What We Lost: Remembering Newtown victim Jack Pinto
(This story appeared in the Dec. 9, 2013 issue of Sports Illustrated.)
The night before, he had been so excited. Someone had said that wrestling was the off-season sport of choice for football players who wanted to stay in shape, to be ready. Jack Pinto wanted to be ready. He was six. He had a plan. So they were heading to his wrestling meet at Sandy Hook Elementary School. His mom was driving the family's Honda minivan. His brother, Ben, 11, was sitting beside her up front, thumbs dancing, eyes boring in on his Nintendo DS.
Wrestling wasn't for Ben. But Jack seemed unfazed by the sport's gladiator trappings: yelling parents, a single winner and loser for all to see, the intimate physicality. At a practice two nights before, in fact, a rogue shoulder had knocked out the second of his top front teeth; blood stained his shirt and lips. Most six-year-olds would pause. Jack handed the tooth to his coach and hustled back onto the mat.
Now, Thursday evening, Dec. 13, 2012, at about 6 p.m., Jack and his family were driving to his second meet -- Newtown vs. Ridgefield. Jack -- first-grader, 55-pound weight class -- sat in the big backseat. Ben, preteen and thus strenuously unimpressed by little-brother activities, was along for the ride. Jack never could leave Ben alone for long, but now he had a specific question.
"Ben, what position do you think I'm going to play?" he asked.
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Read More: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/more/news/20131213/jack-pinto-newtown-shooting/#ixzz2nSKL1xGV
sigh........just sigh.......
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