THEIR BIGGEST FANS
Ohio State's football families experience the ups and downs, the bumps and bruises right along with their young athletes.
By JAY HANSEN
Photos by MEGAN NADOLSKI
Even in the confines of his grandmother’s comfortable lap, the baby was constantly in motion. He was curious and happy, and already showing signs of precocity. And, oh, how he was strong.
His grandmother, his beloved abuela, noticed his strength. She held the baby in her lap, clasped his hands gently, and watched as he pulled himself to his feet. Two-month-old Tony stood there, sturdy and confident, and smiled.
Lourdes Gonzalez was struck. She looked at her daughter-in-law and let out an exclamation: ¡Que fuerte!
Jenna Gonzalez smiled. How strong, indeed!
Tony Gonzalez has surpassed the promise suggested in the first few months of his life. During the course of his final season as a Buckeye football player, he stepped into the spotlight as a star athlete, a model student, and the type of person who makes his mother proud.
And you’d better believe Jenna is proud of her Tony—just like the other Ohio State parents who watched their sons mature on a national stage during the 2006 season. Here are some of their stories.
TAILGATE TIME
Deborah Johnson can be hard to miss on football game days. An ebullient woman with an infectious smile and personality, Johnson hosts a tailgate steeped in tradition and, more important, great food.
Johnson has claimed the same spot, a corner of the Lincoln Tower parking lot, for 25 years. But today is different. Today is the beginning of her son Jay Richardson’s last season as a Buckeye.
“I can’t believe it,” Deb says. “It’s gone so fast.”
But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Although Northern Illinois is waiting to take on the Buckeyes a few hours later, right now there is eating to attend to.
Deb’s husband, Glen Johnson, is in charge of all culinary matters. He begins preparing each week’s fare on Wednesday and doesn’t finish until the wee hours of Saturday morning.
As the tailgate gets under way, Glen spins into action, operating two long grills filled with Bahama Mamas, chicken breasts, kebabs, and other items. Next to him are containers of side dishes and desserts. He navigates it all like a pro, primarily because he is one. Although he has worked at UPS for 25 years, he also owns a business called Black Orchid Catering.
“When I cook, I like to be creative,” Glen says, brandishing a spatula the way Van Gogh might have wielded a brush. “I’ll take a recipe and make it my own. And I like to see people smile when they eat my cooking.”
With smiles and full bellies, the family heads to the stadium about an hour before kickoff. Later, they return to munch on leftovers and relive the Buckeyes’ 35-12 win over the Huskies.
DEFINING MOMENT
The victory over Northern Illinois was the first game Bart Denlinger saw his his son, Todd, play for the Buckeyes.
“We were watching him on the sidelines, and we had an idea he was going to go in,” Bart said. “All of a sudden, David Patterson comes over to him and is hitting him on the helmet, and Quinn [Pitcock] is hitting him on the shoulder pads, and Joel [Penton] is there, too.”
“It was like they were giving him a baptism,” said Teri Denlinger, Todd’s mom. “Then he goes in and two plays later makes a tackle for loss.”
Todd did well in several sports in his younger days. But there was no question where he would eventually excel. “We knew from the first time he played that football was going to be his sport,” Bart said.
Tony Gonzalez, on the other hand, was a standout wrestler before he gave it up in favor of basketball when he was 10.
“He had balance, moxie, aggressiveness, competitiveness—and when he lost, there was no crying. I remember watching him at a tournament when he was eight years old,” Ed Gonzalez said. “I was sitting there thinking, ‘This kid is special.’”
Glen Johnson had a similar rev-elation when he saw his son Jay Richardson split a double-team and sack the quarterback in his second varsity game at Dublin Scioto High School. “He was playing out of position at defensive tackle, but he was still causing problems,” Johnson said. Jay’s football career almost never got started.
“I wanted him to play so badly, but he just wouldn’t,” Deb Johnson said. “Then at school one day in seventh grade, a teacher said, ‘You look like a football player. You should play.’ He got on the phone and said, ‘I need cleats.’ Just like that. All that time I tried to get him to play and he wouldn’t. A teacher says do it and he does it.”
Deb sighed. Then she laughed. She was right after all.
A TEXAS-SIZED WIN
Game No. 2 of the season brought a showdown with the defending national champion Texas Longhorns, who had beaten Ohio State in Columbus the previous year.
The Gonzalez, Denlinger, and Johnson familes all headed to Austin. And they got their money’s worth as the Buckeyes steamrolled the Longhorns 24-7.
The game stamped Ohio State as a legitimate contender for the national title, and Jay Richardson and Tony Gonzalez both played big roles in it. Tony had eight catches for 142 yards and the Buckeyes’ first touchdown of the game. His performance was not lost on Longhorn fans.
Jenna recalled: “After the game, we were walking home and this Texas fan came up to my brother-in-law, who was wearing a No. 11 jersey, and put his arms in front of him like he was guarding him. Then he stepped back and said, ‘I just wanted you to know that someone in Texas can guard No. 11.’ We got a kick out of that.”
Deb Johnson got a different kind of kick—a kick of anger after seeing Jay pick up a disputed roughing-the-passer call. “Our child is so big, he seems to be a target for refs.”
Added Glen: “The only thing Jay did wrong was being 6-foot-6.”
THE TRESSEL FACTOR
The three families differ in many ways. The Denlingers run a construction company in Troy, Ohio. Ed Gonzalez owns a steel-processing business in the Cleveland area, and Jenna is a teacher. Deb Johnson teaches at Columbus State Community College; Glen works for UPS and has his catering business.
But they all have the same opinion of the man at the center of the Buckeye universe—Jim Tressel.
“Coach Tressel is amazing,” Deb Johnson said. “He came to our house when he was recruiting Jay, and he stayed for about three hours. He talked to us as much as he talked to Jay. Coach said he didn’t recruit athletes, he recruited families, because families are the backbone of his program.”
Glen concurred: “I met the man one time, and the next time I saw him he called me by my first name. He has 105 sets of parents in this program, and he knows their names, their backgrounds, and their situations.”
Tressel’s charisma is what in part compelled Tony Gonzalez to choose Ohio State. That was no small feat, considering his dad, Ed, had played for the Wolverines.
“Tony took his recruiting trip to Michigan, and the coach who had been recruiting him was fired the previous week,” Jenna said. “So we went up there and really, it was a nothing experience. We wandered around like lost sheep. No one paid attention to us.
“The next week we went to Columbus, and it was exactly the opposite. Tony really had a change of heart. He was 100 percent Ohio State from then on.”
A STAR IS BORN
Tony’s junior season saw him emerge as a celebrity. In Ohio State’s first six games, he snared 27 passes for 404 yards and four touchdowns. And his candid personality and diligent work in the classroom made him popular among reporters looking for good stories. “I know it isn’t always easy for him because he is really very shy,” Jenna said.
Several articles described one of Tony’s unusual training habits: sleeping some nights in an oxygen deprivation tent to improve his stamina. Jenna was not pleased. “I don’t like the tent at all. It’s not natural,” she said. During Hispanic Heritage Month, Tony was featured on ESPN.com cooking one of his favorite dishes, arroz con pollo—rice with chicken.
He cooks, he’s polite, he gets great grades, and he’s a stellar athlete. Does this kid have a flaw? Of course, his mother said. For one thing, “Tony’s a slob. He’s not real good in the picking-things-up department.”
While Jenna enjoyed the attention her son received during his breakout year, things got tense at one point.
In the middle of October, Tony began to notice a group of four men who always seemed to be around when he came out of the locker room after games. He started seeing the same men around campus, and one day they attempted to corner him as he was pulling out of a parking spot.
“These guys were following him around trying to get him to sign stuff and pretending like they knew him,” Ed said. “They’d blocked him in that one time, and when he finally got out the guys followed him. I told him to drive to the police station, which he did.”
Jenna said, “Tony used to always go out to sign autographs after games, but after a while he wouldn’t because those same guys would always be there. The majority of fans have been great to us, but they were scary.”
Still, the experience did nothing to ruin Tony’s view of the season. One day at dinner, Jenna recalled, “he just looks at me out of the blue and says, ‘Do you realize how much fun I’m having?’ That was very special to hear.”
SIBLING SENSITIVITY
How do football parents balance all the attention one of their sons gets with the lack of attention his siblings receive?
“It can be tough,” said Teri Denlinger, who has two other children—22-year-old Kyle and 10-year-old Annie. “Todd has always been a star athlete, whether it was baseball, football, hockey, whatever. Kyle loves sports; he just doesn’t like to part-icipate.
“What has helped is that Kyle is such a great kid. He is Todd’s role model.”
Deb Johnson was divorced when she married Glen Johnson. She had two children: 10-year-old Jay Richardson and his younger brother, Joshua Alexander Richardson. Glen was a widower with an 18-month-old son, Joshua Otis.
Judging by the sons’ accomplishments, the situation has been handled deftly by all. Jay started at defensive end for Ohio State, and Joshua Alexander excels in football and track and field at Dublin Scioto High School. Joshua Otis plays sports and sings with the Columbus Children’s Choir.
“You do wonder if having a star in the house affects your other children,” Deb said. “But I think it’s been a really cool thing for them.”
Jenna Gonzalez has had less to worry about. Tony’s brother Nick played baseball at North Carolina Greensboro, and another brother, Joe, was a safety and team captain at Indiana. The youngest child, Cristina, was a standout in basketball but elected not to play when she enrolled at Loyola.
“When Tony was a toddler, he was always trying to hang with older kids, his brothers and their friends,” Jenna said. “He wanted to be a part of their group. I attribute a lot of his athletic success to his brothers.”
With Joe playing football at Indiana—where the Hoosiers have not enjoyed the success Ohio State has—the family had to deal with another kind of sibling rivalry.
“Joe loved his experience at Indiana, but there were disappointments,” Jenna said. “But he has always supported Tony.
“I will say that watching Ohio State beat Indiana is not something I’m comfortable with,” she added.
SENIOR BLUES
Prior to the Minnesota game, the parents of Ohio State’s senior players taped a video for the end-of-season banquet. For Glen and Deb Johnson, it brought home the fact that the clock was ticking on Jay’s college career.
“It really hit us,” Deb said. “I don’t want to think that there are only two home games left.”
Before the Buckeyes’ 44-0 win over Minnesota, Glen went to skull session, the pregame pep rally at St. John Arena, to watch Jay take one of his final walks to the stadium. “It’s something I will remember,” he said.
It was Deb who was feeling most wistful about the end of Jay’s senior season. Her Buckeye football roots run deep: she earned her undergraduate degree at Ohio State, and during that time she never missed a home game. She even traveled to the 1976 Rose Bowl. That she had a son who played for the Buckeyes was the icing on the cake.
Football will continue to be a way of life for the Johnsons and the Gonzalezes: Jay was taken by the Oakland Raiders in the fifth round of the National Football League draft, and Tony went in the first round to the Indianapolis Colts. But things will not be the same.
“I’ve talked to the parents of some of our players who’ve gone on to the NFL, and they say sometimes they wonder if NFL players have moms,” Deb said. “It’s just a different thing. The camaraderie and togetherness isn’t there.”
HANDLING THE HURT
When the Buckeyes ran back on the field for the second half of the Minnesota game, Tony Gonzalez was not with them.
“I wasn’t aware anything had happened,” Jenna said. “But I knew immediately when he didn’t come out for the second half.
“I kept my eyes glued to the door, and finally I saw him. We made eye contact and he pointed to his head.”
Gonzalez had sustained a mild concussion late in the first half. The injury was not serious.
All football parents live with fear. Teri and Bart Denlinger know it well. In Todd’s second high school game, he was knocked flat during a play.
“I was waiting and waiting for him to move something so I could breathe,” Teri said. “Finally, he did.”
Todd later was diagnosed with a “stinger,” a common football injury that can result in brief paralysis.
“We made a pact with Todd after that day,” Bart said. “If he’s hurt, he just needs to raise an arm or a leg to let us know he’s okay. The worst goes through your mind at times like that.”
A SCARE IN CHAMPAIGN
Heading into the matchup with Illinois in early November, Ohio State was 9-0 and ranked No. 1 in the nation. The Illini had managed only two wins. As the Buckeyes took a 17-0 halftime lead, it looked like the game was going to be a rout. A few hours later, they were counting themselves lucky to escape Champaign with a 17-10 win.
“That game was way too close for comfort,” Jenna Gonzalez said. She even took some blame for the close call, because she had altered her pregame ritual. Normally, she’d buy cheeseburgers from a certain fast-food restaurant and take them to Tony, who in turn would deliver them to the offensive linemen.
That week, however, the usual restaurant was closed when Jenna got there, so she had to use a backup.
“I won’t do that again,” she said.
Deb Johnson also was ready to shoulder some of the blame. The night before, she had set a precedent by being the first-ever female speaker at the team’s traditional chapel service.
“Speaking to the team was an incredible experience,” Johnson said. “But the game was a little too close for us. As parents, we’ve been saying all season that it would be nice to have a close game. Now we’ve decided we really don’t need that stress.”
BUCKEYE BULLETINS
After Ohio State throttled Northwestern 54-10, there was one game left on the schedule: the annual showdown with the Wolverines, who also were unbeaten.
The increase in media attention surrounding the Michigan game was nothing new for the Buckeye parents. As starters and major contributors, Jay Richardson and Tony Gonzalez were featured in stories consistently. The Gonzalez and Johnson families appeared in front-page articles in the Columbus Dispatch.
For the most part, the families enjoyed the attention from the print and broadcast media. The coverage on the Internet was a different story.
“Some parents live on [the Internet], but I try to avoid it,” Deb Johnson said. “The only thing I read religiously is BuckeyeXtra. And I put a Google alert on Jay so every morning I can get up and read whatever stories he’s in. That’s fun.
“But people’s blogs? I just don’t get it. Why should I care what some stranger is saying about Jay?”
Most of the Web sites devoted to Ohio State athletics feature message boards where folks can express their opinions about the Buckeyes.
That leads to a quandary for parents: do they log on and see what people are saying about their son, or do they just ignore it all?
Teri Denlinger admits to occasionally visiting fan sites—not that she likes what she sees. “It’s almost like a train wreck: you have to watch,” she said.
“One time, some guy was saying that Todd wasn’t going to be successful because he had ‘concrete feet.’ That made me mad, because I know he’s out there giving his best.”
Jenna Gonzalez said she frequents Internet sites, but she stays away from the message boards, where ill-informed opinions flow freely.
“Some of the Web sites are great,” she said. “But I have never tuned into a message board, and I won’t.”
THE GAME OF GAMES
On the morning of Michigan game day, Jenna Gonzalez had no idea where her husband was. He had left their hotel two hours earlier, headed for breakfast at a Waffle House. Then he disappeared.
“I can’t reach him on his cell phone,” Jenna reported from their room at the Holiday Inn. “You can’t get service.”
Even at 9 a.m., people were packed into just about every nook and cranny on campus. At the Varsity Club, fans were already celebrating. Near St. John Arena, people playfully heckled a few Michigan fans and watched ESPN’s College GameDay team talk up the game of the season.
The fans also had something new to discuss as they counted the hours before the game. Legendary Michigan coach Bo Schembechler had passed away the day before.
“That was sad,” said Ed Gonzalez, who finally turned up after breakfast. “Bo was a personal friend.”
Ed had played for Schembechler at Michigan. Given that, he has a special understanding of the game’s significance.
“When you play, it’s a different thing,” he said. “My favorite picture of Tony is when he scored that first touchdown on third and 18 [against Michigan] as a sophomore. . . . I can look at Tony’s eyes in that photo, and I know he’s thinking, ‘I’ve been waiting for this my whole life!’”
“I talked to Tony the other night and he said he’s nervous,” Jenna said. “I don’t know what to think about that, because he rarely gets nervous before games.”
Over at the Johnsons’ tailgate near Lincoln Tower, the menu—steak and lobster—reflected the magnitude of the game. But Deb Johnson’s biggest concern was maintaining her composure as she prepared for her son’s final game in Ohio Stadium.
“This is it,” she said. “It’s so emotional.”
Michigan put an early scare into the Buckeyes by driving 80 yards and scoring a touchdown, but Ohio State answered with a touchdown, then another, and another. In the end, the Buckeyes won 42-39.
Two hours after the game, Deb was still at the stadium, waiting outside the locker room for Jay. He emerged just before 9 p.m., and Deb got to end the day the way she wanted to.
She hugged her son and smiled. “This is a very, very special day.”
THE FINALE THAT FIZZLED
The BCS National Championship game in Phoenix was supposed to be the coronation of one of the all-time great Ohio State teams. Instead, it was a slap in the face. Parents and fans alike watched dumbfounded as Florida marched up and down the field on the way to a shocking 41-14 win. People somehow expected the players’ families to have the answers.
“We were out to eat one night and somebody came up to us,” Teri Denlinger said. “They were upset because they’d spent so much money going out there. It was like they felt these players owed them the win.”
“Tony would give anything to play that thing again two or three times just to prove they were a better team than that,” Ed Gonzalez said. “It’s going to haunt him. That game will always be in his head.”
Despite the ending, the Buckeye families were grateful for the journey. “Ohio State football has been the most incredible ride of our lives,” said Deb Johnson.
“Regardless of what happened in Arizona, I’m still proud to be a Buckeye and to be a Buckeye parent. When I’m 60, 70, or 80 years old, I’m still going to be telling these stories.”
And who knows? By then, maybe she’ll be a Buckeye grandma. That will be another story for another day.
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