TAMPA, Fla. (AP) -- Steelers wide receiver Santonio Holmes' childhood was much like that of any other youngster in rural south Florida. He played backyard football. Chased squirrels. Ran around with his friends.
This was different: Despite being a promising athlete, Holmes also spent a year selling drugs on a street corner in his small hometown.
He chose to make his surprising admission at the Super Bowl, knowing millions of impressionable youngsters will be closely following the game and its players. By revealing his secret, Holmes hopes he may persuade other at-risk youth to choose a path that leads to the athletic field and a classroom, not to a detention center or a jail cell.
"I've only told three or four people about it," Holmes said Wednesday. "I feel it's time to share things. I'm on the biggest stage, everybody's going to be watching. I'm pretty sure some kids can get a feel for changing their lives and not doing those type of things, and can get an opportunity to get out of the ghetto, the 'hood, to be successful."
Holmes, who initially made the admission in an interview with the Miami Herald, became exposed to the lifestyle while growing up in Belle Glade, Fla. Some family members and friends made money selling drugs, he said, and he found it an easy way to make money, too, though he didn't specify exactly what he sold.
Holmes avoided detection by his mother by going to school, then leaving and going to the street corner. He and his family didn't need the money for food or essentials, and he used it mostly on gifts for himself, like shoes.
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