled a little bit to give our receivers time to get down the field. The only one that headed for the end zone was Tony Horne. Everybody else stopped around the 20-yard line.
“Nobody on their team thought I could throw a pass over 75-yards in the air. It shocked everybody who stayed for the last play of the game.
“Tony caught the ball in the end zone; and there weren’t any defenders around him,” Major said. “We went crazy. It was the greatest play I ever made. But it was easy, because he was wide open.
“The game with Mt. Lebanon really opened people’s eyes about me,” Major explained. “But the 71-yard touchdown pass, to Tony Horne on the last play of the game against Indiana, made me the Player of the Week in western Pennsylvania. The Post-Gazette came to Brashear and took a picture of me for the paper.