by Bryan Mealer
Soon Hester was needing shots in his lower back just to play, then more in his foot for his plantar fasciitis. He ended up missing five of the last six games of the 1995 season due to a deep-thigh contusion. In April 1996, when the Rams needed to free up their salary cap, they cut Hester loose.
Midway through the season, Hester was back home in Wellington and still suffering from foot pain, when he got a call from Ron Wolf. Wolf had drafted Hester in Los Angeles and was now GM for the Green Bay Packers.
“Jessie, we need a receiver,” he said.
“Ron, I can’t run.”
Still, Hester told Wolf to give him two weeks to heal, to figure something out. But the next day, the Packers signed Andre Rison and won a Super Bowl that season.
“My pro career just came down to what-ifs,” Hester said. “In the end, my body just broke down on me and I had to come to grips with that. Some things are meant to be. Certain things are just destined.”
• • •
STANDING ON THE sideline with the fourth quarter under way, his Raiders up by six, Hester battled the urge to imagine that his luck was about to change. The fourth quarter was Cocoa’s witching hour, and something told Hester they’d yet to unveil their most potent magic.
Wilkinson had said as much himself. Before the half, he’d told the on-field reporter for Fox Sports, “Our problem is we’re not playing Cocoa football.” Everyone knew what he meant by Cocoa football, and it wasn’t a fluke seventy-yard kickoff return to tie the game. What was missing was that mechanical, coldhearted execution for which the Tigers were known.
Down 13–7, Campbell and the Tigers came out like a gang of accountants and quickly went to work. On the first snap, it was Campbell to Folston, who swept right and was cut down by Boobie for a gain of four. Next, Campbell pitched to Lee, who swept left and into the arms of Jaja for a gain of two. The Tigers were still working the same clinical rotation the Raider linebackers had memorized and contained all night.
Which was exactly what Wilkinson wanted them to think. Drawing them close, he sprang the trap.
On third and four from their own forty-two, Campbell faked to Lee on another sweep, then rolled out of the pocket. And then—for only the second time in eighteen quarters of play—he threw a pass. It was to Jones, who was wide open in the flat. By the time the Raider secondary could adjust, Jones was across midfield to the thirty-six. The Tiger crowd leapt to their feet, for they saw the dark lightning in the distance and knew what was rolling in.
The pass play rocked the Raiders’ equilibrium and the Tigers continued to pound. Folston for two. Jones for six. Jones again on fourth and one for a fresh set of lives. In the thick of the drive, the cameras closed in on Campbell’s face to reveal a placid calm, the long stare of a young man who’d already played the game and was relaxing by the pool.
On first down, Campbell gave it to Folston for another three yards, before Jones blasted a hole to the Raider nine. Two plays later, Jones met Boobie at the goal line and forced his way inside, tying the game.
The kicker, Cody Bell, ran out to attempt the extra point.
It was Bell who had carried his team to their first state title game in 2008 on a fifty-two-yard field goal in the semifinals. In the championship game against Tallahassee Godby, Bell missed all four field goals he attempted. The game ended with the score tied 0–0—the first time that had ever happened in Florida state finals history. It was Godby who scored first in overtime, but the extra point was blocked. Backed into a corner, the Tigers fought downfield for the tying touchdown, then placed their bets once again on the conflicted legs of Cody Bell. His extra point was true.
Now, two years later, on the same stretch of field, Bell’s kick sailed through the center of the uprights.
The Tigers took the lead 14–13.
• • •
MARIO WATCHED THE kick from the sideline and felt a quickening, as if the earth had suddenly gained speed. He looked up at the clock. It read five minutes and fifty-four seconds. It was as if his whole life and its parade of heartbreak were suddenly distilled into this tiny teacup of time. He had six minutes to right so many things: to bring home the ring to rest near his father’s photo, to quiet the ghosts and for once shed the mark of the piteous orphan. Six minutes to become immortal, at last beloved. The man of the city.
Six minutes was enough to win. The quarterback strapped on his helmet and ran back onto the field.
From their own twenty-yard line, the Raiders came out throwing fire. Mario launched his first pass up the right side, hitting Jaime for a gain of eleven and the first down.
That’s right, baby! That’s how to be great!
His heart pounded in his ears. The rush of the moment seemed to lift his rubbery legs and carry him downfield, his body all but floating to the fresh set of sticks.
Mario looked toward Hester on the sidelines.
“Cadillac! Cadillac!” the coach shouted.
It was a fifteen-yard dig route on the left side for Davonte. Mario lined up in shotgun and shouted the snap. That’s when everything fell apart.
Not a second after Mario touched the ball, Tyrell Denson appeared on his left side, charging at full speed. There was no time to react. The defensive end wrapped Mario’s waist and flung him to the turf. Mario instantly sprang to his feet in a rage. From the corner of his eye, he’d watched Densen fly past two of his linemen. Neither player had done anything to stop him.
Mario ran toward them, his arms raised in a panic. The clock was hammering down. This was not the time to forget assignments. “What’s goin on?” he shouted, then saw something in their faces that scared him to death.
“Don’t give up on me,” he said, then pleaded, “Don’t you give up on me now!!”
Later, Hester would contend that the quarterback had misread his teammates’ expressions. They had not given up on their captain, he said. Rather, they were not made of the same stuff. They did not have that fight raging inside, that impossible hole to fill. Unlike Mario, they just didn’t need to win.
The sack pushed the Raiders back eight yards, and then it happened again. The Tigers blitzed with three defenders, who busted through the line with ease. All three linemen hit Mario at the same time and drove his flailing body deep into the backfield.
The Cocoa crowd were on their feet, hysterical. The momentum had shifted. The Raiders had given the Tigers life. And once they had life, they rarely let it go.
On third down and thirty-two, Hester called a 989 Rolls-Royce. Davonte went into motion up the left side as Cocoa once again brought the rush. As Mario dropped back to pass, Ferguson broke free and slapped his arm just as he let go of the ball. It hung in the air, spiraling in the lights across midfield, and almost made the distance. Davonte ran it down like an outfielder staring into the sun, then found himself in a frenzy of black jerseys. The ball came down into the arms of Datarius Allen, the Tiger safety.
With four minutes left in the game, Cocoa began chewing the clock and letting it bleed. On the sidelines, Hester waited for the big play. The defense had been performing miracles all season. It was only a matter of time, he thought. Who’s it gonna be? In the final chapter, who’s gonna make the big play? But the only big play came from Page, who accidentally grabbed a face mask. The penalty pushed Cocoa deeper into Raider territory. Boobie and the defense managed to hold the Tigers to third down and three. But with 2:39 left, Folston fought loose on the right side and seized the first down.
The coaches knew.
“That did it,” said Sam.
Hester shook his head. “Yeah.”
On the sideline, the Raiders watched with blank expressions as Campbell took a knee at 1:34 to run the clock down. As the crowd chanted, “THREE-PEAT! THREE-PEAT!” a lone voice could be heard over the din.
It was the quarterback, standing halfway on the field, still clutching his helmet.
“Do something!” he shouted. “Do something!”
• • •
THE TIGERS RUSHED the
field in triumph. Many fell to the ground, released from the burden of work, and laughed in one another’s arms. They behaved the way true champions did, by raising the sword and passing the credit. Wilkinson, drenched in a victory bath from the Cocoa water jugs, walked the field whispering something to his small son, whom he held in his arms.
Glades Central, once again the losers, did not fall and weep. Instead they stood in stunned disbelief, then discarded their helmets on the turf like tools they’d never use again. By the time the officials erected two platforms for an awards ceremony, most of the Raider Nation had found the exits. But about a hundred stayed behind, among them gamblers who’d just lost thousands. And when Jessie Hester was announced as the coach of the second-place Raiders, they rose to their feet and booed him. Later, as Hester walked off the field toward the locker room, an older man chased him down along the railing, raised his arm, and called him a piece of shit.
For them, nothing was good enough.
As the players packed their bags in silence, more silver medals found their way to the floor. One belonged to the quarterback, who’d bent down and taken his prize like a sickness. Mario had left immediately following the ceremony with Gail and his sisters, his only consolation being that he’d done everything in his power to win.
As the team readied to load the bus, Hester sat alone on the opposite side of the locker room. Elbows on his knees, he stared vacantly at the floor. Minutes passed. Seniors left with parents without saying good-bye. No one dared disturb him. As the room emptied, one could hear the sounds of shouting and loud music. On the other side of the wall, the Tigers were celebrating.
“I’ve just been sitting here listening to it,” he said, not looking up. “I just want to hear what it sounds like.”
He’d been rewinding every play in his mind, searching for an answer: Should they have kicked the field goal? Was it Jaja’s absence on the return? At some point he realized that none of that even mattered. The premonition he’d felt before the game had been correct. Except Cocoa was more than just a team playing lucky. They were a team of destiny. And teams of destiny could not be defeated.
Destiny once had its place in the muck, but those days may have passed. Sitting there now, the coach doubted they would ever return again. Not to a town that devoured its own, a town that had lost its way. Destiny had no place where dark forces were free to roam.
EPILOGUE
Six days later, Jessie Hester was fired.
School principal Anthony Anderson delivered the news the Friday before Christmas break in a meeting with athletic director Edwin James that lasted less than five minutes. The principal did not mention the loss in Orlando, or the group of angry fans who’d crowded his office that week demanding a change. The coach who’d returned home to give something back, whose record was 36–4 with two state championship appearances, was being fired over grades.
“We are grateful for the three years that Mr. Hester spent with our football program at Glades Central,” Anderson said later in a statement. “As we move forward to connect the bridge of academics with our athletic program, we have decided to move in a different direction.”
Despite widespread outrage over play calls during the Cocoa game, particularly Hester’s decision not to kick the field goal, the news of his firing stunned and angered parents and fans. Many saw academics as a veiled excuse for not bringing home the title. In the days that followed, they flooded the comments section of the Post story, lamenting the loss of a role model and mentor. They also criticized a culture that valued winning over all else and routinely tore down its heroes.
“For the past three years with Hester, he has made them not only believe in themselves, but each other as a team,” one parent wrote.
“What kind of message does this send to our kids?” asked another.
Hester’s players were equally shocked by the news.
“I can’t understand it,” said Robert Way. “He was the best coach I ever had. No one ever motivated me like him. We all looked up to him.”
“I thought we should have kicked the field goal,” said Davonte. “But that was no reason to fire him.”
Others were not surprised. “That’s how they do you in Belle Glade,” Mario said. “Nothin’s changed.”
• • •
FOR MARIO, the crushing loss and firing of his mentor made the ground he walked on seem all the more poisonous. He ached to leave Belle Glade, and his official visit to Hampton University in late January appeared to be his only option.
The week before flying to Virginia, Mario was selected starting quarterback in an all-star game for local seniors, held in Boca Raton. The game would be his last time to wear his Raider helmet and offered a chance to at least go out a winner.
After six weeks of rest, the quarterback’s shoulder was feeling better and his headaches were gone. But the time off had also added pounds. “Damn, Mario’s big,” his sister Jamekia said, watching from the bleachers as her brother squeezed into his flak vest and pads. She turned to Canisa and Aunt Gail. “Look at him. He’s fat.”
Gail said that ever since the loss in Orlando, Mario had been calling a lot, needing a boost. “He keeps saying, ‘I need to get out of here, I just can’t wait,’ ” said Gail, who wore a wool shawl and purple scarf to keep out the cold wind. “He told me as long as the two of us can talk every day, he’ll be okay. We just need to keep him positive.”
She sighed and added, “He never got counseling. People gave him material things, but they never filled that emotional void.”
Despite his added weight, Mario gave the crowd another tireless and riveting performance. As captain of the American team, he passed for 140 yards against the Nationals, ran for one touchdown, and threw two more—one of them to his trusted receiver Jaqavein Oliver. The other came in the last seconds of the fourth quarter. With American down 20–13, Mario hit Dwyer wideout Shawn McClaine for a thirty-nine-yard score, but the two-point conversion failed just as the clock struck zero. Once again, the quarterback found himself one point shy of victory.
The crowd in Boca couldn’t have cared less; they whooped and cheered as Mario was awarded his team’s MVP. Standing at the far end of the bleachers was Hester, who slipped out just before the ceremony.
A few days later, Mario traveled to Hampton and received his much-awaited official treatment: campus and facility tours, a hotel room and restaurant dinners, beautiful chaperones, assurance of a role as middle linebacker—and, more important, a vision of a new home. Upon leaving, Coach Field said they’d be in touch with the details of the offer. Mario was ecstatic.
“Hampton’s on point!” he announced on his Facebook page. An unfettered joy seemed to radiate from his beaming profile photo.
The trip came just in time for Signing Day, held the following Wednesday. And just in time for Mario’s name to be printed on a large placard along with the other Raiders signing to Division I programs that afternoon: KB, Davonte, and Robert Way.
Mario awoke that morning and dressed for school, throwing on his maroon polo and pressed khakis. The ceremony and visions of college life filled his thoughts and made him miss his parents even more. But as he drove to campus, he received a text message from Coach Field. After talking to head coach Donovan Rose, he said, the Pirates could only extend a partial scholarship of $14,000. Full tuition was around $27,000, and Mario knew the difference was impossible to cover. He quickly considered taking out a loan, then realized the true meaning behind Field’s text. Hampton did not really want him. Not only did they not want him, but the coaches couldn’t even bother making a phone call to tell him so themselves.
Mario’s mind spun out. He sat in his car in the school parking lot, flattened by the news and ashamed to go inside. He called Canisa and told her what happened. The sound of his voice made her worry, so she called Gail. When Gail rang Mario minutes later, she repeated what she’d been telling him since Mary and James died, ever since she’d wrapped him up trembling in her arms.
“
God has something planned for you,” she said. “You have purpose. You were put on this earth for a reason.”
They made plans for Mario to come stay with her in Fort Lauderdale that weekend, to get a change of scenery and go to church on Sunday. Mario always felt better after hanging up with Auntie Gail. Because if he could not hear his mother’s voice, then Gail’s was the next closest thing.
• • •
MARIO DID NOT appear at the Signing Day ceremony at four o’clock with the rest of his team. The auditorium was packed with students and family. People had heard what had happened to the quarterback and were already whispering. But that news was suddenly superseded when Hester walked through the doors. He’d told his boys he would watch them sign, and despite his bitterness and confusion over his dismissal, he’d swallowed his pride and kept his word. It was odd how he suddenly seemed out of place, like a character from a previous story who’d walked into another book. He heard about Mario and dropped his head, the gesture expressing the worry that most everyone now felt.
Signing Day commenced with jubilation but few surprises. Benjamin stepped up to the podium, which was festooned with maroon and gold balloons. He thanked God and his coaches. “And with that,” he said, whipping on a Seminoles cap, “I’d like to further my education at Florida State.” Both Robert Way and Davonte announced they were joining the Marshall Thundering Herd. All three players then posed for photos with Hester. But the joyous mood quickly turned ugly. As people walked out the doors minutes later, they passed the former head coach engaged in a seething argument with Anderson.
Mario finished the school week in a mild panic. Watching his boys in their college caps filled him with both sorrow and desperation. He would now join Oliver, Page, Purvis, and the other seniors navigating their way into a DII or junior college, whoever would have them. Hester called and assured him, “We’re gonna find you a home.” But still, Mario feared he would have to go it alone.
