Dead player’s parents seeking info from Bucknell
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Tisha Thompson, ESPNAug 23, 2024, 01:08 PM ET
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Tisha Thompson is an investigative reporter for ESPN based in Washington, D.C. Her work appears on all platforms, both domestically and internationally.
Bucknell University has told the parents of a freshman football player who died in July that it is investigating his death, but the player’s parents say they are unsatisfied with the school’s response because Bucknell has not provided any details about the circumstances leading to their son’s death.
Calvin “C.J.” Dickey Jr., an 18-year-old freshman, died July 12, two days after collapsing at his first workout with the Bisons. Emergency doctors told Dickey’s parents that he collapsed from sickle cell-related rhabdomyolysis, a medical condition that experts told ESPN is easily prevented, and even reversed, by simply stopping exercise. Dickey’s parents said their son had previously tested positive for sickle cell trait as part of NCAA-required testing for athletes. They said the team’s head trainer knew about the results of the test before Dickey arrived at Bucknell.
Individuals with sickle cell trait are at a higher risk of a life-threatening condition if they begin to feel fatigued and do not stop exercising. The NCAA’s online “fact sheet” for coaches says that “knowledge of sickle cell trait status can be a gateway to education and simple precautions that may prevent collapse among athletes with sickle cell trait, allowing them to thrive in sport.”
It is unclear what protocols Bucknell had in place to monitor Dickey’s condition during his first workout. Dickey, while in the hospital after collapsing, told his parents he had been doing repeated up-downs, a training exercise in which players quickly drop into a pushup position before jumping into a squat and then standing position.
Bucknell declined to answer a detailed list of questions from ESPN or to make Bucknell’s football coach and head athletic trainer available for an interview. In a statement to ESPN, a spokesperson for the school said, “We offer our deepest condolences to the Dickey family, and are not able to comment further at this time.”
“I want [Bucknell] to own this, to take accountability,” his mother, Nicole Dickey, told ESPN. “Nothing is going to bring our child back. I want the truth.”
Dickey’s parents want a review of any video recordings of the workout session and other events preceding his collapse, as well as interviews with athletes and staff. In a letter to the family’s attorney, reviewed by ESPN, Bucknell said it was investigating Dickey’s death.
“The parents are devastated, obviously,” said family attorney Mike Caspino. “But their devastation is compounded by the fact that Bucknell is not being transparent. Despite repeated requests for information, they have denied these requests. They have repeatedly told us that their investigation is ongoing, and they can’t provide us with any details.”
The family is trying to piece together what happened to their son based on documents and comments he and his doctors made before he died.
Dickey’s parents said their son never experienced any issues with exhaustion while practicing or playing football and baseball for Carrollwood Day School in Tampa, Florida — even when playing both offensive and defensive line in 100-degree weather his senior year.
“He was probably the hardest-working kid I have ever been around,” said Raymond McNeil, one of Carrollwood’s football coaches. “He played through injuries. He played through everything. This is a kid that’s literally playing 100 to 110 plays a game on both sides of the ball.”
When it came time for college, Dickey chose to play football at Bucknell because “he felt like they wanted him,” Nicole said.
His mother said the family never tested Dickey for sickle cell trait until the NCAA required it and that she wasn’t surprised when the test showed he had the trait because she has it as well.
She said she sent documentation to Bucknell confirming the results of Dickey’s test. Nicole said she spoke to head football athletic trainer Kaiti Hager approximately two weeks before Dickey arrived on campus. Hager confirmed on that call that they knew Dickey had sickle cell trait, Nicole said.
Dickey’s father, Calvin Sr., dropped off his son for his first day of minicamp at Bucknell on July 10 at roughly 10:45 a.m. Nicole has a copy of the agenda for the day, which indicates their son and other incoming freshmen were scheduled to have a “med check” at noon. The Dickeys do not know what occurred during those meetings or even if those meetings actually happened.
The agenda also shows “offensive lifting” at 1 p.m. in the weight room followed by 2:15 p.m. “defensive lifting” and “first year/transfer lifting” at 3:30 p.m.
At 3:29 p.m., Nicole received a phone call from her normally laid-back son.
“He was very agitated,” she said. “He was extremely upset.”
Dickey told his mother that he and nine other players had not been “cleared to do workouts or to start training today,” she said.
Dickey’s parents said they were struck by how agitated their son was and are still unclear about why he was so uncharacteristically upset. She said she attempted to calm him down, telling him, “If you don’t work out today, it’s OK. You’ve got the rest of the summer.”
Ten minutes later, Dickey called his mother back and said, “The coaches said it was something they did not do, but we’re cleared, and I’m going to work out,” according to Nicole.
Then, at 5:16 p.m., Nicole received a call from Hager saying she was at the emergency room with Dickey and that he collapsed at practice and “has passed out.”
The Dickeys drove as quickly as they could to the community hospital where Hager met them at roughly 5:45 p.m. The athletic trainer told them their son had been in an air-conditioned building when he passed out and that “someone had to get her” because she wasn’t in the room when he collapsed, Calvin Sr. said. It’s unclear if Dickey was working out in the air-conditioned building or elsewhere.
“She said when she found him, he was out of it and he was kind of clammy. She said his heart rhythm was off, or he had an abnormal heart rhythm or something of that nature. And she said she also had to shock him,” Calvin Sr. said. “She didn’t say if it was successful or not.”
Calvin Sr. said he interpreted the trainer’s words to mean Hager tried to use an automated external defibrillator even though their son had a discernible heartbeat. Hager did not respond to ESPN’s request for comment.
When Dickey’s parents saw their son at about 6 p.m., he had regained consciousness but had low blood pressure and a high heart rate, was breathing heavily and was asking repeatedly for water.
When Nicole asked her son what had happened, Dickey responded, “They had us doing up-downs” and that “some of the kids were not getting it right, so they had us repeat doing them.”
The Dickeys said an emergency room doctor handed them a printout about sickle cell-induced rhabdomyolysis before telling them their son was at risk of kidney and liver damage and needed to be transported to Geisinger Medical Center, a Level I trauma center in Danville, Pennsylvania.
Rhabdomyolysis is the medical terminology for when muscle breaks down and dies. When someone with sickle cell trait doesn’t stop exercising, their blood cells can begin to “sickle,” or turn into a moon shape, said Dr. Kimberly Harmon, the head football physician at the University of Washington who has published multiple research papers on sudden death associated with sickle cell trait.
These moon-shaped cells “get stuck in the very, very tiny little blood vessels, called the capillaries, in the muscles and create a log jam or a dam to the muscles,” Harmon said. “The muscles can’t get oxygen because these moon-shaped blood cells are blocking the blood supply and the muscle dies.”
As a result, she said, the muscles release toxins and other contents that cause cardiac arrhythmias, kidney damage and organ failure, all of which can lead to death.
The key to avoiding rhabdomyolysis, Harmon said, is for someone to immediately stop exercising as soon as they begin to feel fatigued. Athletes with sickle cell trait report experiencing cramping, most often in the legs and back. These “cramps,” Harmon said, can feel different and are flaccid to the touch, while normal cramping often causes a muscle to become hard.
Harmon said there is a significant difference between sickle cell trait and sickle cell disease, which would prevent people from playing sports. She and other experts note a number of collegiate players with sickle cell trait have gone on to have successful careers in the NFL.
Dickey arrived at the trauma hospital at around 10 p.m. the same day he collapsed and was later put on dialysis, according to his parents.
Two days later, on July 12, according to his parents, his weight had ballooned from 290 pounds to more than 315 pounds, and he was rushed into emergency surgery to slice open both of his calves and one of his forearms to relieve pressure building in his extremities.
“He was starting to lose feeling in his fingers and toes and feet, and his arms were swelling,” Calvin Sr. said. “The analogy they used was like sausages, when they get hot and they split. They had to do that in order to release the pressure from his arms.”
His parents said Dickey’s heart stopped beating during surgery and that doctors were able to resuscitate him before returning him to his room. But after surgery, Dickey’s heart stopped at least four more times, and his parents watched as doctors used CPR and an AED to try to resuscitate him.
“They shocked him, two, maybe three times. It lifts him off the bed. It was so violent,” Calvin Sr. said. “You can see, like, his whole body lifting up, and I’m like, ‘Oh my God, what is this?'”
The last time Dickey’s heart stopped, Nicole said the doctors attempted to bring him back for 20 minutes before she and Calvin Sr. told them to stop.
“It was the toughest decision I ever made in my life, ever. And I almost regret making it,” Calvin Sr. said. “But at the same time, to see your child going through this, you don’t want this for your child.”
Quietly crying next to her husband, Nicole nodded as he said, “When they were working on him, he was not really breathing.”
“C.J.’s spirit was not there,” she said.
Dickey’s parents say they believe their son’s death was preventable.
“I keep asking Calvin [Sr.], what could they have done?” Nicole said. “What could they have possibly done [at Bucknell] that he has not experienced in Florida?”
They are still waiting on the results of the local coroner’s report. A private autopsy requested by the family, performed by Dr. Jose SuarezHoyos in Tampa after the local coroner completed his autopsy, found that several organs, including the lungs, had red blood cells in the sickle shape.
The NCAA has required athletes to be tested for sickle cell trait since 2010, a move that stemmed from a settlement agreement with the family of Dale Lloyd II, a Rice University football player who collapsed during practice and died from rhabdomyolysis.
In its online fact sheet for coaches, the NCAA says, “Incidents of sudden death in athletes with sickle cell trait have been exclusive to conditioning sessions rather than game or skill practice situations. … Coaches should conduct appropriate sport-specific conditioning based on sound scientific principles and be ready to intervene when student-athletes show signs of distress. Student-athletes can begin to experience symptoms after only one to three minutes of sprinting, or in any other full exertion of sustained effort, thus quickly increasing the risk of complications.”
The pamphlet provides about a dozen suggestions for how athletes with sickle cell trait can moderate their exercise, including: “Implement a slow and gradual preseason conditioning regimen that prepares them for the rigors of the sport,” “be provided adequate rest and recovery between repetitions, especially during ‘gassers’ and intense station or ‘mat’ drills” and “be allowed to set their own pace while conditioning.”
The NCAA did not respond to questions sent by ESPN.
David Beaty, who recruited Lloyd to Rice as the team’s offensive coordinator, said he didn’t realize at the time how dangerous sickle cell trait could be. As the head coach at the University of Kansas, Beaty required players with sickle cell trait to wear a different color jersey or helmet during workouts so trainers and coaches could easily identify them if they began to struggle.
“I made sure that every time we go over our medical report, which is every single day, at the bottom of the report are the sickle cell kids. And every single day, I would read their names off until all of us coaches had committed it to memory,” said Beaty, who is now the wide receivers coach at Florida Atlantic University.
Beaty said he would like to see the NCAA strengthen its mandates and require all coaches to receive additional education on death associated with sickle cell trait.
“They don’t have to die,” Beaty reiterated. “There’s no drill, no practice, no amount of pushing, no lesson to be learned. There’s nothing worth a kid’s life.”
The day before Dickey collapsed, he and his father met with Bucknell’s coaching staff, including assistant offensive line coach Sean Pearson. According to Calvin Sr., Pearson told him, “You’re delivering a young man to me now. I’m going to deliver you a man when he’s finished here at Bucknell. We’re going to take good care of your son.”
Calvin Sr. and his wife now want answers from the university and its coaches.
“I want to hear from them,” Calvin Sr. said. “Not sugar-coating it, but who didn’t do what? Who should have done something and what could have been done or should have been done so this doesn’t happen again.”
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Sports
Rays to play 2025 season at Yankees’ spring field
Published
7 hours agoon
November 14, 2024By
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Associated Press
Nov 14, 2024, 12:13 PM ET
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — The Tampa Bay Rays will play their 2025 home games at the New York Yankees‘ nearby spring training ballpark amid uncertainty about the future of hurricane-damaged Tropicana Field, Rays executives told The Associated Press.
Stuart Sternberg, the Rays’ principal owner, said in an interview that Steinbrenner Field in Tampa is the best fit for the team and its fanbase. At about 11,000 seats, it’s also the largest spring training site in Florida.
“It is singularly the best opportunity for our fans to experience 81 games of major league Rays baseball,” Sternberg said. “As difficult as it is to get any of these stadiums up to major league standards, it was the least difficult. You’re going to see Major League Baseball in a small environment.”
Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred said the Rays-Yankees deal is good for the sport and the Tampa Bay region.
“This outcome meets Major League Baseball’s goals that Rays fans will see their team play next season in their home market and that their players can remain home without disruption to their families,” Manfred said in a news release.
The Rays’ home since 1998, the domed Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, was hit hard by Hurricane Milton on Oct. 9, with most of its fabric roof shredded and water damage inside. The city of St. Petersburg, which owns the Trop, released an assessment of the damage and repair needs that estimated the cost at $55.7 million if it is to be ready for the start of the 2026 season.
The work would have to be approved by the city council, which earlier this year voted for a new $1.3 billion, 30,000-seat stadium to replace Tropicana Field beginning in 2028. The new stadium is part of a much larger urban revitalization project known as the Historic Gas Plant District — named for the Black community that once occupied the 86 acres that includes retail, hotels, office space, a Black history museum, restaurants and bars.
Amid the uncertainty, the Rays know one thing: they will play 2025 in a smallish, outdoor ballpark operated by one of their main American League East rivals. A ballpark with a facade mimicking that of Yankee Stadium in New York and festooned with plaques of Yankees players whose numbers have been retired.
Brian Auld, the Rays co-president, said in an interview that Tampa Bay has to be ready for a regular-season MLB game March 27 against the Colorado Rockies, just three days after the Yankees break training camp.
“There will be a ton of work toward putting in our brand,” Auld said. “The term we like to use for that is “Rayful’ into Steinbrenner Field.”
It will also come with weather challenges in the hot, rainy Florida summer climate the Rays didn’t worry about in their domed ballpark. The Rays averaged about 16,500 fans per game during the 2024 season.
The Yankees will receive about $15 million in revenue for hosting the Rays, a person familiar with the arrangement told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because that detail was not announced. The money won’t come from Tampa Bay but from other sources, such as insurance.
Once known as Legends Field, Steinbrenner Field opened in 1996 on Tampa’s north side. It is named for longtime Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, who ran a shipbuilding company in Tampa and died at his home there in 2010. One of his sons, Yankees executive Hal Steinbrenner, was instrumental in getting the deal done with the Rays, Sternberg said.
“This is a heavy lift for the Yankees. This is a huge ask by us and baseball of the Yankees,” Sternberg said. “[Hal Steinbrenner] did not waver for one second. I couldn’t have been more grateful.”
Hal Steinbrenner said in a news release that the Yankees are “happy to extend our hand to the Rays” and noted that the team and his family have “deep roots” in the Tampa Bay area.
“In times like these, rivalry and competition take a back seat to doing what’s right for our community, which is continuing to help families and businesses rebound from the devastation caused by Hurricanes Helene and Milton,” he said.
The Tampa Tarpons, one of the Yankees’ minor league teams, play their home games at Steinbrenner Field during the summer. They will use baseball diamonds elsewhere in the training complex this season.
It’s not the first time a big league team will host regular-season games in a spring training stadium. The Toronto Blue Jays played part of the 2021 season at their facility in Dunedin because of Canadian government restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Sports
4-star QB 6th to decommit from FSU’s 2025 class
Published
10 hours agoon
November 14, 2024By
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Eli Lederman, ESPN Staff WriterNov 14, 2024, 09:37 AM ET
Close- Eli Lederman covers college football and recruiting for ESPN.com. He joined ESPN in 2024 after covering the University of Oklahoma for Sellout Crowd and the Tulsa World.
Four-star Florida State quarterback pledge Tramell Jones pulled his commitment from the Seminoles Thursday morning, marking the sixth departure from Mike Norvell’s 2025 class across the program’s 1-9 start to the regular season this fall.
Jones, a 6-foot, 190-pound passer from Jacksonville, Florida, is ESPN’s ninth-ranked dual-threat quarterback prospect in the 2025 cycle. The longest-tenured member of Florida State’s 2025 class, Jones’ decommitment arrives five days after Norvell fired three members of his coaching staff on Sunday following the program’s 52-3 defeat at Notre Dame, headlined by the exit of offensive coordinator and offensive line coach Alex Atkins.
Jones’ move represents the latest blow to a Seminoles’ class that’s taken a series of hits this fall as Florida State has followed its 13-1 in 2023 with a disastrous 2024 campaign. A previous lynchpin in the program’s 2025 class, Jones follows ESPN 300 prospects Myron Charles, Javion Hilson, Malik Clark, Daylan McCutcheon and CJ Wiley among the top recruits who have left Norvell’s incoming class since the Seminoles’ Aug. 24 season opener. Jones’ exit leaves Florida State with 12 prospects left committed in 2025, including five ESPN 300 pledges led by five-star offensive tackle Solomon Thomas, ESPN’s No. 13 overall prospect in the 2025 cycle.
Florida State sat at No. 37 in ESPN’s class rankings in 2025 prior to Jones’ decommitment Thursday with further movement expected out of the Seminoles’ class in the coming weeks.
With his recruitment reopened, Jones stands as one of the top uncommitted quarterbacks in the final weeks of the 2025 cycle. A four-year starter at Florida’s Mandarin High School, Florida has remained in contact with Jones this fall, and sources within the Gators’ program are optimistic that Florida will ultimately land Jones in the final weeks of the cycle following the school’s decision to keep Billy Napier as head coach beyond 2024.
Florida is set to host a series of high-profile recruits when the Gators host LSU at 3:30 p.m. on ABC Saturday afternoon. Florida State is off in Week 12 before a Nov. 23 visit from Charleston Southern.
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Even in death, college football fans want to be at their favorite stadiums
Published
12 hours agoon
November 14, 2024By
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Andrea Adelson, ESPN Senior WriterNov 14, 2024, 07:08 AM ET
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- Joined ESPN.com in 2010.
- Graduate of the University of Florida.
BARBARA WEITZ SAT at a Nebraska Board of Regents meeting over the summer, when thinking about ways to generate revenue to help mitigate recent university budget cuts, she blurted out an idea.
Without much thought or research, Weitz wondered aloud whether passionate Nebraska fans would pay money to have cremated remains stored in a columbarium, a standalone structure with cubbies that house said remains. Even better, with a grass field set to be installed at Memorial Stadium in 2026, what if that columbarium was built underneath the football field as part of the renovations?
“Then grandma or grandpa or sister or brother could be a Husker supporter forever,” Weitz said.
Her fellow regents laughed her out of the room. Nobody liked the thought of games being played above a de facto burial ground. The idea was impractical, anyway. If the columbarium was built under the field, they would also have to construct an underground entrance for people to be able to visit, and how exactly would that work?
Feeling discouraged, Weitz went about her other work. But the meeting was public, and soon a newspaper article published her idea. Before long, the emails started coming in. One came from a casket company in Kansas interested in helping make the hypothetical columbarium. Another came from a company in Ireland claiming to have done a similar thing already, for a rugby and soccer club in the United Kingdom. She also learned someone was trying to build a columbarium in South Carolina, near Williams-Brice Stadium, but plans had stalled.
The idea gained enough traction that at a recent football game, someone stopped Weitz and said that if the columbarium became a reality, she would pay to have her husband’s ashes housed there. Weitz got plenty of emails from Cornhusker fans to the same effect.
When she blurted out her idea, Weitz did not know just how often fans spread the cremated remains of their friends and loved ones at college football venues across the country, mostly without permission. Choice Mutual, a company that offers insurance policies to cover end-of-life expenses, conducted a survey that asked Americans where they would want their ashes spread if they choose to be cremated.
The survey, published in July, listed the top choice in all 50 states. Sports venues topped the list in 11, including college football stadiums in Arkansas, Idaho, Michigan, North Carolina, Oklahoma and Wisconsin. Anthony Martin, owner and CEO of Choice Mutual, said in an email, “We were definitely surprised by the prevalence of sporting venues as the target. We assumed some sporting venues would show up, but not this many.”
“Let’s face it. Fan is short for fanatic,” said Chris Gerbasi, who helped spread the remains of his good friend, John Burr, at Michigan Stadium in 2005. “He was a diehard, no pun intended. It made perfect sense for him to want his ashes to be on the field. He would have laughed his ass off at us being able to achieve that.”
MOST SCHOOLS HAVE strict rules prohibiting the spreading of ashes onto playing surfaces, both to preserve the grass and also simply to limit trespassing. But when you are determined to complete a final wish, you simply find a way.
Like Gerbasi did. He and three others set out for Michigan Stadium in July 2005 to honor Burr, who died following complications from an accident at age 41. Gerbasi and Burr attended Michigan together in the 1980s and went to the 1998 Rose Bowl that clinched a national championship season for the Wolverines.
When Gerbasi was a student, Michigan Stadium was easy to enter. But when he and his companions arrived that summer night, they encountered one locked gate after another. They walked around the stadium, until, Gerbasi says, “It was almost like seeing the light.”
A bright light was coming from the east side of the stadium, where renovations were underway. They saw a way in, down the ramp where players walk from the locker room to the field, and made their way to the 50-yard line.
“I don’t get excited about too many things, but it was awe-inspiring for the four of us to be standing on the 50-yard line in an empty Michigan Stadium,” Gerbasi said.
Burr’s brother handed Gerbasi a bag with the ashes.
“There just happened to be a little gust of wind, and I kind of twirled the bag in the air a little bit, and all the ashes flew out, and the wind caught ’em, and they flew down the field,” Gerbasi said. “Looking back on it now, it was cool as hell. It was like somebody opened up this door for us.”
Parker Hollowell had a similar idea for his dad, Dean Hollowell, who died in 2015 following a car accident at age 72. Dean was a lifelong Ole Miss fan and took Parker to games his entire life. When his stepmom said his father was going to be cremated, Parker knew what he needed to do.
He waited until dusk one night in August that year and drove to Vaught-Hemingway Stadium, the place where he and his dad shared so many memories. A new field was being put in, and though workers were still around, nobody said a word to Hollowell and a friend as they made their way to the 50-yard line.
Hollowell said a few words to his dad as he spread the ashes, while his friend took a video.
“I thought it was a tribute to my dad,” Hollowell said. “That was our life, that’s what we’ve done as a family. Period. Now my dad’s got a 50-yard line seat. He’s right there with me when I go to games. I don’t see anything wrong with it.”
Having done it for his dad, Hollowell now has his final resting spot picked out.
“I am going to ask my son to put me in the end zone. Where Tre Harris scored on LSU [last year],” Hollowell said.
Ann and her husband, Johnny, had a similar conversation at their dinner table in North Carolina years ago. Ann, who asked that her last name not be used, cannot remember how they got on the topic, but they started discussing where they wanted to be buried.
Johnny asked to be cremated and have his ashes scattered in three spots. First, the beach. Easy enough.
Second, Carter-Finley Stadium, home to his beloved NC State Wolfpack. Slightly more challenging, but OK.
And, if possible, Kenan Stadium, home to North Carolina, as friend Theo Manos recalled, “so he could haunt those MFers.”
“I thought he was kidding,” Ann said. “But then I realized he was serious.”
Ann figured she would have time to plan it all out. But Johnny died unexpectedly at age 52 in 2007. A “total shock,” Ann said.
She decided she would sprinkle his ashes in their longtime tailgating spot outside Carter-Finley, a picturesque area filled with trees. They had a tight-knit tailgating group — some had been friends with Johnny since kindergarten. On the day they spread his ashes, they formed a circle, said a few prayers and then Ann placed his remains near a spruce tree.
The spot has become a resting place for several others, including their son, Allen, who died in 2017. “I thought that was a good sentimental thing to do,” Ann said. Johnny’s sister, Nancy, also has some of her remains there, as well as another tailgater in their group.
She noted the spruce tree “shot up out of nowhere” after placing Johnny there. But last year, NC State cut down many trees in their tailgating area — including that beloved spruce. Ann still brings flowers to every home game and places them on the spot where she sprinkled the remains of her husband and son. The group pours a drink on the ashes and says, “Here’s to you, Johnny.”
As for Kenan Stadium, let’s just say Johnny did make his way onto the field. How and when, well, Ann says that must remain a mystery. But it should be noted NC State is 6-2 in Chapel Hill since Johnny died.
WHEN JASON FAIRES was in his first year as Oklahoma director of athletic fields and grounds in 2019, he spotted a man in the south end zone holding a paper grocery bag, without gloves on, taking handfuls of something unidentifiable and dropping it on the ground.
“I start to lose it, and ‘I’m like, ‘What the hell are you doing?'” said Faires, now golf course superintendent at Dornick Hills Country Club in Ardmore, Oklahoma. “He goes, ‘This is my dad. Just spreading his ashes out here, like he wanted me to.’ I’m like, ‘Did you get permission to do this?’ He didn’t think he needed permission, and he’s just dropping clumps. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen ashes. It’s not just ashes, it’s frickin’ bone and everything.
“So out of respect for him, I said, ‘OK.’ As soon as he left, I had to go out there and kick him around, spread him out. I felt weird doing that. I started telling that story at a meeting, and they’re like, ‘Oh yeah, that happens a lot.'”
Plenty of field managers across conferences have stories about encountering fans evading gates, waiting out security personnel or downright trespassing in their quest to make it onto the field to spread ashes. While it is not technically illegal to scatter ashes, most states require permission be granted if remains will be spread on private property — like football stadiums — or on public property or national parks. Some states require a permit to spread ashes in public areas.
“When I worked at LSU in 2007, it was about 2:30 in the morning after the Virginia Tech game and we saw someone leaning up against the goal post,” said Brandon Hardin, now the superintendent of sports turf at Mississippi State. “We were like, ‘Hey, what’s this guy doing?’ He had a book in his hand, and he opened it and dumped ashes out on the ground and had his moment. Then he turned around and walked off. Never saw him again.”
At Texas A&M, too, where Nick McKenna serves as assistant athletics director of sports fields. He recalled the time the Yell Leaders at Texas A&M had a former leader’s ashes spread at Kyle Field without permission, upsetting their longtime facility manager.
“So he had the head field manager go out, vacuum them up, put them in a jar, and he took them to the Yell Leader and said, “Y’all left someone out there on the field the other day. Just wanted to return him to you,” McKenna said.
Another time, someone had spread ashes in the outfield before a baseball game.
“I remember having to talk with our center fielder because there was this cloud ring of remains,” McKenna said. “He was like, what in the heck? I was like, ‘You’re out there basically playing in a ring of death.'”
As all three turf managers explained, fans are unaware of how much goes into caring for the fields across all their athletics venues. That includes resodding the fields after a set amount of time. Oklahoma, for example, resodded the field last summer. Texas A&M does it every 12 to 15 years.
“So the majority of these relatives who have been spread on that field are down on the left side of the driving range at the OU golf course because that’s where all the material goes when we redo the field,” Faires said. “You don’t say that or anything, but you kind of feel bad for them.”
When grounds crews see ashes that have been left on a field, they quickly work to limit the damage. The ashes are either vacuumed up or blown around with a backpack blower. Some will run water through them to flush them through. What grounds crews want to avoid is their sophisticated and expensive lawn mowers picking up bone fragments, which could damage the equipment.
Hardin says he has gained a newfound perspective on spreading ashes to fulfill a loved ones’ request, after he did it for his dad last November in the Arkansas mountains.
“It’s very special to the person that does it, so we try to be very understanding,” Hardin said. “We tell people no, and then they still find a way to do it, because it was somebody’s last wish. People need that closure.
“It’s not going to hurt the grass, but if you ask certain people within organizations or schools, it gives you the heebie-jeebies knowing that it’s there and visible.”
That makes the columbarium idea all the more appealing to Weitz. She has tried to brainstorm other ideas than having it under the field — could it be outside the stadium? In the tunnel leading to the field?
“These responses I got after the meeting said to me this is creative and there are ways to do these things,” Weitz said. “So it really encouraged me in a lot of ways, but I haven’t come up with any new ideas.”
Putting a columbarium under the field might not be practical, but burial grounds for mascots do exist both inside and outside stadiums. In fact, Mex, a brindle bulldog who was Oklahoma’s mascot in the 1920s, is buried in a casket under the football stadium. Bully I, Mississippi State’s first mascot, is buried on stadium grounds. Other Bully mascots have had their ashes spread on the football field.
Texas A&M has a burial ground for its Reveille mascots on the north end of Kyle Field. A statue of the SMU mascot, Peruna, is on the burial site of Peruna I outside Ford Stadium. Sanford Stadium has a mausoleum dedicated to its UGA mascots.
McKenna remembers reading about Weitz and her columbarium idea over the summer.
“I don’t know where you would put it logistically, but as somebody who’s encountered people spreading ashes and understands how often it happens and the nuances, it’s not the worst idea in the world,” he said.
Weitz will keep thinking about it. Others will keep finding ways to honor their loved ones and their passion for college football. Loved ones such as Fred “The Head” Miller, who once asked former Florida State alumni association president Jim Melton if his head could be buried underneath the Seminole logo at midfield.
“True story,” Melton says.
Miller played fullback at Florida State from 1973-76 and then became the ultimate super fan — painting the Seminoles logo on his bald head for every home game, beginning in 1981. Hence his nickname.
He died in 1992 at age 38 of a heart attack and was cremated. Miller asked his family to scatter his ashes at Doak Campbell Stadium.
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