Not every NFL scout has the eye to recognize all-time talent and Steve Young's rise to prominence is the perfect example of talent that got away from many football franchises. On the field, Young was a risk-taker and was willing to take the blame for some of the wild throws he would take. But while he knew some of the attempts he was making were irresponsible, he was also aware that some of those passes would ingrain his name as an NFL legend. While at Bringham Young University, the coaching staff considered switching Young to defensive back because of his athletic ability and the struggles he was having getting accumulated as a college quarterback. But after countless hours of work, Young proved he was worthy of the position and set an NCAA single-season record with a completion percentage of 73.1 as a senior in 1983. Young also helped BYU set an NCAA record averaging 584.2 yards per game as well. To close out his college career Young led the Cougars to a 21-17 victory in the 1983 Holiday Bowl against the Missouri Tigers.
Prior to entering the NFL, Steve Young played in the United States Football League (USFL) with the Los Angeles Express for two seasons before the league was dissolved. Young was picked by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the supplemental draft but went 3-16 with Young as a starter. In 1987, Steve Young was traded to the San Francisco 49ers where he would make history leading the team to three Super Bowl victories (XXIII, XXIV, and XXIX). Young would win Super Bowl MVP honors in Super Bowl XXIX for throwing a Super Bowl record six touchdowns against the San Diego Chargers. Young had a passer rating of over 100 six times throughout his fifteen-season NFL career along with seven Pro Bowl nods and two NFL MVP honors. Steve Young retired following the 1999 NFL season.
Celebrities are no strangers to changing their looks for a role. And in some instances, they have to get pretty extreme. From 500-calorie-a-day diets to drinking pints of ice cream, Actors and actresses know what it takes to change their bodies in preparation for a new film.
Charlize Theron is no stranger to gaining and losing weight for movie roles, as we remember her transformation in Monster. Charlize Theron gained close to 50 pounds for her role as Marlo in Tully. Theron said that “for the first time in my life I was eating so much processed foods and I drank way too much sugar. … I remember having to set my alarm in the middle of the night in order to just maintain the weight.”
You’re used Chris Hemsworth's hulk-like figure in Thor, but In the Heart of the Sea required a totally different diet. The movie required the cast members lose a ton of weight to make their stuck-at-sea plight more believable. Chris Hemsworth said there were days when all he ate was one boiled egg, a couple of crackers, and a celery stick.
Anne Hathaway wanted to get serious for her role in Les Misérables, as she was playing Fantine, a starving prostitute with tuberculosis. So Anne Hathaway went on a diet of “rabbit food” to drop 25 pounds. Hathaway explained her diet was essentially just starving herself, but she didn’t want to give details, as she doesn’t want to encourage anyone to copy her emaciated look. She did note that she “just had to stop eating for a total of 13 days shooting,” however. And at one point, her bones became so frail that she reportedly broke her arm.
Matthew McConaughey's portrayal of Ron Woodruff in Dallas Buyers Club, a man with HIV/AIDS, was spot-on, earning him the title of best actor at the Oscars. But it also required a serious physical transformation. Matthew McConaughey said he lost 38 pounds for the role. During filming, he said he lost a lot of energy from eating so little — and he hit plenty of plateaus along the way. Finally, with a strict diet, he got down to 143 pounds. And while he did cardio to help with the weight loss, he said it was 90% what he was eating and portion size.
Hilary Swank had to put on 23 pounds of pure muscle for her role as a boxer in Million Dollar Baby. The process doesn’t sound easy, however. “I started working out five hours a day — I had to eat 210 grams of protein a day,” Swank said. She also mentioned that she had to consume 60 egg whites per day, and when that proved too difficult, she had to drink them. And to keep the muscle on, she would get up and drink protein shakes in the middle of the night.