Making People Smile

Running back Kenyan Drake of the Arizona Cardinals helps make children smile around the world, literally. Mr. Drake supports and participates in the Boys and Girls Clubs and in an organization called Smile Train, an international charity that helps enable surgeries for children with cleft palates and lips.

The Boys and Girls Clubs on their official site BGCA.org, provide safe places, life enhancing programs and caring mentors to children and teens with a motto of whatever it takes to give the kids a chance to grow and have a great future. Kenyan grew up in the Atlanta area being supported by the local Boys and Girls Club. In a December 12, 2018 article by Joe Schad on PalmBeachPost.com, the then Dolphin back was quoted as saying,“But it’s been real cool to see that first-hand, I have the ability to help somebody. To me, giving back makes me happier than receiving anything.” Kenyan D. went on to recall, “Arts and crafts,Basketball. Baseball. I would go with my little brothers and sisters. It was a way to not be at the house all day. I was able to learn a lot of valuable lessons with the rest of the kids that were coming there.”

During his NFL career the young running back both in the Miami and Arizona areas, has volunteered his time at the local Boys and Girls Clubs to try and help the next generation have the love and support he had growing up.

Smile Train is defined by their webpage SMILETRAIN.org, is an international children’s charity with a sustainable approach to a single solvable problem: cleft lip and palate. The group states that many kids around the globe are left in isolation but more importantly have trouble doing basic functions of life like breathing, eating and drinking due directly to cleft. The treatments for cleft are safe and have an immediate, positive impact for the children. The charity does this by providing not only funding support but through training the local communities health care workers in how to treat cleft. The organization  appropriately refers to their method as the “teach a man to fish “ model.

Kenyan Drake has traveled to places such as Mexico City, and has seen first hand surgeries that have aided stricken kids to have better lives after the Smile Train supported procedures are completed. A cleft happens when particular body parts and structures do not fuse together during fetal development. Clefts can involve the lip and/or the roof of the mouth, which is made up of both soft and hard tissues.

The star rusher, formerly of the Miami Dolphins was heard on a Sirius XM radio interview with Bruce Murray and Mark Dominick on the show called the SiriusXM Blitz on May 1, 2020 regretting how the pandemic cancelled his annual trek to a foreign country to help children burdened with cleft with moral support and financial help towards medical assistance to help them against cleft. Drake and his Smile Train teammates, this year had planned to go to Peru on their philanthropist quest to aid the stricken youngsters there. They have not given up the fight though as they still do what they can from afar to help the kids while they wait for the pandemic to pass.

If you would like to stand by Kenyan Drake and support these worthy causes you can donate and find more information at their respective internet websites by clicking the following links. BGCA.org and SMILETRAIN.org.

What awesome messages and even greater acts of kindness that this football player is doing to share his time and own good fortune with those in need. Mr. Drake you are making new fans for your actions off of the football field.

We at PigskinDispatch.com celebrate people associated with any level of football, who give us that good feeling, just and Kenyan Drake has done. If you, our reader, are aware of anyone else associated with any level of American football that has done a great act of kindness, please let us know via email at PigskinDispatch@gmail.com and we will get one of crack staff to get an article up to celebrate the good people of football.