Earl Campbell built his mother a house so she'd stop seeing the stars through her roof. That was the goal. Not the Heisman. Not the Hall of Fame. When Earl was 11, his father died of a heart attack. B.C. Campbell had worked the rose fields by day and a Kmart at night. His wife, Ann, was left with a rose farm, eleven children, and, by one account, two dollars in cash. She cleaned houses for a living. When Earl's first agent drove to Tyler to ask her permission to represent him, he said he could feel the wind blowing inside the house. Here's the part nobody expects. Ann didn't want him playing football. She tried to talk him out of it in high school. "I dis-encouraged Earl," she said. He played anyway. In 1977, he won the Heisman Trophy at Texas. By one account, the first words out of his mouth were for her. She was in the audience. Houston took him first overall in 1978. He signed for $1.4 million. The first thing he built was a house for his mother. It stood about 50 yards from the old one. When it was done, people lined up outside just to see the Heisman on a pedestal in her living room. His son Tyler once said his father's whole goal was to spoil Ann Campbell for the rest of her life. That's what he was running for. Every yard. Football gave her a house. It also took his body, over a career built on running straight at people. I think that's the fair way to read his story. The house was the trade. The body was the price.