For today's Throwback Thursday moment presented by SUBWAY® restaurants, Redskins.com looks back at Dion Foxx's memories of Darrell Green.
Dion Foxx couldn't believe was he was seeing. A Redskins linebacker in 1995, he watched as Darrell Green pulled up to Redskins Park in a red Volkswagen Beetle.
Yes, this was the same Darrell Green who by then had established himself as one of the most feared cornerbacks in the NFL, with multiple All-Pro distinctions and Pro Bowl appearances since he'd entered the league more than a decade earlier. Plus, he was still one of the fastest players in the game.
Foxx inquired about the car.
"I asked him about it, and he said, I've had it ever since I was in college,' " Foxx remembered. "I said,Are you serious? And you still got it?' I looked at it kind of funny. He said, `Yea, that's my baby right there.' "
Foxx doesn't know if Green's decision to drive the diminutive vehicle had anything to do with his unassuming personality or undersized ego.
"He just loved that car," Foxx said. "He said his wife had a new car, but that he loved that Beetle. He still drives it. I saw him at a golf tournament a few years ago. He pulled up with a blue Beetle. I asked him if it's the same Beetle. He said, `Yea, man, I just had it restored. I had it painted blue this time.'
"Maybe it was something that he used for himself to see where he came from to where he is," Foxx said. "Sometimes, players do that. I never asked him, but all he kept telling me is, `That's my baby. That's my baby. I'm going to ride my baby as long as I can.' I understand that because I know some guys who still drive their first car or the car that they got with their own money, whatever it may be, just something that they have that's symbolic to them for whatever reason. That was symbolic to him and still is to this day."
Foxx was also amazed at Green's blazing speed. The 5-8, 170-pound cornerback, who today holds the Redskins' record for interceptions with 54, was a track star at Texas A&I. His 10.08, 100-meter time was second in the country at one point behind famed Olympic sprinter Carl Lewis.
"We're running our 40-yard sprints," Foxx said. "I thought I did good. I ran a 4.47. He ran a 4.25 or 4.28. I've never seen anybody that I played with or against run that smooth, that effortless, and that fast as Darrell Green. And he ran it like he was waking up and stretching. I was in awe of him because when I was in high school, middle school, college … I was watching him from eighth grade all the way up on TV. So being in the same building with him, and he's still performing at that level and still can run that fast."
"Father Time didn't mess with him at all," said Foxx, who had a two-year NFL career after playing his college ball at James Madison. "Even if you look at him today, he looks like the same Darrell Green from 20 years ago."
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