It's always funny to see media latch onto a catchy lead for a sports story:
- Indianapolis Star: Receiver Darrius Heyward-Bey follows his heart — and Andrew Luck — to Indianapolis
- Herald-Bulletin: Heyward-Bey follows heart to sign with Colts
- PFT: DHB follows his heart to Indy
The "heart" stuff stems from this quote from Darrius Heyward-Bey during his introductory conference call with media. A person that sounds an awful lot like Phil B. Wilson of IndyStar.com asked DHB, "So why the Colts, Darrius?" His response:
"At the end, I just had to follow my heart and I just felt comfortable there."
By the way, you can listen to the entire conference call here, and let it serve as a pleasant reminder that if you are ever on a conference call and you have your phone on speaker, mute your line unless you plan to speak. Think of this as a helpful IT tip of the day. Your local IT technicians in your respective offices will thank you for it.
Another interesting tidbit from that conference call was DHB strongly suggesting that his former team, the Oakland Raiders, was just a weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee bit dysfunctional:
Question (from a person who sounded an awful lot like the Indy Star's Mike Chappell): What didn't work in Oakland?
DHB: Well, I was there for four years. I had three head coaches, four O.C.s, and seven starting quarterbacks.
Heyward-Bey also called Andrew Luck the best young quarterback in football.
DHB: It's a confidence thing. You know this guy is gonna be your quarterback. There's no question about that. In Oakland, there were times we wasn't sure, going in, week-to-week. But, you know, we had to adjust on the fly.
Heyward-Bey also told reporters on the call that what he wants to work on in 2013 is high-pointing the ball. Last year, he said he tried to work on yards after the catch.
When asked to describe the late-Al Davis, the former Raiders owner who drafted Heyward-Bey with the 7th overall pick in 2009, Heyward-Bey answered:
DHB: Player's owner. He loved his players. He was a great owner. He was all about winning. He knew so much about the game. He watched every practice film. Every game tape. He knew all about you from when you was in high school all the way to that moment when he drafted you. He knew so much about you. So, very smart man.