Strap on the boots and scrape up the knuckles. Hold ahead, he got jacked.
This is the Big Red Rage presented by santan Ford and Gilbert Barry's.
Gonna score touchdown slim to the ground by Buddha Baker Like a torpedo.
He came flying into the back deal.
The Rage is brought to you by santan Ford and Gilbert right on the Price right on the corner of the Santan two O two Freeway in bal Vista see Key your ticket to Great Seats and by Arizona Cardinals Podcast. Visit Azycardinals dot Com, Slash Podcast, A Red Seats Rising Up, Timber Rising Vision, Flurry Rage, take it over. Here's Paul Calvici.
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And Ron Woolfley.
It doesn't get any better than that.
A singular player in Cardinal's history, Pat Tillman was one of the most unique people to ever walk amongst us. In fact, a statue stands outside the Cardinals stadium for all to see, but very few know what's displayed inside Cardinals HQ. A very special big Red Rage. We call it our Cardinals Folktales Legendary Locker Edition, The story behind the saving from an almost certain destruction of Pat Tillman's
locker back in the day. You know, Cardinals Folktales Wolf it's number one in the series, the story and rightfully so of Pat Tillman's legendary locker that is now behind glass outside the Cardinals locker room, essentially a museum piece. And you also know how what we like to say about Cardinals Folktales, this Emmy Award winning series, that you can't spell history without the word story. But what about the word folk tale? What does that mean to you? How would you define it?
Yeah, Pauli, that is a great question right there. Well, first of all, folk tale, it's got to be a story, So it's got to be a story about a human being, and it's got to be a story about a human being doing legendary things. That to me is my definition of a folk.
Tell And that would definitely define Pat Tillman, someone where football did not define Pat Tillman. We both know that. We both go back to the days when he was a star at ASU and then a Cardinal's draft pick, and to this day. Look, we're both asked about Pat Tillman. I know you are. And what do you say when people ask you about the late great Pat Tillman?
You know, for the most part, Polly, I just say, let me tell you a story, because this really defines who he is right here. And I tell him the story about when I ran into Pat Tillman who was walking out of a bowling alley pushing a ten speed a bike with him, and I thought it was so weird. I said, hey, Pat, what's up man? How you doing?
You know?
And he said hello? And I said, Pat, what'd you do? Did you ride your bike here? And he said to me, yeah, I did. As a matter of fact, I said, what do you live around here? He said no, I live about ten miles that way. I said, you rode your bike here and he said, yeah, I'm training for a triathlon.
Paul, I remember.
That trainy, Yes, he was training for that. And I was like, Tilly, what are you doing? I mean, you're an NFL player. Don't you have enough challenge right there? He said, why are you doing that? And he said, I just wanted to test myself and challenge myself. That just blew me away, Paul. And yet it says so much about.
Pat he does. In fact, all the cardinal strength coaches at the time said, no, don't do it. That's counterproductive to being a football player. The explosion you need. You don't want to run marathons and do triathons. And you know what Pat did it. Anyway, Look, if you asked me about Pat Tolman, I think of the epitome as someone who thought for themselves, right. Yeah, they felt it was ultra important to educate yourself in so many different ways.
He had that insatiable curiosity about him. You know, you think about Pat Tillman, not just the football player, but the Pat Tillman scholars as someone who had a three point nine gpa at ASU. He was always driven by seeking knowledge, right, the need to experience life, and what he got out of his twenty seven years you could only hope to get out of a full lifetime compared to Pat Tillman.
Yeah, and for me Pauly too, it's just I've got to bring it back, man, I got to bring it back to the white lines, the football field, the grid iron and mother grid iron and how tough Pat Tilman truly was as a football player. I'm sorry. I know what he did and the way he gave his life for our country in service to so many others. But for me, the fact that he walked in between those white lines as well and endured so much and absorbed so much damage while giving damage on the football field,
to me so impressed with him. That's my number one takeaway from Pat.
He still holds the Cardinals all time record for tackles in a season, more than two hundred and twenty tackles in a single season. Think about that. This is a seventh round pick in nineteen ninety eight. He came out as a tweener. He was the Pac twelve Defensive Player of the Year at ASU, But where was he supposed to play in the NFL? So he lasted to the seventh round. Remember his first training camp as a rookie Wolf. We were in Flagstaff. He came in, he was held
bent on making a statement. He was telling them you need this physicality, you need my mentality, and he defied the odds. He made the team and then started ten to sixteen games as a rookie.
And then, of course his leadership and how he would impact others. Paul guys around him were inspired by Pat for so many different reasons.
We know his football career, we know his status as an American hero, and we're going to get into all that and his entire story how his legacy really is captured in Pat Tillman's legendary locker when we come back on this very special edition, our Cardinals Folktales edition of the Big Red Rage presented by Santan Ford in Gilbert and welcome back everyone into the Big Red Rage presented
by Santan Ford and Gilbert. We are Santan Ford, I'm Paul Calvic And as we noted off the top, our game plan revolves around an encore presentation of Cardinals' folk Tales, where we like to say it can't spell history without the word story. Well, if you were to go from the Cardinals radio studio about fifty yards to my left, you would at the Cardinals locker room, and before you enter, you would see a locker behind glass, and there's a
reason why that locker once belonged to Pat Tillman. So as we look at the makeup of NFL rosters and we see long shot players and low round picks who might be able to defy the odds, it's hard not to think of the greatest Cardinals example of that. Ever, at least to me, Cardinal's seventh round pick in nineteen ninety eight, Pat Tillman. He was far from a lock that year. He is considered a tweener between a linebacker and a safety. But he had a plan make the
coaches take notice. And as someone who covered Pat both ASU and the Cardinals, it was impossible not to notice Pat. If it wasn't the hair flowing out of the helmet, it was just his style of play with total abandon. I mean, he didn't just wear pads, he used him. So although we might know Pat's story, what's the story behind the locker that was seconds away from total demolition. Well here's that story, Cardinals' full tales legendary locker. Every year,
NFL teams conduct their fight for fifty three. That's the size of an NFL roster, fifty three players, and those names will always vary year to year, heck, week to week, but the Arizona Cardinals have a fifty fourth locker and that name plate will never change.
Pat Tilman talk about a.
Guy with a lot of heart.
Passion is kind of important word for me, whether it's you know, playing sports, or whether it's you know, just living or whatever you're gonna do, you should, in my opinion, you should be passionate about or else Why why do it?
He was pretty legendary just for being the guy he was that, being true to himself, challenging people around him, you know, never being dull or just taking things for granted or being complacent. He was always searching for knowledge.
I think it was important to save the locker.
As time goes by, you start to forget about things that happened in history.
I didn't want Pat to be.
Forgotten, legendary locker with the forever nameplate Pat Tillman. This is Cardinal's Folktales, presented by seventy two sold where we go in depth into Cardinal's history, all time anecdotes through the personal recollections and memories of those who lived in We hear their words, their voices. My name is Paul Kelvic. I've covered the Cardinals since late nineteen ninety five, the
end of the Buddy Ryan era. I've been the Cardinals sideline reporter since two thousand and five, and as I can attest, you may think you know some of these folk tale stories, but as I found out, as even team historians have found out. We don't like this story, this folk tale revolving around the most widely known figure in Cardinal's history, Pat Tillman, and how his legendary locker was saved with a last second interception from a buzzsaw literally by a longtime staffer.
I didn't really get the idea to kind of preserve the locker until two thousand and six. I always put it in the back of my head, like I want to save this locker.
That would be kind of cool. And I just didn't know when renovations would take place.
And I'm sit Mary eating lunch at Oreganos and they're taking place.
So I had to do something.
When you know the cliche, if you cut somebody open, they bleed, Cardinal reds. That's Almo. So it was fitting that, you know, he would be the one that has his finger on the pulse of that and in the moment immediately recognizes how significant this is to preserve.
Before we get to that locker, the museum piece on display showcase for all to see at Cardinals HQ, we need to understand Pat Tillman. Notice how we didn't say the football player Pat Tillman, because Pat was so much more than an athlete.
Pat Tillman, what can I say, just all around good guy, not cocky, very confident, soft spoken, like the sing Desperado and like that movie.
Immediately I kind of liked him on long hair. He didn't dress nice. He was just such a unique, genuine dude that people, you know, weren endeared to him.
He was a different kind of guy. You know, he was a flower child if you will you know. Of course, at the time, I didn't have any clue that he would go on to the come to hero that he became, But you know, he was a different type of dude. He would ride his bicycle to practice every day.
Those are the voices of former Tilman teammates Larry Senters, Jake Plummer, and all started by former linebacker Mark Maddox. The thing is, if you asked Pat to talk about himself, something he seldom did, I'm not sure that football player would have made the top three things he'd say about himself. To know Pat was to know that Pat was about the next achievement, the next challenge, the next curiosity. Longtime Cardinals beat writer and Arizona Republic columnists Ken Summers.
As a player just passionate to the point of borderline. Is this guy human? I mean cand of human actually play that hard and have such disregard for his body and play the game that way? And never I mean there was just one speed, you know, one gear there was you know, Steve McGinnis used to say that the guy has a switch, not a dial. You know, you just flip it on and it's the same, the same speed.
When Pat put on the pads he used him, he was all in. Like everything else he did. Pat never did anything half speed, even when the drills were designed to be half speed. That was Pat in his first NFL training camp as a seventh round tweener just hit anything and everything that moved. I watched it in person. I covered that nineteen ninety eight training camp in Flagstaff. I watched the decision makers take notice that the guy in the football uniform belied the dude in the surfer
shorts and the flip flops. Here's former Cardinals wide receiver Frank Sanders.
I think probably deserved flip flops and a surfboard somewhere in some Oakley shorts. And I had a real nice golden hair.
And that's it.
Like playing football. Never seemed like he should be there until he put on his pads. Put on his pats. A different person showed him, I understand you hit pretty hard.
Now, different guy in the.
Middle of the field that falls into the plate.
Wow, off comes the helmet of the attended receiver as he gets crushed back there by Pat Tilman.
Pat Tilman the blade.
He knocked him right in the helmet with a forearm and just slapped.
That helmet off. Even as a rookie, we used to have to call him off, you know, some some practices we were you know, just fit up on the guy with the ball. But he would come in and demolish the guys, which was a really good tactic, and it worked out great for him because he got the coach's attention.
He brought that same kind of few mentality to the Cardinals. I mean, rookies don't hit receivers in Ota days.
But he would lay some.
Wood on a guy or like put an elbow in him and get in fights. And he really up the competitiveness during practice where guys didn't like him because he would hit you or rough you up, or do what he whatever he felt he needed to work on, and they ended up respecting him because it made everybody's level come up. He was a tone setter.
Let's just say that Pat would routinely exceed the perceived practice speed limit. But that's how Pat forged an NFL career. That's how Pat made the Cardinals as the two hundred and twenty six player taken in the nineteen ninety eight draft. How he caught the coach's attention even though he was the reigning Pac ten Defensive Player of the Year. But at the NFL level, was he still a linebacker? Was he fast enough to be a safety? Pad made sure none of that mattered, because all he did was turn
guys into tackling dummies. That entire camp, even though it landed in the NFL's version of a coach's time out, former Cardinals head coach Den Stobin and.
The one I remember was a wide receiver that he got in a fight with and entered up having to throw them both off the field because every time the play started, whether they'd be a fight between those two at the end of the play, and so I sent them out.
But as vin Stobin himself would admit later, the Cardinals needed that mentality that Pat Tillman brand of physicality and fight that tilman too, because remember the Cardinals were still in the same division with those Cowboys teams coming off Super Bowls and physical East Coast teams from tough towns playing bullyball like the Giants and Eagles and Washington once again, Former Cardinals quarterback Jake Plummer, you.
Look at someone like him who was similar to me. We were too small, too slow, not strong enough, now smart enough, all these excuses for why we shouldn't be there yet. We just you know, we threw that all side and said, yeah, we're supposed to be here.
He congratulated me, and I guess he was one of my advocates.
He was talking me up, So what the hell?
Where are you all right?
Thank you, appreciate your help, Jake.
He said that I gotta give him fifteen percent of whatever I get because of his good.
Talk, so it might not be much.
So we had that chip on our shoulder and that confidence, that quiet confidence about ourselves and belief in ourselves. So we were kindred spirits right away.
Pat became a football player simply because of will and determination. He wasn't really big enough, strong enough, fast enough to play in the National Football League but he willed himself to become a good enough football player to overcome those limitations.
And it's something that Pat had already done plenty of define the doubters. A quick personal note, I covered Pat during his years at ASU and then his early years with the Cardinals. Before that, I'd known of Pat through our high school alma mater, Leland High School, in South San Jose. We were both from the Alminant Valley, which you might have seen featured in some of the Pat Tillman documentaries. His future father in law was my high
school baseball coach. We were seven or eight years a part or so, and I still remember my dad call me during Pat's senior year of high school. Hey, you guess what he said? Leland is in this section title game. And I cut off my dad. I say, come on now, Pop, have you been drinking more of your red wine again? Come on? He said, no, no, no, They've got this Tilman kid. He's a running back and nobody can tackle him, and he's a better middle linebacker. He's all over the field.
So when people talk about Pat's ability to inspire and lift others, people rightfully cite the fact that the last time ASU went to the Rolls Bowl. It was Pat Tillman and Jake Plummer. During Pat's rookie year in the NFL nineteen ninety eight, the Arizona Cardinals won their first playoff game in half a century. And my response is always, you know what, though, Pat's greatest team achievement was leading his high school to a because, believe me, the degree
of difficulty there. Pat's high school hasn't come close to winning before or after Pat.
Both towers so the World Trade Center have been hit by aircraft.
Both are in flames.
It's a black smoke coming from both of the towers.
It's a horrific scene here.
There are chore crews just screaming into this area from every conceivable direction.
You know, times like this you stop and think about just how not only how good we have it, but what kind of a system we live under, What freedoms were allowed? You know, my great grandfather was at Pearl Harbor, and a lot of my family has given up, you know, has gone and fought in wars. And I really haven't done a damn thing as far as laying myself on the line like that, And so I have a great deal of respect for those that have and what the flag stands for.
The voice of Pat Tillman September twelfth, two thousand and one, after the horrific events of nine to eleven. In fact, on September eleventh, Pat Tilman was at the Cardinals facility and he wandered through the media area and sat down to watch the news coverage as it unfolded. With Cardinals beat writer Darren Urban.
He was like, what we do playing in the NFL? He goes, We're worthless, We're actors. He goes, that means nothing. This is so much bigger than that.
There's probably no better time to talk about a guy who took nine to one one to heart and made a life changing decision based on his feeling something he felt he needed to do.
It was sort of the you know, man bites dog story, like this doesn't make any sense. He's right on the verge where in discussions with his agent about potentially extending his contract and he decided I'm going to walk away
from this. But you know, it was just six months after nine to eleven, and it was only three weeks after he got married to Marie as high school sweetheart, and it was about one week after they got back from their honeymoon, he joined the Army up in Colorado and then went on to become, you know, part of the Rangers and one of.
The leaders Cardinals owner Michael Bidwell. As Pat had just set a team record for tackles in a season, his jersey was worn by fans all over town. Plus there was the business of football, as Pat was on the verge of cashing in on a mega contract and he literally left it all behind.
My reaction was was just I just like, I just kind of had this big smiling started laughing to myself, like this is completely believable. I mean, I did not expect him to join the army, but as I process it, like, yeah, Okay, of all the guys in professional sports in the world, he's the one who would do that.
Pat would leave that Cardinals locker room to join us, different team with a different plan, defending his country and his former teammates. Remember the reactions like it was yesterday, Frank Sanders, Jake Plummer, and former head coach Vince Toban.
I saw Pat coming out of the building, and I was coming in where the players only go in the little area. I was coming into the gates. He was going out and say, Pat, are you doing? What's up with your contract? He said, Bro, I'm probably gonna go to the military.
I said what he said, I'm gonna.
Go to the army and be arranged with my brother.
So what you go do?
What I want to serve my country, That's what I'm gonna do. I say, brother, God bless you.
I just kind of like that sounds like, Pat, what can you do? I remember getting a call from Mike Devlin, who is my center my rookie year and now is a coach with the Cardinals. He said, Hey, you got to call Pat. He's he's about to do something that you know, I don't know if he should do this. It's you know, he's giving up all this money and giving up the game, and I don't know. You should
give him a shout. And I kind of chuckled because I was like, if Pat makes his mind up, he's made this decision and his wife has it changed his mind? And what good am I going to be to go try to change his mind. I'm not going to piss him off before he goes to fight for our country. I gave him a hug and told him I love him. He'd be safe out there, man, because there was no change in his mind.
Well, he's all in. He believed in what he believed in and believed it very strongly and acted on what he's blased where a lot of people have blafed, but they don't act on him. And he did no matter what he was doing, whether he's on the field or not.
He believed in himself so much so that he did something that no one could fathom he would do and go give up millions of dollars to go fight for our country. Well, for Pat, it was just life. That was what life was about, was doing what you believed and living your life.
And what's amazing is as media friendly as Pat was as a player, all the interviews that Pat did when he was at ASU and the Cardinals, you can search the internet all you want, good luck trying to find any interview that Pat did as a soldier once again and Summers from the Arizona Republic.
One of the things that really resonated with me was his refusal to talk about it ever. It's like, I'm not in it for that, I'm not in it for the stories. I'm not in it for a future movie or to set myself up for business later. I have my reasons for doing it. I'm not going to share them. They're my reasons.
So Pat left his Cardinals locker behind for a foot locker. One more aspect of a person who could have done virtually anything he set his mind to, and quite often Pat did just that. Former teammate, a longtime Cardinals staffer, Anthony Edwards, on Pat's selfless act.
To serve that's humility. I choose to serve my country. I choose to go dis route instead of this one. The more popular vote would be stay where you at, continue to do what you're doing.
But he didn't feel that was enough.
That wasn't satisfying to him, so he chose the other.
And that's former Cardinals receiver Anthony Edwards, who said it so well in Cardinals' folktales that Pat was all about service to his team, to his community, to his country. I think, like a lot of media members, we walk into that Cardinals locker room, you can still hear Pat's laugh,
you can still picture him with his teammates. And it was that locker of Pats that was spared the wrecking ball from the demolition crew in last second dramatic fashion, and when we come back, we'll hear how that locker saving play, how it unfolded, how Pat's lasting legacy is memorialized in other ways as we continue with his encore presentation of Cardinals Folktale's Legendary Locker on the Big Red Rage,
presented by Santan Ford and Gilbert. We are Santan Ford, and welcome back to our special encore presentation of Cardinals Folk Tales Legendary Locker Here on the Big Red Rage, presented by Santan Ford and Gilbert. We are Santan Ford.
I'm Paul Calvi.
Seen if you go to State Farm Stadium, you'll see the Pat Tillman statue. There's Pat Tillman's name and number in the Ring of Honor. At Cardinal's headquarters, there's Pat's locker. And that's what we're talking about here tonight, the legendary locker and last we left you here during Cardinals Folktales, Pat Tillman was making that selfless decision to leave football and a multi million dollar contract behind to serve his country.
As we know, Pat lost his life in action while serving with the Army Rangers in Afghanistan, and not only hit. All of us in Arizona heard a lot of us vividly remember that April morning, but our nation mourned as well, and we pick up the story of how Pat's legendary locker still it stands today. With a salute from Tom Cruise at the Espies.
The news came out of Afghanistan that an athlete turned soldier was gone. And when we heard the news on that April day, it stopped us all in a long and profound silence. And we all know why, because Pat Tillman was a transcendent figure in the life of this nation.
Word of Pat Tillman's death came out early on the morning of April twenty second, two thousand and four. Fans created memorials at the Cardinals facility and in Pat's hometown of San Jose. I remember waiting a line at Sun Devil Stadium to pay respects at an impromptum memorial. The news hit with the ferocity of a Tilman tackle, and it struck owner Michael Bidwell and fullback Larry Centers the same way.
It was a I mean, it was a gut punch. It was a kick to the stomach, and I remember I was I was standing in my closet that day, getting ready for work and to head into the office, and my phone ranked, you know, and sent shivers down my spine and we realized it's going to be shocking news to everybody.
I was in Dallas on the golf course. I was playing with a couple of guys who played in the NFL, and one of them got a call or a text and said, hey, man, Pat's him and just died in Afghanistan. It was a jaw dropping moment. I remember exactly where I was, like. I'm sure a lot of the teammates can tell you exactly what they were when they heard the news.
As news traveled through the Cardinals facility, it reached the locker room longtime trainer John Omahandra.
It weighed on us, impacted us a lot, and thought started going through my mind a way that we could memorialize him or remembering in some fashion.
In the training room.
I went down to pr ask him to give me a photo of Pat. I took it and had it framed, put it up over the tape table. So every day everybody that came in got overseen by Pat, and the guys would get up on the table to get taped and they could maybe this past thought on trying to live up to his standards of toughness and dedication, being a warrior, just all things that Pat was.
The Tillman player photo that John olmahundro referenced, well, if you walk into the training room today, that frame picture sits in this same exact spot, just like it did days after Pat's death.
I think there's a wow factor to it.
Take, for instance, JJ Watt when he signed with the Cardinals, he took a picture in front of it. It means something to him. He's very familiar with the story. He's involved with the Pat Tillman Foundation.
I've obviously long been a fan of Pat Tillman. What he stood for, who he was.
And everything about his legacy is unbelievable to me.
So to be here, to be walking the same halls that he walked and to see his locker was special for me.
It made me feel good to see him, the guy of his level, standing in front of that and it means something to him.
That's the voice of Jim o'mahundro, longtime Cardinals broadcast producer, more than two decades on the job while his father, the aforementioned John Omahandro spent forty two seasons as a Cardinals athletic trainer. A couple of other longtime Cards employees, Darren Urban and Dave Pash, give us the scattering report on Omo.
I would paint Jim o'mahundro in this way he works for the team, but I I feel like in a lot of ways, Cardinals DNA is literally in him.
So I've been around the Cardinals my entire life. My dad was an athletic trainer for the team for forty two seasons. I like to say I was negative nine when he started with the team, and so I was literally born into this organization. I couldn't imagine it any other way.
Cardinal football means so much to him. Outside of the Bidwells who grew up with Cardinal football, I can't think of anybody who has a closer connection than the Bidwell family than the ol One Hundre family because of the time and the energy that's been spent rooting for the team.
So when people ask how exactly did the Tilman locker end up encased in glass when every other locker is no moss, Well glad yes, Because remember earlier the story that we thought we knew but didn't. Well, here we go twenty fifteen. The Cardinals locker room. It's a hard hat area, not your typical football helmets, but construction workers.
It's a day after the Super Bowl, kind of slow around the facility. So I come over here to a Reganos just to get a normal lunch. So I ordered a slice and a salad and I'm waiting for the food.
So I'm scrolling through Twitter.
I see a tweet by Darren Urban that alerts me to the renovation starting at our Tempe facility.
So I freak out.
There's a photo with a destroyed locker on the ground. So I had ordered my lunch, it hadn't come yet, and I'm like, I got to get out of here. So I throw twenty dollars down onto the table and I'm out of there. I just run to my car, drive down, get to the facility, run through the parking lot, run through the auditorium, the weight room, the training room, step into the locker room. The carpet is all torn up. The glue from the carpet is there and it rips
my shoe off my foot. So I'm hopping around the corner to see two lockers on one wall and about four lockers on the other. There's a guy with a saw walking directly for Pat Tillman's locker. I said, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, don't cut that one out. That's Pat Tillman's locker. So that's what happened and prevented it from being destroyed.
And that is quite a series of events. I mean, think of how razor thin that margin was. One more stop, like perhaps or almost stopping to unglue his shoe, and that Tilman locker would have been turned into lumber. That got the attention of Cardinals owner Michael Bidwell.
Found out an hour after it happened that Jim Olmhunter was walking through and said, wait, don't touch that. And so we're like, okay, we don't know what to do with it right now, but we're going to do something. And then because we were doing a renovation of the building, we look for an area where we could put it, and the designers found what I think is a perfect
entry area right outside the locker room. So it's it's a perfect area and it's really a landmark within our building and serves as an important reminder for his sacrifice.
But also his spirit.
Everybody who goes out to the practice field, they walk by it. Everyone who comes in from the practice field, they walk by it. And if you look at the old foot front of the locker room, it's literally on the other side of the wall, kind of diagonal from where it was, and I think that's pretty cool.
It's kind of hollow ground in a way.
Remember it'd been over a dozen years since Pat had left his locker, so over those years a number of other players use that locker.
Pat's final year in the locker room was two thousand and one, so every year after that, I would kind of look to see who had that locker, and I'd make it a point to go up to him and say, Hey, you know who's locker you are sitting in, And they're like, who said Pat Tillman.
Some of them looked at me like I was nuts, Like what this is Pat's locker?
You know some that come to mind, Gabe Watson, former defensive tackle.
O Mahandro told me you'd share the same locker that Pat Tillman had. I'm like, are you serious? You know you hear the stories behind them, and there's only a few people that can say shared the same locker. It's just honored to just be in any company with them.
John Fullington was a reserve offensive lineman who was the final occupant of Pat's locker, and he was genuinely touched.
I told him, and he he was just like, I'm honored. He didn't know what to say.
So, you know, you see guys that maybe had that locker. Then you see guys that in future years will walk past that locker and you kind of get the idea of what they might feel about it.
You know, the first time you see Pat's locker on display, and as someone who sees it on a daily basis now, it is a heck of a first impression that makes for a lasting impression. Here's VPM meter relations Mark Dalton, followed by former Cardinals Larry Centers and Anthony Edwards.
When you get to that spot, it's almost a universal reaction. People just stop and conversation ceases and they just take it in and there's like a a solemn moment of reflection, which is really cool.
Keeping his legacy alive. I think that's a big step in the right direction. You know, the generations go on and the people the players come and the players go. But to see him immortalize in that way and appreciated by the organization, I think that's a really good move of the team.
It's a reminder as a player that's leaving out of the locker room going to the practice field, here's some wim was dedicated, committed to excellence and whatever he did, just let us do the same thing and take it to the field today and be our very best. So it comes as a reminder of striving for excellence.
Each time a guy walks by, they're gonna see Pat and his locker there, and remember, you know, hey, you could be having a crappy day. You could be complaining about little things, and then you see that and you.
Check yourself a little bit.
Say, Okay, there's thousands upon thousands of men and women all over the world serving our country, and you know they can't afford to have a bad day.
We can afford to have a bad day. So you've got it pretty good.
In the NFL, everyone is looking for impact players in Cardinals team history, and that is going back more than a century. Not a single player on the field and off combined is at a bigger impact than Pat Tillman.
Pat Tillman was all about team and if you can walk past that and not get something inside of you turning, we got some issues.
Go back to the whole idea of you know, it's not what you say in life, it's what you do.
And we can all talk, but ultimately it's what we do.
And I think the lasting legacy of Pat Tillman is this is someone who did, who believed in something and was willing to risk his life for it.
It's voice of the Cardinals day past, preceded by former Cardinals linebacker Mark Maddox, make an impact players today when they see Pat Tillman's locker, it says, challenge yourself to do as much with your life as Pat did in his twenty seven years. To me, that's what Pat's locker stands for, and that's why it still stands today for all to see.
To me, when they keep his locker alive and his legend alive there, it's telling the players to like, live your trueness, to be who you are, and like, hey, you know, don't go against the grain just because you want to go against the grain. But if you have a feeling and it's a thought and it's something you believe in and if it's against the grain, do it and trust yourself because Pat was like that.
And there you have it, Cardinals, folk Tales, legendary locker, the one locker that will never change nameplates, the same locker where we used to witness Pat reclined between practices, taking a snooze to refresh for what was next. And that's just one tribute to Pat's greatness that seemingly everyone has a story. In fact, I'll share a quick one with you here. I knew a guy at Asu went to school with him, and he told me years later that he was Pat's next door neighbor for a spell.
One night he got home from work, he pulled into his driveway and he couldn't help but notice there's Pat on his roof. His buddy of mine gets out of his car. He's half stupefied and he yells out, hey, Pat, what are you doing on your roof? And Pat looked at him, just watching the sunset, dude, just watching the sunset. And that was Pat. He took nothing for granted, and he inspired others to do the same. But how do you convey that, how do you pass that along? How
do you honor that. Well, the Cardinals do just that every day by putting Pat's locker on display at their training facility. Thanks for joining us everyone. I'm Paul Kelvic. This has been Cardinals s Folktales Legendary Locker presented by seventy two Soul. Thanks for listening. You know it's stories like that, and so many people have stories regarding Pat Tillman.
That's how his legacy lives on today. If you go to the Pat Tillman Foundation website and they state how Pat's life and principles and service, that's his true legacy of Pat's family and friends started the Pat Tillman Foundation to carry forward that legacy. If you go two days after his passing, it was the NFL Draft two thous thousand and four, and then Commissioner Paul Tagliboo wore a black ribbon with Tilman's name on it and a helmet
pin with his number forty. And there was Paul Taglibou while flanked by five Marines in Madison Square Garden, and he told the audience quote, Pat Tillman personified the best values of Americans and the National Football League. And we know Pat's legacy is personified by Pat's Run which is held annually in tamp And when we come back, we'll bring back and talk with Ron Wolfley, who covered Pat watched all those games from Sun Devil Stadium, both ASU
and the Cardinals. As we continue with this encore presentation of Cardinals Folk Tales Legendary Locker presented by Santan for In Gilbert, and welcome back to this very special edition of the Big Red Rage Our Cardinals Full Hotails Legendary Locker Edition, all presented by Santan Ford in Gilbert, Paul kelvc Ron wolf Ley and the story behind the saving literally saving Pat Tillman's locker from a certain destruction within seconds.
Wolf we heard the story man of how our own executive producer, a longtime producer for the Cardinals, Jim al Mahandro, he saw a picture posted by Darren Urban of the renovation of the Cardinals locker room and he just ran a four three forty out of the restaurant where he's having lunch, and if he would hit one more stoplight, he probably wouldn't be able to make it in time back into that locker room to save Pat Tillman's locker.
And as we say there's fifty three players on an NFL active roster, and then the Cardinals have designated their fifty fourth locker where the name plate will never change. It is behind glass. And it's quite a story as to as it all transpired.
Yeah, Paulie, you know what's incredible you stop and think about it, and just the fact that Jim Almahandro would be the guy, he would be the guy that would actually burst in and save Pat Tillman's locker. You know what a historian he is. He's the best game day producer on the face of the planet. Yet at the same time, this guy is a historian man for Cardinal football.
And the fact that it was him who actually came in and stopped them from literally cutting right into that locker and everything that has happened to that locker, since that's exactly what a folktale is, man, this is a folk tale about a folk tale, legendary acts by human beings.
You know, players to this day see it for the first time and it stops them in their tracks. Yes, JJ Watt, most recently when he showed up, he stopped that very locker. Dennis Gardak, we've talked to gard Deck the barbarian about it? Have we not Walts?
You know?
He current players, you know, most of them are so young, they've only read books about Pat Tillman. But it's what that locker says to them, and to listen to them tell it Wolf. It essentially means, Okay, can you get as much out of your life out of your career that Pat Tilman did? A guy who was barely drafted a seventh rounder and then went on to achieve so much, not only in football, but obviously in life itself.
You know, I love that, Polly. That is a great thought, There's no doubt about it. You know, you think of Pat Tillman though the statue, of course, is what I think of at State Farm Stadium and the Tilman Tunnel at ASU, and you know, just the legendary impact that this has had on so many football players and so many Americans. The ultimate sacrifice of Pat Tillman and what he did for this country and for everyone who serves this country, and for his teammates as well. It's truly inspiring.
Yeah, yeah, that's a great point about this. You the Tilman Tunnel, how about the bridge and the Arizona Nevada border named after Pat Tillman, the USO centers worldwide. I know it was a couple of years ago. I was like the fifth assistant coach for my son's little league team. Right, everyone had to introduce themselves and they said, what do you do for a living? And okay, and who have
you interviewed? Who have you interviewed? And I named Larry Fitzgerald, Randy Johnson, old timers like Joe Montana, Michael Jordan, Lebron James. But when I named Pat Tillman, everyone stopped and everyone wanted to know more about Pat Tillman. That's how his name resonates even today.
Truly, just an incredible human being. Paully. I know that you and I over the years, of course, have talked about our relationship just knowing Pat Tillman from time to time, and the respect and the regard that we have for him can't be measured with human hands.
When my son was born, actually I bought him a jersey. It's the only jersey I've ever purchased for him, and it's a Pat Tilman jersey because it's about so much more than football. Football did not define Pats under service country and his status now as an American Hero. I hope everyone enjoyed that Cardinals Folktales Legendary Lockers special. Thanks Jim Amhandro, Ron Wolfley on Paul KELBC. This has been the Big Red Rage presented by santan Ford in Gilbert.
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