No legs? No problem

DAYTON, Ohio -- The halftime announcement is met by squeals from the football crowd at Welcome Stadium, as if Ed Sullivan is introducing the Beatles.

''And now, ladies and gentlemen, the 2005 homecoming king, the very talented Mr. Bobby Martin."

Born without legs, Martin -- a 3-foot-1-inch, 117-pound high school football player -- quickly uses his hands to propel himself between a flag-toting honor guard lining the 50-yard line. The coronation is sweet. The new king stands tall. Martin is crowned, and his green-and-yellow No. 99 Cougars jersey is draped with a red cape that flutters in the wind, Superman-like. It was specially tailored by Sharon Murphy, his consumer science instructor at Colonel White High School. Even though she was ill, Murphy was there, caught up in Bobbymania.

Picture a young Cassius Clay from the hips up -- handsome, charismatic, bragging, funny -- and you've got Bobby. So on a recent Friday night, in a half-empty stadium several miles from his inner-city school, Bobby Martin has his dream come true.

''This day is going to go down in history," he declares. ''I always wanted to be the king. Always dreamed about it."

Martin, 17, plays on special teams and is a backup nose tackle who sees limited playing time. But when he does, he fearlessly propels himself with gloved hands, his torso inches above the turf. He's agile and has tremendous arm strength. He makes cobra-like tackles and is the last defense on kickoff returns.

Don't tell him he is handicapped.

''I stand 3 foot 1 inch but I've got a soul of a 6-foot-4 person," he says. ''I have no disability. I can do anything everyone else does."

And then some.

When Martin sets his sights on something, he is unstoppable. He campaigned hard for king. He placed ''Bobby Martin 4 Homecoming King" signs all over the school and gave a passionate speech at a rally that ended with him doing rapid-fire pushups that were more like handstands. At least one of his opponents apologized for running against him and even promised to vote for him.

As halftime ends, Martin races into the locker room and trades his crown for his helmet. During the second half, he propels his body into a punter who has faked a kick. Martin grabs the runner's leg with a viselike grip and pulls. The runner flips; Martin is pumped. Heading off the field, he high-fives coaches and teammates, screaming, ''Bam, bam, yeah!" Even the referee taps his helmet.

''I just made a game play," he says. ''If it weren't for me, he would've scored. I swear. I saved the game once again. And that's the bottom line."

Actually, the Cougars are comfortably ahead of the Western Hill Mustangs, 21-0. But no matter. Everybody is invited along for the ride with Bobby. His friends call him Tony Hawk, after the legendary skateboarder, because he rides an oversized skateboard everywhere but on the football field. It was made by prisoners at a local jail.

Controversy to celebrity
Martin has been a legend in Dayton since he nearly won the state wrestling championship four years ago. Now he's receiving worldwide attention. All because of a referee enforcing the fine print of the rule book.

It started Sept. 16, when crew chief referee Dave Daly announced at halftime that No. 99 for Colonel White was ineligible to play the second half against Mount Healthy of Cincinnati. The National Federation of State High School Association rulebook says no player may compete without shoes, thigh pads, or kneepads.

''I was like, 'I don't have no knees, no thighs, so how could I put them on?' " says Martin.

So Martin put the shoes around his neck, until school athletic director Carolyn Woodley told him to keep his dignity.

Then he wept. ''Yeah, I was kind of sad because I'd never been told I couldn't do anything in my life," he says.

His friends were worried.

''He was really hurt," says Kristin Draper, 17, a cheerleader who hopes Bobby asks her to the senior prom. ''He told me it was the first time he ever felt handicapped. That's not Bobby. He's really, really funny; he keeps me laughing. He was quiet the whole time."

Colonel White officials argued that Martin had medical clearance to play and parental permission. ''My principal told me not to worry about it," Martin says. ''I'd be back the next week."

Colonel White principal Gerry Griffith says the incident was ''just ridiculous, a tremendous mistake. They were very rude and nasty."

Daly still refuses media requests. A Cincinnati sports radio talk show host piled on, calling the controversy surrounding Martin a ''freak show."

Martin was reinstated the following week. An official presented him with his own whistle and told him to blow it if he didn't like the call. The opposing team gave him Superman decals for his helmet, the kind they get for making a great play. Two-hundred kids lined the fence in Cincinnati waiting to meet him.

''I felt like I was Warren Sapp or something," he says. '' 'Ninety-nine, 99, can I have your autograph?' I gave this one girl a hug. She just passed out. Fainted."

The talk show host, Andy Furman of WLW-AM, contacted Martin. ''He called and apologized and wanted me to talk on his show," Martin says. ''I said no. I told him to put on some padding and meet me on the field."

The team rallied around Martin. ''It made us angry," says teammate Carlos Robinson. ''He makes you want to step up your level of play because he has no legs and we do."

The Cougars, then 1-3, haven't lost since. They are 5-3.

''He's the coolest, greatest dude in the school," says Danyon Wallace, who has known Martin since the seventh grade. ''He took it like a champ. They messed with him, they made him more popular."

Heart and intensity
Martin has been receiving media visits from around the world. The Korean Broadcasting System and the Cleveland Plain Dealer are in town, London's calling, and even Oprah's minions are making inquiries.

''Sometimes I feel like I'm working for Bobby," says Griffith, smiling. ''He's probably the most unique person I've ever met. He's strong-willed and he believes in himself."

Martin would like to play more, but understands that he's a senior playing high school football for the first time. ''The other guys have been here three years," he says. He does start for the junior varsity.

When he runs, he looks like a skier half-buried in an avalanche.

''One of my hips is bigger than the other because I walk on it; the other half of my body doesn't touch the ground," he says. ''When I run, I run on my right hip instead of my left."

''He's very quick in 5- to 15-yard bursts," says Colonel White coach Earl White, who possesses the patience of Job. On his roster, 90 percent of the players have absent fathers. White calls Martin ''the least of my worries. He's got great heart and determination."

But sometimes his opponents are conflicted when they come face to face with someone waist-high.

''If I do have to hit him, I don't know if I want to," says the Mustangs' Greg McBurrows. In an early-season game, an opponent simply moved out of the way and let Martin pass.

Colonel White assistant coach Kerry Ivy says that is the exception -- and that Martin has also gotten ''pancaked."

''You better hit him, because he's going to hit you," Ivy says. ''His heart is bigger than our biggest lineman, 6 feet 6 inches, 310 pounds. He's the fire on this team. If he had legs, he'd be recruited by every Division 1 school in the country. Everything he does is remarkable. I look at him like everybody else. After 10 minutes, you absolutely forget he has no legs."

But he never did have legs.

At birth, says his mother, Gloria, ''They told me his legs were hiding. They never told me they weren't there. I never thought they weren't there until he was born."

His parents separated when he was 2 or 3, Martin says. His father left, returning only recently. Told that his father is in the stands, Martin says, ''I don't look into the audience during the game."

Martin credits his mother for his success. ''My mom never held me back, she wasn't overprotective, she'd let me try everything," he says. ''She told me to go for it."

Little did she know her son would be king.

''I'm very proud," she says. ''I didn't hold him back from doing anything. I said, 'No limits.' He was in a little trouble growing up, but I guess he matured."

Onto the skateboard
What really changed his life was a slow elevator in the Roth Middle School. Until then, Martin had been in a wheelchair.

''It was the second day of seventh grade," says Martin. ''I had a class on the second floor but the elevator used to take forever. I said, 'I want to go up the steps on my own. I don't want to wait on the elevator.'

''So I left the wheelchair at the bottom of the steps and went on without it. I got to class and everybody said, 'Where's your wheelchair?' I said, 'I don't need that wheelchair.' That's where my skateboard came in.

''We were at the skating rink and we were trying to figure out how I was going to skate. First they put skates on my hands, and then skates around my bottom. They decided I might as well get a skateboard and just make it a little bit wider. So ever since then, I get one made once a year."

He also has prosthetics, which are gathering dust.

''Yeah, I have a pair, I don't want them," he says. ''They slow me down. There's training you've got to go through to use them and I don't want to go through all that."

In the eighth grade, Coach White -- then the wrestling coach at Roth Middle School -- recruited Martin, who was always getting into fights, for the wrestling team. ''He said, 'You know, you should come out.' " Martin weighed just 92 pounds.

Martin says he got strength from his grandmother, Martha Walker. ''My grandmother always says, 'When God takes something away from you, he always puts it back in other places.' "

Walker remembers that. ''I told him, 'He'll give you something else to get you through, " she says. ''He gave him strong arms, and a good will to do what he does."

Martin wound up second in both the city and state championships. Coach White and Martin devised a unusual strategy to maximize his arm strength.

''You'd get 2 points for a take-down," says Martin. ''So I'd tackle him, let him back up, and then tackle him again. And they wouldn't know what to do."

But Martin lost in the finals. ''He did some kind of move that put his elbow into my back and it made my shoulder kind of weak," he says. ''I just couldn't do nothing. It was a kind of cheap shot."

But this year as a senior, he decided to go out for football.

''My brother played when I was little," Martin says. ''He kind of inspired me. I wanted to try something new. In my head, I think I can try anything. I'm going to try and see if I can do it or not."

He says he's playing with some advantages. ''I'm already low and I ain't got to worry about arm tackling," he says. ''When people arm tackle, they usually don't make the tackle. I make plays when I make the tackle."

He had a sack in his first game.

''The quarterback fooled the defensive line because he faked it to the halfback and tried to run the ball," says Martin. ''Because I'm low to the ground, I see him try to run down the line of scrimmage to the right. He tried to hit the C gap [between tackle and tight end], but I broke through and it counted as a sack."

A bit of a wild side
In school, Martin is a C student.

''When I first met him, I felt kind of sorry for him, but there isn't anything wrong with that boy," says Anthony Graham, his language arts instructor. ''He's just like any other 17-year-old boy."

Graham turns toward Martin, who is reading in class. On closer examination, he's looking at fan letters, not ''The Adventures of Beowulf."

''Now finish your fan mail and get ready to do some work," Graham says.

Outside of school, Martin loves to work on cars. He also used to drive a Camaro, sometimes with a squeegee stick, or a two-by-four jury-rigged to the gas and brake.

''Oh, Bobby drives," says Coach Ivy. ''One day last year, the assistant principal was down in the teachers' parking lot. We have these radios and she said, 'I need help, I need help down here.' We're like, 'What's wrong?' Bobby's out in the parking lot. He's spinning out, digging up rocks and hitting her. He peels off out there. So we're all laughing, 'C'mon what do you want us to do, it's Bobby.' "

Dayton Police don't see the humor. Martin has been cited for 29 traffic violations in nine separate incidents and has no license. He has transferred from two other high schools because of what he calls ''problems with authority figures."

But here, school security loves him. ''He's an inspiration to all of us," says school security officer David Johnson. ''He hasn't changed at all. He's a normal person. The other kids treat him like any other kid. If he's in the way on his skateboard, they smack him in the head and tell him to move."

At a pep rally in the gym hours before game time, Martin grabs the microphone and raps. He wrestles, flirts with the cheerleaders, dances, grabs the school video camera, and is a human dolly, rolling on his skateboard, capturing the madness on the Bobby-Cam. Later, he races full speed past the basket. There's no way he can stop. No problem. He catapults into the cushioned wall, does a flip, and lands on his hands, laughing.

Martin is also the brunt of many jokes. Coach White will instruct his team to ''take a knee -- even you, Bobby."

Martin strikes the Heisman Trophy pose and urges photographers to shoot him gulping Powerade, with the hope that the energy drink company might sign him to an endorsement deal.

But right now his future is uncertain. He'd like to play college ball but has no firm offers. He wants to be a computer programmer and someday have children. But no matter what the situation, Martin never complains.

''That's just me," he says. ''I don't complain about anything."

And he loves his 15 minutes of fame.

''It's great, the greatest," he says. ''I feel warm inside. People care what I'm doing. I want to inspire people to get out and do something. I just want to inspire everybody to never give up, never give up, because I never gave up on anything a day in my life."