NASCAR champion Steve Grissom turned down offer from Bear Bryant to pursue racing

Long before he turned into a household name in the NASCAR world in the 1990s, Steve Grissom had the opportunity to play college football at the University of Alabama. 

Grissom, a star offensive lineman at Gaston High School in Gadsden, Ala., received several offers to play college football in 1981, including one from the legendary Paul "Bear" Bryant at Alabama. 

But Grissom took a different road -- one that led to the high banks rather than the gridiron, and one that he doesn't appear to regret. 

"I wouldn't change a thing," Grissom told al.com in October 2010.

Steve Grissom went on to become a NASCAR star 

In hindsight, Grissom, now 62, probably made the right decision. 

His first NASCAR start came in the Busch Series — now the NASCAR O'Reilly Auto Parts Series — in 1986, just five years after he turned down the opportunity to play for Bryant at Alabama. He finally got the chance to contest a whole Busch Series season in 1988, notching four top-10 finishes and a 13th-place points finish. 

Grissom then made his Cup Series debut in 1990 at Atlanta, finishing 24th. 1990 was also the best year of Grissom's Busch Series career to that point, as he won four races and finished third in the standings. 

It was in 1993, however, that Grissom finally became a breakout star. He won two races and had an average finish of 10.3 during the 1993 Busch Series season en route to the championship. The next year, he took a step up to full-time Cup Series competition. 

Grissom never found the success at the Cup level that he'd had in the Busch Series. In 151 Cup Series starts, he only had 18 top-10 finishes. But he'd done what very few individuals have done: simply make it to NASCAR's top level, and be good enough to stick around for more than a weekend or two. His last start came in 2002, while his final start in any NASCAR division came in a 2009 Nationwide Series (now O'Reilly Series) race at Bristol. 

It's safe to say that Grissom, who ended up with a racing career that spanned more than two decades and included a NASCAR championship, made the right decision in 1981 to turn down Bryant and the Crimson Tide to pursue his racing dreams instead. 

All quotations obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted.