A few years ago when my son was an Atlanta fireman, the station got a call to a high rise condo in Buckhead. An elderly man had fallen and his wife and a caregiver weren’t strong enough to lift him up.
The elder man was Bill Mathis, a former Jets teammate of Joe Namath. One of the fireman knew about Mathis’ football career and asked him about playing with Namath.
Mathis was very happy to talk about his playing days and even showed the firemen his Super Bowl III ring.
Amazingly, later in the day, the station got a second call to Mathis’ condo. He had fallen again. The firemen told him he had to start using his walker since his knees were in such bad shape.
Poor guy!
Turns out my dermatologist had one of our Baltimore Colts in her repertoire. My husband went to her also and met this man. It wasn’t THAT “Art” (even my Steeler-loving husband would’ve known him anywhere) but “the other” Art, deCarlo. He showed him his ‘58 Championship ring and went on talking about the team. Fun. But not so fun having skin problems!