"We'll Always Be Pals" are the last words my father said to me before he died. The youngest of his six children, he taught me everything there is to know about how to be a man in this world. He should know, after the life he lived. Born in 1920, Gene McManus witnessed some of the most historic events in our country's history. A product of the Great Depression, he was a football star, a boxer, and a B-24 Liberator pilot and POW during World War II. My story is a small one. Out of football for two full seasons after a glorified college career, I had left my football dreams behind me until I got a call out of the clear blue sky. The man who taught me how to play the game was all the inspiration I ever needed to realize a life long held dream. "We'll Always Be Pals" is ultimately the story of a father and son who were fifty years apart in age yet ended up best of friends. Tom McManus, grew up playing football. He started in the 4th grade at St. Mary's of Buffalo Grove, Illinois, a Catholic grammar school located outside of Chicago. He went on to Wheeling HS, where he was an All-Conference and an All-State linebacker. He accepted a football scholarship to Boston College and received his bachelor's degree in Marketing. He was named a third team All-American his senior year along with being a two time First Team All Big East linebacker under the tutelage of Tom Coughlin. He failed in his first two attempts to make it into the NFL and spent two football seasons out of the game, tending bar in Chicago. In 1995, he got a lucky break and became a member of the inaugural Jacksonville Jaguar Franchise of the NFL. He played an instrumental role in the Jaguars miraculous 1996 season, the Cinderella story of the NFL that year, as he started 14 games at middle linebacker including the 1997 AFC Championship Game and proved to the NFL that he did, in fact, belong. Tom is the owner and host of a sports talk radio show in Jacksonville, Florida called, "The Rumble with Tom McManus" on 1010 XL. Tom is involved in many charitable causes, most notably, the Jay Fund Foundation, established by Tom Coughlin, and the C.H.I.L.D. Cancer Fund. Tom resides in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, a beach residence outside of Jacksonville, with his wife, Kristina, and their three daughters, Avery, Kelsey, and Harley.