[Excelsior]

Quote:

Myles Crosby, who made 108 tackles as a senior for Heritage (Colleyville, Texas), sure does love football.

The 6-foot-3, 205-pound safety signed Wednesday to play football next fall for Southern Methodist University. Meanwhile, he gave up what could potentially be a $100,000 yearly income from being one of the premier male models in the world, according to a story in the Dallas Morning News.



He has already posed in Calvin Klein ads for jeans, underwear and the Euphoria fragrance. He has also posed for such well-known magazines as Esquire, GQ and Vanity Fair. At age 18, he is already the 11th-ranked male model in the world, according to Models.com.

"I'm told I'm so stupid by every single person," the teenager said. "That every single person in my shoes should drop out of school now and go make the money."

Crosby, who once passed up a fashion show in Milan, Italy to play in a football game, can either thank (or blame) his mother, Vera, who is a professional photographer, for her keen eye which encouraged her to send his picture to the Kim Dawson Agency in Dallas.

Crosby knew nothing about it. When he found out, he was furious and told his mother he just wanted to focus on his football career.

Finally men's director Gerald Frankowski convinced him to sign up, and he has been a rising star since his junior year when he was pictured on the cover of FD Luxe for Nov. 2011. Calvin Klein then came calling and his career skyrocketed.

"With him, it was his cheekbones, his jawlines, his lips and his eyes. He is the total package," said Frankowski.



Somewhat mystified by his overnight success, Crosby said, "I was just a normal football-playing jock kid and literally, miraculously we got a call from New York. The modeling thing happened so randomly. I'm just trying to make as much as I can before college. Football is going to be my job when I'm there."

Crosby has been able to manage his career as a male model because of the tough mental attitude he developed from years on the football field.



Crosby, who once made 18 tackles in a game during which he suffered extreme pain from damaged nerves in his neck, said with a laugh, "The stereotypical model is a lot softer than I am."

He plans to major in film at SMU and may want to become a director following graduation. Even so, it will be hard to keep him off the runway when the demand is so high.

The kid could have made plenty of money, but chose to follow his passion instead and now walks into a golden opportunity to basically live a dream life for 4-5 years.

He's going to have his pick at SMU, which from what I hear is not a school short on pretty (and often affluent) girls. I'm not sure if it is possible to be more well pre-selected than he is right now (has some fame due to viral story, is D1 athlete, is a model, etc). He's got plenty of interesting stories to tell, will come with plenty of status the minute he steps on campus and also probably has made some decent money already.

The man will slay if he so chooses.