Arizona Cardinals safety Pat Tillman shocked the sports world in 2002 when he walked away from a $3.6 million NFL contract to join the U.S. Army Rangers.

Tillman, who attended Arizona State University on an athletic scholarship, had been a first-team All-American and Pac-10 Defensive Player of the Year in 1997. By 2000, two years after he joined the Cardinals, Sports Illustrated named Tillman to its NFL All-Pro team.

But eight months after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Tillman and his brother, Kevin, enlisted in the Army and completed basic training together. Pat then fulfilled the Ranger Assessment & Selection Program requirements and was assigned to the 2nd Ranger Battalion in Ft. Lewis, Washington. Tillman was deployed and participated in the initial invasion of Iraq, what became known as Operation Iraqi Freedom. One year later, Tillman entered Ranger School and, upon finishing his training in November 2003, was shipped to Afghanistan.

On April 22, 2004, Tillman and Afghan allied soldier Sayed Farhad were killed by Afghan enemy combatants in a firefight near the Pakistan border – or so the official and ultimately proven false story went. The Army issued a........

© Yuma Sun