MURFREESBORO Living in Albuquerque, Marty McKnight earned his "Tennessee" nickname by accent of voice and orange of color.
Then one day this past spring, a fellow worker of the Murfreesboro native pulled him aside and said, "Hey, Tennessee, I've got something you might want."
McKnight queried: "What's that?"
The answer: "An autographed University of Tennessee football. And I'm asking $50 for it."
McKnight was delivered the ball the next day at work in a plastic grocery bag.
He didn't look at it until later that night when wife Michelle started reading names on the ball.
"I didn't recognize any of the names until she said (former UT star) Reggie White," Mc-Knight said.
"And then I started looking at the ball, and it had all these autographs and said in big letters 1982, Tennessee 35, Alabama 28.'"
The next day, McKnight asked his buddy where he got the ball. Sheepishly, he said a big Alabama fan had given him the ball some 20 years ago and had explained that he had stolen it out of the University of Tennessee trophy case following another loss by the Crimson Tide at Neyland Stadium.
"I asked my buddy if he knew what that ball was worth back in Tennessee," McKnight said. "He just said he knew what it was worth in New Mexico $50."
Where it belongs
Feeling he might have the real deal, McKnight contacted UT associate athletics director David Blackburn to relay his story.
And on a vacation visit back home this summer to Murfreesboro, McKnight drove to Knoxville to show Blackburn the ball.
"He told me at first it wasn't one of their game balls because he couldn't find the head coach's signature, which is always signed on the game ball at a certain place," said McKnight, a 1984 Riverdale High graduate.
"But then, in small letters, we saw the name Johnny Majors. He said this was the genuine piece, and that they would love to have it.
"It was just not right for me to keep it."
McKnight was invited back to the recent Georgia game in
Knoxville as UT's guest. And he presented the ball, which will return to its rightful place in the UT athletics hall of fame.
"All that ball would have done is sit on top of my television and collect dust," McKnight said.
"And I would have just said what a nice ball. Now, it's back where it belongs."
McKnight thought it would have been appropriate to return the ball during UT's game this coming Saturday at Alabama some 25 years after that 1982 Vols' victory but thought better of it.
"I don't think that would have gone over too well in Tuscaloosa," he said.
