Farasopoulos was selected 79th overall in the fourth round by the
Baltimore Orioles in the
1967 Major League Baseball draft. He turned down the Orioles' $5,000 offer after they asked him to change his name "to something like Faras," which he felt "was like offering to take only half of me." He chose instead to accept a full and guaranteed football scholarship from Brigham Young University (BYU) where he was hailed as "the Galloping Greek" by the
Arizona Republic. Best known for his
agility and speed at BYU, Farasopoulos played defensive back as well as punt and kickoff return. In 1968, he set a
Western Athletic Conference record for average yards returned per kickoff at 27.2, a record that stood until
Chad Owens's 29.4 average yards per return years later. After selecting
John Riggins and
John Mooring in the first and second rounds of the
1971 NFL draft, the
New York Jets chose Farasopoulos in the third round with the 58th pick overall. During his rookie season, he began a lasting friendship with teammates Riggins and
Burgess Owens. He later played for the
New Orleans Saints. Following his football career, Farasopoulos held management positions at VLSI Technology Inc. and
National Semiconductor. He then spent 13 years at
Integrated Device Technology (IDCT) in various operations management positions, both at the Technology Center and the Static RAM Division in
Salinas, California. Most recently, Farasopoulos was responsible for customer operations and business development as vice president with QuickSil of
Fremont, California. ==Personal life==