Playing For:

Warrick Dunn Family Foundation

National Football League

Team:       Atlanta Falcons
Position:   Running Back

Recent Plays

Recipient, 2009 Bart Starr Award
Recipient, 2009 Bank of America Local Hero Award
Inductee, World Sports Humanitarian Hall of Fame

How He's in the Game

When he was only 18 years old, Warrick Dunn’s mother was tragically gunned down, leaving him to look after and provide for his five younger siblings.  His mother, a Baton Rouge police officer, was a single parent whose dream was to one day own a home and provide a stable environment for her children.  Now, years after this unfortunate event, Warrick Dunn is leveraging his extraordinary and inspiring NFL success to help single-parent families with a similar dream of self-reliance.

In 1997, Dunn founded “Homes for the Holidays,” a program to help single parent families achieve their dream of first-time homeownership.  Dunn and the Warrick Dunn Family Foundation have helped place 99 single parents and their children in homes of their own, forever changing the trajectory of their lives.  Dunn is personally involved in the selection of recipients and presents each family a $5,000 check to be used as a down payment on their new home.  The program also works with local businesses to provide complete home furnishings for each new home. To date, the Homes for the Holidays program has provided $495,000 in down payments and nearly $2 million in home furnishings.

About Warrick Dunn

Before entering the NFL, Warrick Dunn was both a football and track standout at Florida State University. He still holds school records for career rushing yards in a season. Dunn exploded onto the professional scene in 1997, earning the Offensive Rookie of the Year Award and a spot on the NFC’s Pro Bowl roster. He went on to earn 2 more Pro Bowl bids during his career playing for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Atlanta Falcons.