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Posted by ESPN.com staff

Smith

Andre Dabagghian desperately didn't want to have that conversation on Aug. 10, 2008. It was nearly 11 p.m. on a Sunday night, and he knew his good friend, San Francisco 49ers quarterback Alex Smith, already had plenty of pressure on him.

Smith was fighting to keep his starting job during training camp. He was enduring tremendous pain in his surgically repaired right shoulder. The last thing Dabagghian wanted to do was drop this bomb: Smith's best friend, David Edwards, had killed himself earlier that day.

The job became that much harder when Smith received Dabagghian's text message and called back a few minutes later. When Dabagghian heard the upbeat tone in Smith's voice, he told his friend to sit down.

It's been nearly 11 months since Alex Smith started what has been the hardest period of his life. He's still finding his way back from that devastating night. He's never been a man who's let people into his life easily, so the death of Edwards was even more painful to accept. But Smith would be the first to say that something blossomed in him shortly after that tragedy. In the wake of the devastation, he's developed a clarity of purpose that might ultimately save his NFL career.

Click here to read Jeffri Chadiha's story in its entirety.