Jimmy Burrow is wary of sharing the photo with just anyone, especially a member of the media. He has mostly kept it to himself and his family. It’s never been published, never been seen by the outside world.
He’s afraid of the optics. After all, he says, what father gives his 7-year-old son a cigar, tells him to pose with it and snaps a photo?
“Is that child abuse?” Jimmy says jokingly.
He finally relents and shares the photo through text.
There, in all of its glory, is his son, Joe Burrow, smiling for the camera while donning a red-striped shirt and black jeans, a basketball positioned under his left tennis shoe, and awkwardly gripping an unlit cigar in his left hand.