Parker Henry may be missing a tooth but he's not missing any opportunities

Parker Henry spent his first 3 years as a Cougar seeing the field only during special teams yet he fought and proved to the coaches he deserved more. That mentality started in 2012 when he chose to walk-on at Washington State and still continues as a scholarship player.

After deciding that he wanted to be a Coug, Henry, who has earned himself the nickname of 'Bulldog,' took a redshirt his freshman year but stuck with the program. In 2013 he finally saw action on the field when he found himself in seven games. He kept at it as he earned himself 11 games in 2014.

In December of 2014 Henry received a phone call from Eric Mele, the Cougars special teams coach, that would allow the bulldog to continue his education and football career in Pullman. The life of a walk-on is rough as Christian Caple of The News Tribune explains in his article, Henry was going to have to leave Pullman if things didn't change as he and his family were not going to be able to financially support him.

Henry learned all about his bulldog mentality from his mother who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2003. Whenever things start to get hard for him he always thinks of his mother who never complains about her condition or the situation she was put in.

The bulldog never let anything get in his way and after receiving the scholarship he went on a tear and finished the 2015 season with 71 tackles, fourth on the team, and found himself starting in 7 games and played in all 13.

After a stellar season, Henry earned himself a spot on the big stage with wide receiver Gabe Marks and head coach Mike Leach at the Pac-12 Media Days.

The question about his missing tooth picture that is in the program as well as on his bio page was inevitably going to be asked. Last summer Henry was working out and had a slip up while doing a power clean. The incident resulted in him losing his front tooth, a tooth that didn't get fixed in enough time for team pictures. When it came time for individual pictures, Caples article says that Henry decided to smile wide in hopes of making a joke of an incident he said wasn't his proudest moment. The tooth is now fixed but the bulldog still pokes fun at the situation.

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