Barack Obama honors Philadelphia Eagles' Chris Long with shout out for charity

Dec. 30 (UPI) -- Chris Long received praise from Barack Obama after generously pledging to give his entire 2017 salary to educationally based programs.

The Philadelphia Eagles defensive end told reporters Friday that it's an honor to be mentioned by the former President of the United States.

"It's cool. At the end of the day that's an honor that that would fly across one of our former President's radar," Long told reporters Friday, according to PhiladelphiaEagles.com. "That's the whole point of doing good things in the community, spreading positivity and it's an honor to be mentioned."

"That's somebody I have a lot of respect for, just the class that he carried himself with as the face of our nation. You don't have to agree with every single thing politically all the time, and that's kind of what we've gotten into doing as a country, politicizing everything, but I have a great deal of respect for him as a President and as a man and a family man. To see him pick that up on his radar is pretty cool for me."

Long, 32, is due $1 million - with a $750,000 roster bonus - this season for the Eagles. The 10-year NFL veteran is the son of Pro Football Hall of Famer Howie Long and the brother of Chicago Bears tackle Kyle Long.

Obama mentioned Long with a Tweet on Friday afternoon. He was tweeting out some of his favorite stories from 2017.

"Chris Long gave his paychecks from the first six games of the NFL season to fund scholarships in Charlottesville, VA. He wanted to do more, so he decided to give away an entire season's salary. That's a story from 2017," Obama tweeted, including a link to a Philly.com article.

Long used his first six game checks for the 2017 season to fund two seven-year scholarships to a school in his hometown of Charlottesville, Va. He's giving his final 10 checks from the regular season to four non-profit organizations that provide education opportunities to children in St. Louis, Boston and Philadelphia.

"I've been able to make a lot of money playing a game," Long told the Eagles website in October. "At the end of the day, it's my 10th year so you don't know how much longer you're going to have the platform to do something like that and for me to give my game checks hopefully it rallies fans to work toward a match."

"I think education's something that's always been really important to my wife [Megan] and me. We've funded scholarships in our hometown but we wanted to do something that was on a larger scale and in some of the cities that have been so gracious and welcoming to me as a player over my 10-year career."

Long enters the final year of his contract in 2018.