Like most kid brothers in that time and place, little Mark Stoops tagged along with his older siblings, doing what he could to earn their favor. The older siblings being Ron Jr., Bobby and Mike, that meant Mark played all kinds of ball against some of the biggest, toughest kids in Youngstown, Ohio.
As a result, the first thing anyone thought Mark might grow up to do was play football, not coach it.
“As a kid, you talk about Pop Warner, around fifth grade, he was so advanced catching the ball and running. Cause that’s all he did keeping up with us,” said Bob, the second Stoops boy and seven years older than Mark. “I mean, he was a terror. Offense, defense, he was like Dick Butkus and Walter Payton. We would go to his games and just laugh because he’s just killing everybody.”
Eventually, bodies and skill sets evened out. Mark continued to prosper – “He may have been the best athlete of all of the Stoops boys,” said Don Bucci, who coached all four at Youngstown’s Cardinal Mooney High – but not enough
to consider any kind of pro career.
So he followed his older brothers again. He coaches for a living, and he is excelling at it.
Read more from this Tulsa World article at http://www.tulsaworld.com/sportsextra/OU/article.aspx?subjectid=92&articleid=20100907_92_B1_CUTLIN872627
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