Junior Seau

by Jim Trotter

  At the halfway point of the season they were 7–1 and cruising when turbulence hit in the form of injuries. Humphries, who had missed the final series in a 20–15 loss to the Broncos two weeks earlier because of a badly sprained ankle, sat out a 10–9 loss at Atlanta. Center Courtney Hall was also dealing with a partially torn biceps and bum knee that would require surgery at the end of the season; and guard Joe Cocozzo had a foot injury that caused him to miss time. Even Junior was having issues. On November 20, on the fourth play of a 23–17 loss at New England, he sustained a pinched nerve in his neck. Each time he sustained a hit in that area, a current of incredible pain would shoot down his spine and through his body, leaving his right arm limp and useless at times.

  “You’ve got to play through it,” he told reporters two weeks after sustaining the injury. “You never play this game 100 percent healthy. It’s nothing to complain about. I’ll still be out there.”

  He didn’t miss a game that season and helped the Chargers advance to the AFC Championship Game for only the third time in franchise history, but late that season it was clear he was not in a good place physically. Keoki Kamau, the Chargers’ head trainer, was so concerned that he took Junior’s helmet in one game and told equipment manager Sid Brooks to lock it away.

  “I can’t believe you’d just take my helmet,” Junior said to Kamau, furious.

  “Bug, at some point we’ve got to stop this,” Kamau said. “I’m tired of seeing you hurting. I don’t like seeing you hurting this thing even more.”

  “I’ll be fine,” Junior said defiantly.

  Players often talk of a “warrior mentality” and never giving in to pain. They’ll take shots, oral medication, anything to stay on the field, particularly when they see a player of Junior’s stature sacrificing his body.

  “There’s a ripple effect,” Kamau said. “John Parrella, the stud defensive tackle, breaks his thumb in the conference final and I tell him, ‘You can’t go back in.’ He’s like, ‘Bullshit! I’m playing. Let’s go. All we have to do is put a cast on it.’ He went back in, and the next day he had surgery and they put pins in it. . . .

  “When you look at what goes on, you constantly ask yourself, are you doing the right thing? Am I putting them in positions where they’re going to get exposed to further injury? So you do all types of testing to make sure that that doesn’t happen. Medically, anatomically, whatever test is available, doctor’s experience—you use all you can to make sure they’re okay.”

  The Chargers’ coaching staff knew that Junior wasn’t 100 percent for the showdown against the Steelers in the AFC Championship Game, so they designed a game plan that would accentuate what he still could do effectively. If they were going to send him on the blitz, for instance, they would have him come from an angle that would lessen the chances of him aggravating the pinched nerve. But like some plans, things didn’t go as designed.

  Early in the first quarter Junior walloped running back Barry Foster. An electricity-like current immediately ran through his body, leaving his right arm limp. Feeling eventually returned to it, but the sequence would repeat itself multiple times over the course of the game; each time it did, Junior refused to give in. He finished the first half with nine of his game-high 16 tackles as the Chargers went on to upset the Steelers, 17–13, and reach their first Super Bowl.

  None of Junior’s tackles was bigger than the last one: on third-and-goal from the 10 with 1:22 to play, quarterback Neil O’Donnell looked for fullback John Williams in the flat. The 231-pound Williams had caught a similar pass earlier in the game and bulled through linebacker Dennis Gibson for a 16-yard score. This time, after catching the ball at the 5, he had to deal with Junior—and Junior’s bad arm. It was no contest. With the help of Griggs, Junior brought him down at the 3-yard line. One play later Gibson batted down a pass at the goal line to preserve the victory.

  For Junior, succumbing to injury was not an option. Too much was at stake. The Chargers had been to the AFC Championship Game twice before but lost both times, in 1980 and 1981. The first defeat was 34–27 at home to the Raiders, whom they had split with in the regular season. The second was 27–7 to the Bengals, in what came to be known as The Freezer Bowl, a game that featured a wind chill of minus-59, making it the coldest game in league history. If that hadn’t been disadvantage enough for the California-based Chargers that year, they had played the previous week in the high heat and humidity of Miami, prevailing 41–38 in overtime. In one week they had gone from the steam room to the icebox, from 79 degrees at kickoff to minus-9.

  “It’s pain,” he said of his shoulder after the victory, “but after what happened here, it’s worthwhile.”

  When Gibson batted down the goal-line pass, Junior didn’t know whether to smile, cry, or laugh with glee. He did all three. Gina was the only immediate family member to attend the game, and when she reached him outside the locker room they hugged and sobbed. Her face was smashed against his jersey, which was drenched with sweat and rain, and all he kept saying was, “We did it! We did it, G!”

  Gina had to cut short their time together because she needed to catch a plane back to San Diego. Junior reached town before her and, along with the rest of the team, immediately was taken to San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium, where more than 70,000 fans were waiting to continue the nightlong celebration. He was flanked on each side by his parents as he emerged from the tunnel to a large ovation. He wore a Chargers jacket, an AFC Championship Game cap, floral shorts, and Flojos. He said nothing, but it was apparent that he was practicing the teachings of his mother, who after each victory would tell him: “Put it in your heart. Don’t show off. God has given this to you. Put it in your heart.”

  His father smiled and silently thanked God. “Half for my son, half for the team,” he said.

  All the negativity of Junior’s rookie season was gone, and so was the losing that had preceded his arrival and lingered through his first two seasons. He had the respect of the locker room, his counterparts on other teams, and the community. He was much more than a football player. He was a brand, having started an active-wear line called Say Ow! Gear in 1993. At media day during Super Bowl week, at least 15 San Francisco 49ers wore some form of Say Ow! Gear, including quarterback Steve Young and former teammate Gary Plummer. It was an incredible sign of respect from an opponent, and the fact that it occurred on the biggest stage in professional sports made it even more special.

  That same week Junior was named the NFL’s “Man of the Year” for his work with at-risk youth, in addition to being the official spokesman of Pop Warner Football and the NFL kids’ program. His star could not have been brighter. He even had national marketing deals with Nike and Frito-Lay, accounts that traditionally had been reserved for offensive players. But Junior’s playmaking and personality transcended manufactured boundaries.

  “Junior has charisma,” said Steve Rosner, an executive vice president of Integrated Sports International who was working with Seau at the time. “He’s emotional on the field, but he’s not outrageous. People like that, and he’s respected by his peers.”

  “It’s warming to me to know that a beach bum like me can do things like this,” Junior said. “It’s always been a dream. [But] don’t let all this fool you. It’s great to have the media around and the commercials and endorsements and everything. But it’s just a window within my life span . . . I just hope after I hang up my helmet, I’ll be respected with the elite group.”

  The dream of playing in the Super Bowl turned out to be a nightmare. The Chargers were destroyed, 49–26, with Young throwing for a record six touchdowns. The outcome wasn’t necessarily a surprise; in order to get over the hump after losing in the NFC Championship Game the previous two years, the 49ers had spent the off-season signing cornerback Deion Sanders, defensive end Richard Dent, and linebacker Rickey Jackson—free agents who all would later be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. San Francisco finished a league-best 13–3 in the regular season and was an 18.5-point favorite
entering the Super Bowl, the largest spread in the game’s history.

  The Chargers had no answer for them. On the third play from scrimmage, Young found Jerry Rice on a post route for a 44-yard touchdown. On the fourth play of their next possession, Young located running back Ricky Watters, who converted a short pass into a 51-yard touchdown. And just to show they were more than big-play artists, the 49ers put together a 10-play drive for a 21–0 lead on their next possession.

  Afterward, through the confetti that fell over Miami’s Joe Robbie Field, Junior peered through his pain and thought he saw better days ahead for the Chargers. In fact, his future would be filled with repeated disappointments, as the Chargers would not win another playoff game during the remainder of his time in San Diego. In fact, they reached the postseason only once over his final eight years with the franchise.

  9

  Cheating . . . in Business and Matrimony

  JUNE 29, 1996.

  It was not your typical summer evening in San Diego. Instead of being mild, the temperature climbed from comfortable to hot to sweltering. It was one of those times when homeowners along the coast kicked themselves for not having air conditioning.

  Things were even hotter on the northeast corner of the Westfield Shopping Mall, in an area known as Mission Valley. The prelaunch for a new sports-themed restaurant was taking place, and the “MVP Kickoff Party” featured some of the area’s most popular professional sporting figures, including the man whose surname was on the front of the two-story, 14,000-square-foot establishment: Junior Seau.

  It was an exhilarating and humbling experience for a kid who grew up poor in Oceanside, with parents who worked multiple jobs to make ends meet. In the nine years since he had graduated from high school, he had gone from owning little more than his good name to owning the city. Everyone wanted a piece of him, to be associated with him, to be near him. He was the Michael Jordan of San Diego, which made owning a restaurant fitting considering that Jordan, the iconic Bulls star, had done the same three years earlier in Chicago. The sports-bar market in San Diego was relatively uncrowded in 1996, and the idea that customers might get to see—or even meet—the celebrity owner figured to be a major draw.

  Junior and his partner, John W. Gillette Jr., had architects model the place after sporting venues such as Denver’s Coors Field, Cleveland’s Jacobs Field, and the Chargers’ San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium. The patio area had replica bleacher seats, and a 25-foot-long tunnel-like entrance simulated the long passage from the Chargers’ locker room to the playing field. A long green mat with painted hash marks replaced the red carpet to further embellish the sporting theme.

  If you hadn’t known better, you’d have sworn it was a Super Bowl party. There were giant laser lights, stretch limos, screaming fans, and representatives from every media outlet. NFL luminaries such as Greg Lloyd, Duval Love, and Darren Woodson attended, as did Hollywood starlet Lela Rochon and San Diego mayor Susan Golding. As the party roared into its later hours, the lights dimmed and Alan Parsons Project’s “Sirius”—the same song played for Chicago Bulls player introductions—blared through the sound system before a curtain fell to reveal a 25-foot-high mural of Junior, in full uniform, crouching and moving forward, as if to make a tackle. Lightning crackled behind him, making the image even more striking. If the goal was to affirm his larger-than-life status, he had succeeded.

  The next morning the local newspaper described the place as big league, inside and out. There was sporting memorabilia everywhere and TVs at every angle, including a 150-square-foot projection screen that was the centerpiece of the restaurant. The place was everything Junior had hoped for after his previous big-picture business ventures failed or flamed out. “Say Ow! Gear” all but disappeared two years after its launch when the company was sued by a New Mexico sportswear production company that accused it of running off with a clothing franchise deal, according to U-T San Diego. In 1995 he debuted “Say Ow!” water in one-liter and half-liter sports bottles, but the venture quickly dried up.

  Seau’s The Restaurant would be different, Junior told himself, largely because of what he was hearing from Gillette, a financial adviser known for connecting with clients on both a business and a spiritual level, even going so far as to pray with them in his office on occasion. “I’m a Christian, [and] John looked me in the eye and said he lived by Christian values,” said Ryan Jaroncyk, who had received an $850,000 bonus as a 1995 first-round pick of the New York Mets and turned over $100,000 to Gillette. “He had a picture of Jesus as a judge on the wall.”

  In reality Gillette was a phony who conned a number of high-profile athletes out of $11 million before pleading guilty in 1997 to 38 counts of grand theft and forgery. “Somewhere along the line you lost your moral compass,” San Diego Superior Court judge Bernard Revak told Gillette before handing down a 10-year sentence, of which Gillette served just four years behind bars.

  A Stanford graduate, Gillette worked in the financial business for many years, including stints as a vice president at Bank of America and a stockbroker at Shearson Lehman. At the latter job, one of his employees in the summer of 1991 was Patrick Rowe, then a star receiver at San Diego State. In a somewhat foreboding quote, Rowe told the San Diego Evening Tribune: “I don’t know where this leads for me, but I do know if I apply the things that John teaches me I’ll never be a person who has money and then turns away and loses it all.”

  Gillette set up his own operation in 1993, and two years later he and Junior decided to go 50-50 on a sports-themed restaurant near the stadium where the star linebacker wowed fans. Although Junior was the biggest name in Gillette’s pond of professional athletes, he wasn’t the only one. Chargers safety Stanley Richard, San Diego Padres pitcher Greg Harris, and triathlon champion Mark Allen were among his other clients who allowed him to handle large sums of their money. Allen and Harris were among the first to file suit against Gillette, claiming that money they had entrusted to him was unaccounted for. Other athletes immediately began to worry about their investments, and a short time later Junior was among those filing to have Gillette’s operation placed in Chapter 7 liquidation bankruptcy. Before the end of August 1997—just 14 months after the glitzy restaurant opening—Gillette was behind bars.

  Gillette told most of his clients that their money was going into real estate investments, and in some cases that was true. But even when the investments made money—a Ghana gold mine investment was one that did not—most of the clients never saw the profit. Gillette kept those to himself to finance his lavish lifestyle, which included a five-bedroom home on a golf course and a Mercedes roadster. Though much of the money was unaccounted for, slightly more than $2 million was used for Gillette’s share in Seau’s The Restaurant. As part of restitution, Gillette surrendered his stake in the restaurant back to Junior.

  On the field Junior continued to perform at a high level and helped the Chargers to a 4–1 start. One of the more memorable games of his career occurred that September, when the Chargers hosted the Kansas City Chiefs and future Hall of Fame running back Marcus Allen. Junior and Allen were close friends. Both grew up in San Diego County, both were All-Americas at USC, and both were iconic NFL players. Playing against Allen was special for Junior because he had so much respect for him. But this encounter had even more significance because the Chiefs were 4–0 and the Chargers were 3–1. First place in the division was on the line.

  Junior put on a show in the 22–19 victory. He had 12 tackles, two interceptions, and a late-game sack on which he bulled through Allen, one of the game’s best pass-blocking running backs. It was a stunning play because no one ragdolled Allen. He was too technically sound, too tough, too fearless. In college Allen actually played fullback before moving to tailback. But Junior treated Allen as if he were a blocking dummy, slamming into him before tossing him aside en route to the quarterback.

  When he rose and pumped his fist into the air, the sellout crowd stood and roared with him. It was the highest of highs for Junior, wi
nning the battle against an undefeated opponent and a future Hall of Famer for whom he had tremendous respect. But trouble loomed.

  Behind closed doors in the Chargers’ offices, general manager Beathard and head coach Bobby Ross were beginning to butt heads over personnel. The 4–1 start was followed by three straight losses, all within the division. Tension was rising inside the building and among the fan base. Two straight wins followed, but the Chargers lost four of their next five and finished 8–8. Shortly afterwards, the only coach to have taken the franchise to a Super Bowl was forced to resign.

  Publicly, Beathard still had the respect of the locker room and community. Privately, people wondered about the decision to force out the coach who had brought them out of the darkness of nine straight nonplayoff seasons by taking them to three postseasons in his five seasons. The only way to ease tensions was to hire a capable replacement and win immediately.

  On January 18, 1997, the Chargers announced the hiring of Kevin Gilbride as their new coach. Gilbride, the Jacksonville Jaguars’ offensive coordinator, had no NFL head-coaching experience but was known for being creative and innovative with his game plans—something that could never be said of San Diego’s ground-oriented offenses under Ross. Hopes for a fast start were buried, however, beneath the rubble of a 41–7 loss at New England in the season opener.

  Junior didn’t play that afternoon because he was rehabbing from knee surgery. The injury occurred during the preseason, when Junior was run into by fellow linebacker Kurt Gouveia. He thought so little of it at the time that he didn’t bother checking on the test results after undergoing an MRI. He had tested the knee a day earlier for peace of mind and came away thinking it was nothing more than a bruise.

  “Everything is fine,” he told Gina.