New Payton biography riles his biggest fans

Fans of the late Walter Payton are hitting the Internet hard and posting comments denouncing a new biography that describes the Chicago Bears legend’s addiction to pain killers as well as his infidelities and bouts of depression after his NFL career ended nearly 15 years ago.

Excerpts of “Sweetness: The Enigmatic Life of Walter Payton” by author Jeff Pearlman are published in this week’s Sports Illustrated. Pearlman is a former SI senior writer who spent two years on the project and interviewed nearly 700 people for the book.

The book chronicles the life story of Payton, who died in 1999 from bile duct cancer, from his childhood in Mississippi through his 13 years playing for the Bears and life after retiring from the NFL.

Payton’s longtime agent, Bud Holmes, paints a troubling image of Payton leaving the team locker room “with jars of painkillers, and he’d eat them like they were a snack.” Pearlman also writes that Payton habitually ingested a cocktail of Tylenol and Vicodin.

Pearlman recounts that Payton wrote to a friend that he contemplated suicide in his post-football career, and that his extramarital affairs were “common knowledge” and extended to having both his wife and a mistress attend his Hall of Fame induction.

While Connie Payton and her children declined to speak to the author, Payton’s fans were quick to come to his defense. In just three hours after a story about the book was posted at Yahoo.com, more than 700 people left comments, with the vast majority targeting the author or the media.

Here are three such examples:

Ÿ “Rest in Peace ... means just that. Let a Man rest in his grave with his name and pride intact. He was possibly the greatest Running Back the NFL has ever seen.”

Ÿ “i dont see the purpose to put all his business out there ... the man has passed away. what is the point of the book? we all have our problems, we all have our skeletons hidden in the closet. but why the need to talk about all the negative things many years after the fact? i dont get it.”

Ÿ “Walter Payton was a joy to watch on a football field. His alleged drug use is not that shocking, considering his profession. His dedication to the sport of football, even in the off-season, was truly remarkable. He was a gifted athlete, and I’m glad I had an opportunity to watch him play. The affairs should be private matters between him and his wife, and that’s it. I’m just really saddened to learn of his depression.”

In an interview at SI.com, Pearlman talked about the expected reaction:

“Some loyalists will read the book and say, ‘How could this guy write about Walter Payton this way?’ I feel almost the opposite. There’s something important about learning that even the greatest among us have their burdens. Whether you’re a Hall of Fame running back or a guy moving cement, we all have issues. No one lives up to the pedestal.”