59-Year-Old's Football Dreams Come True

Sept. 4, 2007 — -- Call him the grandpa of the gridiron.

For 36 years, former college football player Mike Flynt has wanted to get back on the field.

Now, after decades of seeing his dream deferred, Flynt, a 59-year-old grandfather and former linebacker, is strapping on shoulder pads, buckling a helmet and getting back into the game at his alma mater.

"Looking through that face mask again is surreal, it's so hard for me to believe I'm actually having this opportunity to do this," said Flynt, a card carrying member of the AARP.

Flynt's football career began when he starred at Sul Ross State University in 1971, but he was kicked off the team during his senior year for fighting. "When that was taken from me, that's what became so hard to live with for so many years," he said.

While attending a Sul Ross team reunion this spring, Flynt, a strength and conditioning coach, called his wife and said he wanted to give it another try. "I thought this was just a group of men talking. They've come up with some crazy ideas," his wife, Eileen, said.

But Flynt was completely serious. After all these years, he still had a year of eligibility left on the Sul Ross team, so he tried out and made the team. After Flynt signed up for a few graduate classes, the couple sold their Nashville home and moved to Texas.

"I know if it was something that important to me he'd say 'OK lets do it,'" Eileen said.

Now Flynt is prepping for his first game and the chance to show his teammates -- the majority of whom are younger than two of his own sons -- that dreams can come true at any age.

"You can still do things in life, you can still go out there and take on challenges maybe you thought you were too old to do," Flynt said.