Counting the Days While My Mind Slips Away

by Ben Utecht

  I had no idea how this stranger knew so much about me. Clearly he had done his homework before making the call. When I hung up the phone my roommate asked, “What was that?”

  “A sports agent,” I said, in shock.

  “You’re kidding me! Oh man, that’s AWESOME!” my roommate said. He jumped up and gave me a high five. “Dude, this is going to happen for you!”

  That was just the first of many calls I received throughout the off-season and into the beginning of my redshirt junior year. If you thought my receiving a scholarship at the age of sixteen went to my head, having agents call took me to a whole new level. My college major was supposed to be communications, but once the possibility of playing on the next level presented itself, my major became football. Football not only became my major, it was my identity. When I watched NFL games on television, I started picturing myself on the field. I craved the fame and fortune. When another agent called, I ate up the attention. I still went to FCA meetings, and I went to church when I went home, but I also started slipping into the lifestyle that I thought I deserved. The party scene became normal and I started making compromises with my convictions that I never expected myself to make. But, at the time, I didn’t feel too bad about it. After all, I was on my way to the NFL. This was going to be my life. I might as well enjoy it.

  And then I would run into Karyn.

  One evening that summer I called her. “Hey, Karyn, it’s Ben. Would you like to go see a show?”

  “Tonight?” she asked.

  “Sure, if you don’t have anything else going on,” I said.

  “Okay,” Karyn said.

  I took her to see the theatrical comedy Triple Espresso. I had already seen the play with my family and loved it so I was confident it would make for a good date. A long time had passed since I had seen Karyn, and in a way, I missed her. Maybe my feelings came because it was summer and my days were filled with nothing but summer school classes and football conditioning on a nearly empty campus. Perhaps I was lonely, but I found myself thinking about Karyn a lot. This is so right. Why don’t I pursue a real relationship with Karyn? I found myself thinking over and over. And what better way to bring two people together than comedy?

  My plan worked. The two of us had a great time laughing together and enjoying dinner after the show. The whole night I thought how I could get used to this. Then, once again, after I dropped her off at her off-campus apartment with just a hug, she didn’t hear from me. I’m sure she thought that just like the comedy we watched, the joke was on her. But in reality, the joke was on me.

  Around that time Karyn went home for a visit. She and her mother went to a special IMAX showing of one of her favorite movies from when she was a girl, Beauty and the Beast. In the middle of the movie, when Gaston sings his praises and all the girls swoon, Karyn sat up in her seat and said to her mom, “That’s it! That’s Ben. He’s Gaston!” I have to be honest. She was right. I had allowed my success to go to my head and had become Gaston. All I needed was the hunting lodge and a goofy sidekick.

  •  •  •

  The hype surrounding me as a player peaked right before the start of my redshirt junior year. I was named to a couple of preseason all-American teams. ESPN listed me as a potential second- or third-round draft choice. Other publications called me a favorite for the Mackey Award. Before I signed with Minnesota, Coach Mason said I had the potential to be the best tight end in the Big 10. This was my chance to prove him right. If I had the kind of year I hoped to have, I planned on declaring myself eligible for the next NFL draft. Even though I had not put as much energy into my schoolwork as I should have, I was on track to graduate in May. The timing, to me, was perfect. I could graduate on time, land my dream job as a professional football player, then use that position to set me up for a life after football.

  In our first game of the 2002 season I picked up where I left off in the previous year’s Wisconsin game. I had three catches for eighty-six yards and one touchdown in a 42–0 win. The next week, against Louisiana-Lafayette, I led the team with seven catches for seventy-eight yards and three touchdowns in another Golden Gopher win, 35–11. Against Toledo in week three I only had three catches, but that still led the team. I also scored one touchdown as we went on to win, 31–21. I had four more catches in a big win over Buffalo. After the first month of the 2002 college football season I led the nation in receiving, not just among tight ends but for all receivers.

  More calls from agents rolled in. National sports commentators talked about me. I was right where I wanted to be as a football player. All of my dreams appeared to be on the brink of coming true.

  And then came a game against Purdue.

  CHAPTER 6

  TURNING POINT

  AS A TEAM, MY GOLDEN Gophers went into the 2002 Big 10 opener riding a four-game winning streak and feeling good about our chances to make some noise in the conference. Although the 2001 season had been a disappointment, we ended the year beating our biggest rivals in Wisconsin. That was my breakout game, which was supposed to lead to 2002 becoming my breakout season. However, putting up big numbers against smaller schools Louisiana-Lafayette, Toledo, and Buffalo is very different than doing the same against the power schools of the Big 10. I was anxious to prove myself against the best teams in the best college football conference in the country. First stop: Ross-Ade Stadium in West Lafayette, Indiana, for a game against Purdue.

  In 2002, Purdue was two years removed from a Big 10 title and playing in the Rose Bowl. Drew Brees had gone on to the NFL, but Purdue still had a good quarterback in Kyle Orton, who also went on to play in the NFL. On top of that, we had to go on the road for only the second time all season. We knew this was going to be a tough game, but everyone on the team, from Coach Mason on down, felt we had a good shot at coming home with a win.

  Purdue jumped out in front with a touchdown drive midway through the first quarter. However, we clawed back in front as Dan Nystrom kicked three field goals in the second quarter, including one with only a minute and a half remaining in the first half. We went into halftime in front 9–7 and were set to receive the opening kickoff of the second half. That meant we had a good chance both to score late in the first half and again at the beginning of the second, without Purdue even touching the football. I had three catches for twenty-nine yards in the first half, which isn’t a bad way to start a game.

  Unfortunately, Purdue intercepted a pass from our quarterback, Asad Abdul-Khaliq, on the first play from scrimmage in the half and ran it back for a touchdown. No one on our sideline panicked. Coach Mason walked up and down the line telling us, “That’s all right. Let’s get the ball back and put some more points on the board.”

  During the next series of plays, Asad called a play on which I was to run a corner route. On a corner route, I run out about ten yards, plant my foot, and cut hard at a 45-degree angle. I can run the route in my sleep. The moment the ball snapped, I took off from the line. A linebacker tried to stay with me but I blew past him. Ten yards out I planted my left foot and made a hard cut. No one was near me. I was wide open. The moment I planted my foot I heard a pop and a sharp pain shot right through the middle of my foot and up my leg. I pulled up from the route and kind of hopped up in pain. I don’t remember if Asad threw the ball to me or not. The shooting pain in my foot sort of crowded out every other memory of the moment.

  I limped back into the huddle. Asad looked over at me. He could tell I was in pain. “You okay, ’techt?” he asked.

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” I lied. In football you are taught to play through the pain and that’s what I tried to do. The initial shot of pain grew into a deep, constant throbbing that got worse with every step I took. I should have taken myself out of the game, but I didn’t. The game was too important and I didn’t want to let my coaches and teammates down. Unfortunately, Purdue scored two more touchdowns in the third quarter to take a 28–9 lead. We managed to cut it to 28–15 in the fourth quarter with a touchdown (the extra point failed), b
ut we never got close to scoring again. The loss only made my foot hurt that much worse on the trip back to Minneapolis.

  I thought the pain would go away, but when it was even worse on Monday I went in to see the team trainers. They sent me in for an X-ray. My worst fears came true. I had a significant stress fracture right in the middle of my foot. The team sent me to see an orthopedic doctor, who told me that I had made the injury worse by continuing to play on it after the initial break. So much for playing through pain. “You have a couple of options, Ben,” he told me. “We can put your foot in a hard cast and you stay off of it for the next six to eight weeks. Unfortunately, your season will be over. However, you will qualify for a medical redshirt.” A medical redshirt means I would receive an extra year of eligibility, which I didn’t need or want. I was on track to graduate in four years. I didn’t need a sixth year of college.

  “I need to keep playing,” I replied. “Is there any way I can stay on the field?”

  “There is,” the doctor said. “We can cast your foot, just as we discussed, and you stay off of it through the week. Then, on game days, we can remove the cast, give you strong anti-inflammatories, and let you play. It will be painful, but what we give you for the pain should help.”

  “Let’s do that,” I said without hesitating. I didn’t need to think through the two options or consult anyone. If there was a way for me to stay on the field and contribute to the team, I was going to do it.

  The doctor put my foot in a cast. For the rest of the week I hobbled around campus on crutches. I could not practice with the team, but I sat in on all the team meetings and film sessions in preparation for the next game. Then on Saturday mornings the trainers cut off my cast, gave me a shot of painkillers, and sent me out to play. I did not miss a game, but I never came close to matching my level of play from the first four games. Through the rest of the regular season I never led the team in receiving and I did not score another touchdown. All the hype about me possibly being a high draft choice evaporated. Agents stopped calling. I went from being a leading contender for the Mackey Award, as one of the premier tight ends in college football, to just another guy. The fact that I was playing every week on a broken foot did not matter to the scouts and commentators. I disappeared from everyone’s radar screens. My dreams of playing the next season in the National Football League were all but dead.

  And that really, really ticked me off.

  I wasn’t mad at the doctors or trainers who put me in and out of the cast. I wasn’t mad at the scouts and sportswriters who had basically written me off as a flash in the pan who could put up great stats against little MAC (Mid-American Conference) schools but melted when the competition got tough. I couldn’t blame them for moving on from me to whatever tight end happened to be lighting it up now. If I had their job, I would do the exact same thing. And I wasn’t mad at my foot for giving out. That would just be dumb.

  No, I was mad at God for letting my foot break and taking away all the hopes and dreams I had of a brighter future. This was my third major injury in basically four years, going back to my pelvic avulsion in high school. Every single injury happened on fluke plays where no one was around me. My pelvic fracture occurred when I planted my foot and cut hard on a pass route, which sounded extremely familiar now. Then I tore up my ankle when some bonehead put a sprinkler head in the middle of a football field. How can something like that even happen? And now I had broken another bone, not because some all-American linebacker plowed into me, but because I turned at the wrong angle while running. God, I yelled in my mind, why do you keep doing this to me?! He had to be the one doing it. There was no other explanation. Even if He wasn’t responsible for causing the injuries, He sure could have kept them from happening.

  And that is exactly what I expected Him to do. I felt like God owed that to me. After all, I was a good guy. All through high school I had gone out of my way to do good to other people. I even played with a broken hip, not for my own personal gain but because the team needed me. My high school coach, Bob Majeski, called me the eternal optimist because I always put the team first and I always did what I could to help others. Always! Coach Majeski even resurrected an old award at Hastings High that hadn’t been given out in years. The Marvin “Tubby” Biskupski Award went to an athlete that showed exceptional character, integrity, compassion, and competitiveness. When he gave the award to me it hadn’t been given out in forever, and it hasn’t been given out since. I carried that same dedication into college. Deep down, I felt the accolades coming my way and the NFL buzz were God’s ways of rewarding me for my solid character. And now He just up and decided to take it all away.

  Week in and week out I hobbled about on those cursed crutches, then suffered through constant, throbbing pain as I limped through Saturday’s games. The more my foot hurt, the angrier with God I got. Finally I flat-out told Him, “That’s it, God. I’m done. I did my part. I lived the kind of life I thought You wanted from me. I didn’t complain when my hip fractured, even though it cost me my season. And I didn’t get angry with You when my ankle broke even though it cost me starting as a true freshman. I sucked it up and I did what You expected me to do. Then You let this happen to me? How? How could You do this to me? If You aren’t going to be here for me, then why do I worry about being there for You and doing what You want?”

  I hit my breaking point, which made me stop straddling the fence. I jumped down with both feet on the other side. Through the rest of that season I allowed myself to get swept up in the party culture on campus. Commitments I made when I was in high school, commitments to purity and integrity, I threw out the window. I’d always been a hopeless romantic who dreamed of a very special wedding night with my bride, where the two of us have saved ourselves for one another and that moment. At twenty-one, I stopped saving anything for anyone. In the back of my mind I was thinking, I’ll show You, God. Through all this I remained part of FCA and played on their worship team. I had even become part of the leadership team prior to becoming so angry with God. Honestly, I should have stepped down because I wasn’t living the kind of life one should expect from a person in a Christian leadership position. But I didn’t. I guess that was also part of my way of sticking it to God.

  •  •  •

  I was still mad at God one afternoon as I hobbled through the training room next to our football locker room. Just being in the training room made me seethe. You only go see the trainers when you are injured, and that was me. I was finished with my treatments for the day and was on my way toward the door when I felt a tap on my shoulder. Turning around I looked down at a little five-feet, two-inch, blond-haired, blue-eyed girl I recognized as part of the training staff.

  “Are you Ben?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “We haven’t met yet. I’m Melissa. Could I talk to you for a minute in the back room there?”

  “Sure,” I said, even though I didn’t really want to. I followed her back toward one of the rooms the trainers use, and honestly, the whole time I thought she wanted to ask me out on a date. That’s how full of myself I was. The whole way back to this room I’m trying to figure out what I am going to say because I didn’t want to go out with this girl.

  The moment we got to a private place she turned to me and said, “Are you a Christian?”

  “Uh . . . yeah. Yes, I am,” I stammered. She caught me completely off guard. Her question felt like a sucker punch in the gut, it was so out of the blue.

  “Well, I’m a Christian, too, and . . .” She hesitated for a moment. “This may sound strange to you, I don’t know. But I need to ask you another question.”

  “Okay,” I said, completely unsure of what might come out of her mouth next.

  “Do you believe God speaks to people?” she said.

  I grew up in the home of a Methodist pastor in the Midwest. My parents took their faith very seriously, but we never talked a lot about supernatural encounters. She had to sense how uncomfortable her question ma
de me when I sort of spit out, “Yeah, well, you know, I guess.”

  “Okay. Good. I was hesitant to tell you this, but last night I was praying with some of my friends and all of the sudden God just put your name on my heart so much that I couldn’t focus on anything else. So I left the room and got down on my knees and started praying for you by name.” Then she stopped and looked at me in a way that made me feel like my soul was laid bare before her. “Things aren’t right in your life, are they? There’s a darkness there. I don’t have the answer for you, and I’m honestly really nervous about saying this to you because I don’t know you, but the Lord told me to tell you something.”

  She had my full and undivided attention. “What?” I asked.

  “He told me to tell you that you aren’t giving Him something, Ben; do you know what that is?” she asked.

  I broke out in a cold sweat. All I wanted to do was get out of there as fast as my crutches could carry me. “Uh, you know, I . . . I . . . I . . . I don’t know. I gotta go,” I said, and turned to leave right then. Melissa didn’t chase me or press her question. She watched as I left.

  Once I got outside and started toward my dorm the panic I felt in that little room grew. I felt tormented inside. A battle waged inside me between who I had once been and who I was now becoming. I tried to push Melissa’s question out of my head as nothing but crazy talk, but I couldn’t. She knows. How can she possibly know about the choices I’m making? I wondered. And why would she care how I’m living my life? Why would she ask me these questions?

  When I got back to my room I tried to study or do something, anything, normal. I grabbed a book off my desk and started studying. But I couldn’t concentrate. My mind kept dwelling on Melissa’s questions. You aren’t giving Him something, Ben, I could hear her say. Her words grew louder and louder in my mind until I was completely overwhelmed. The only thing I could think to do was the same thing I always did when I needed answers: I called my dad. I told him everything Melissa had said and then I asked, “Dad, what do I do?”