Meet America’s hardest hitting 9-year-old football player
Ever wondered what the late, great Washington Redskins safety Sean Taylor may have looked like on the football field as a 9-year-old? The odds are good that he looked an awful lot like the mighty mite you see wearing number 3 in the video below.
Now that is one hard-hitting kiddo. The athlete in question is a youngster named Brian Pope, who is proving to be an absolute terror as a linebacker for the Norfolk Saints of Norfolk Virginia's Pop Warner league.
You can see more of Pope's hard hitting action in this video, as well.
According to a Prep Rally source who asked to remain anonymous because of Pope's sensitive age, the fourth-grader has been playing competitive football for three years, starting in the Tiny Mite division and building to his current position.
Needless to say, his ability to read the flow of play has improved dramatically since his first days on the field. Off the field, the 9-year-old attends Portsmouth (Va.) Christian School and earns straight A's while allegedly testing at a seventh-grade level in both reading and math.
Naturally, that last bit of data is significantly more important than whatever tackle totals he racks up in Pop Warner and later levels of football. Still, he's nothing if not entertaining to watch now, so long as your son isn't the ball carrier for whichever team happens to be facing off against the Saints that week.
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