The most intriguing point that you made, I think, is that you gave a writing assignment and many students chose, of all possible choices, professional athletes. I'd be quite concerned too! So that I have a little more context, may I ask the general group of your students?
I don't follow professional sports very much, myself. But even I know titans like Tiger Woods and Michael Phelps; I hadn't realized that Phelps also had DUI's! That's disappointing for sure...
You more or less already summarize my thoughts on the topic - the word "hero" might simply not mean to others what it means to us. Some of us think of those who sacrifice or risk much to help or save others, but professional sports players are, as by job description, competing to be the in the top rank. Nothing wrong with that, just doesn't feel heroic. And we can all still at least admire the amount of training that they do to get to where they are, not just anyone can pull that off. Dedication to self improvement is an excellent thing to be a role model for... Unless the training is so intense it might sap willpower from other things that matter? I can only speculate on the lapses of judgment from many famous sports players...
But competing to be the top, in my view, is admirable but not heroic. I feel that many heroes simply are invisible, maybe nameless to us, and therefore we don't have as strong a connection to them. When they're successful, things are normal, if they falter, things become tragic. It's not as fun to think too much about these things - yay, I'm still alive! Or oh no, my pet had to be put down...
Looks line my post is getting really long, so I'll put down a team of heroes to me : all the people of the world who worked together to eradicate smallpox. It's such an abstract thing, it's gone and doesn't affect me, but only because people like William Foege (Author of House on Fire, an account of the eradication of smallpox) and his coworkers dedicated themselves to its destruction. I admire what they did, and yet it feels weird to say so... Their triumph, though monumental, was in the past, and is proven by something that just isn't happening anymore. If I want to cheer them on, I have to learn of more people trying to eradicate different diseases, but then they're facing a lot of hard, maybe boring work, and a lot of frustration...
This is such a great and well thought out comment. I agree that most of today’s real heroism are indeed , invisible. They don’t seek out attention for their actions. I teach grade 8 students btw. Thank you for sharing your ideas.