Here’s an interesting piece on H.B. Blades rebuilding his relationship with his father, Bennie Blades, the last few years.

“He was in the NFL, bouncing around and doing those things,” H.B. said. “At first, ours wasn’t like a normal father-son relationship because he was doing football stuff.”

Bennie Blades, who earlier this year was voted into the College Football Hall of Fame, played nine seasons with the Detroit Lions and another with the Seattle Seahawks. During that time he largely ignored H.B. and his other children and in 2005 was ordered to repay almost $300,000 after pleading guilty to a felony for failing to pay child support.

But now, the relationship between Bennie and H.B. is closer than it ever has been.

“Our relationship is good,” H.B. said. “He realized he missed out on a lot. Now, we’re making up for things. It’s never too late to make a relationship better or get it back.” …
The tragic part of their reunion is that the death of Al Blades, H.B.’s uncle and Bennie’s brother, who drowned following a car crash in March 2003, helped bring them together. H.B., who was a freshman at Pittsburgh then, said his father became more involved with him after Al died at just 26 years of age.

“We grew up in the same household and (Al) took me under his wing because he knew my dad couldn’t be around as much as he wanted to be,” said H.B., who was raised by his grandmother. “He was my best friend. He taught me everything I knew about football. Even if he did something wrong, he’d say make sure you don’t ever do that. He taught me to be a gentleman and to be well-spoken and to carry yourself in the best situation because you never know who is watching. Everything he taught me I took to heart and still use it today.”

I did not know about the past estrangement with his father. Mainly because in the last couple years, the focus on H.B. and his family has always been about the bloodlines. The mentions of his tight relationship with his uncle never accompanied that it was in part because his father wasn’t there.