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Former NFL running back Peyton Hillis trended on Twitter Wednesday as users claimed he deserved the Arthur Ashe Award for Courage instead of the recipients, the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team.
The Arthur Ashe Courage Award is presented as part of sports network ESPN’s ESPY Awards, and is given to individuals whose contributions “transcend sports.”
This year the uber-liberal ESPN network awarded the entire U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team for its “resilient fight for equal pay off the field” after it reached an agreement to split men’s and women’s soccer pay evenly.
.@USWNT to receive the Arthur Ashe Award for Courage pic.twitter.com/yai9XvbuM9
— ESPN (@espn) June 28, 2023
Thousands of Twitter users took to the social media site to point out Peyton Hillis nearly lost his life while saving his young son and niece from an ocean rip current.
The accident happened while Hillis and his family were swimming at a Florida beach earlier in 2023, with the former NFL player saying, “It is 100% a miracle” nobody died during the terrifying incident.
Hillis’ 8-year-old niece Camille and 9-year-old son Orry were both swept away by the current before the athlete swam out to save them.
The “scariest” moment came when he decided to pass up his drowning son to save his niece because she was pulled further out to sea.
“I think the scariest point… was when I’m swimming to my son and I have to pass by him because my niece is in more danger,” Hillis said to “Good Morning America” co-anchor Michael Strahan. “I knew that I had to pass him up to get to Camille first. Because, you know, if I didn’t then there’s no way she would’ve made it.”
The ex-pro football player put his niece on a boogie board and pushed her to shore before going back for his son who was “limp” by the time he reached him.
“He didn’t have any more strength in him to swim and I’m sitting there holding him,” said Hillis, who was trying to stay afloat in 10 to 12-foot waves while carrying his 130-lb son. “You can’t swim and you’re holding him, you’re seeing his eyes roll back in the back of his head.”
About 20 or 30 yards from the beach Hillis lost consciousness and suffered lung and kidney failure but was eventually saved by emergency medical responders.
The children were saved and are now in fine condition but Hillis was airlifted to a nearby hospital, sedated and placed on a ventilator where he was unconscious for about 10 days.
The heroic athlete’s next two weeks were spent recovering in the hospital’s intensive care unit.
Because the heart-racing story went viral across the nation, many Twitter users were aware of the tale and argued Hillis, not the politicized women’s soccer team, should have received the award.
The majority of people posting about the controversy took the stance that nearly dying to save children takes infinitely more “courage” than complaining about making less money than the male team that fills more seats in stadiums and gains more television viewers.
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