Look: Lions' Derrick Barnes Visits Cincinnati Boys and Girls Club

Detroit Lions linebacker Derrick Barnes recently visited a Cincinnati Boys and Girls Club.

Recall, the young linebacker told veteran offensive lineman Andrew Whitworth, when the Lions visited the Rams this past season, the impact his visit had on him.

The veteran lineman shared the story when he accepted the Walter Payton Man of the Year Award in front of a nationally televised audience.

“One experience brought it all together for me this year, and it happened to me on a football field,” Whitworth explained.

Whitworth then elaborated, “In our game against the Detroit Lions, I had a young player from the Lions run up to me as soon as the final horn went off. I saw him sprinting over, and I didn’t know what was going on, like we had known each other forever. I couldn’t place him. It made me so nervous. Had I actually played long enough that a coach's son or player's son is playing against me? He stopped then, and he said, ‘Hey, man, you’re not going to remember me. I’m Derrick Barnes. You spent time with me when you were a young player in Cincinnati at the Boys and Girls Club, and it meant the world to me. You used to sit with me and talk to me about life, and I was just a little kid."

Barnes made it a point to find Whitworth to share that he had made it to the National Football League and the role he played in his achievement.

The moment was impactful, and it was meant to reveal just how impactful visits from athletes can have on impressionable youth.

"I want you to know how much it meant to me," Whitworth said. "He goes, ‘You know what, the main thing I wanted to say Whit, I made it. I made it to the NFL, big Whit.’ Wow.”

Barnes is entering his second season with the Lions, and hopefully shared some impactful words to a captive audience.

"I made it. I made it to the NFL, Big Whit."

An unbelievable moment during Andrew Whitworth's Walter Payton Man of the Year acceptance speech. | 📺 ABC/NFL Network pic.twitter.com/YS8fScKQbZ
— Los Angeles Rams (@RamsNFL) February 11, 2022

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