Stringer’s Death Gives This Story a New Meaning

“The Enlightened Man,” a profile of Minnesota Viking Pro Bowl offensive tackle Korey Stringer, will run in the September issue of Esquire magazine. However, because of Stringer’s death Wednesday, Esquire posted the story in its entirety on https://www.esquire.com, the magazine’s Web site, with an editor’s note about his death as a preface.

The article, reported by Jeanne Marie Laskas in June, was completed and edited long before Stringer entered a hospital because of heat stroke Tuesday, and because the magazine is already en route to newsstands, there will be no mention of the tragedy in the printed copy.

“The story will now make people realize how much has been lost,” Esquire editor-in-chief David Granger said. “The reaction that we had was to try and acknowledge that this happened. There wasn’t much else we could do.”

Laskas, who said it felt “surreal” Wednesday when she heard about Stringer’s death, went to camp in June to find a player to feature. “I just stumbled blindly upon Korey,” she said. “He turned out to be quite heroic.”

The writer was besieged Wednesday by media.

“I haven’t really thought about contacting any of [Stringer’s] family,” she said. “I’m still trying to figure out what to do. If this had happened in my family, I’d probably want to crawl into a hole and hide.”

Laskas, who befriended Stringer, said that she wished he had the chance to read her in-depth feature, which will be available at newsstands Aug. 10.