Truthfully, it was hard for me to type the title of this post. I can't believe Frank Wychek died on Saturday at the age of 52. So young. So very, very sad.
This is one of those strange times when I find myself profoundly affected by the death of someone I never met. I've been processing this all week and trying to understand why Frank's death hit me so hard on a personal level. I want to be clear, too, that I'm not minimizing the tragedy or the devastating impact on his family, particularly his two daughters and three grandchildren.
Frank was an all pro tight end in the early years of the Tennessee Titans. Along with Eddie George and Steve McNair, his every man, lunch bucket approach to football personified those Titans' teams that came within a yard of beating the Rams in Super Bowl XXXIV. Blue collar, tough, hard to play against. That was the Titans of the late '90's and early 2000's.
In those days, I never missed a Titans' home game. It was still hard to believe, at that point in time, that Nashville had an NFL team. My law partner, Mark, and I had season tickets in the club section. With other friends, we tailgated before every game, in the heat of early September or the bitter cold of late December. It was a production, too, with charcoal grilling, all kinds of food, and a lot of beer. Often times, we tailgated again after the game as we waited for traffic to thin out so we could head home. This, of course, is before most of us had children. The Sunday noon Titans' games were a focal point of our social lives.
After his career ended, Frank replaced Pat Ryan as doing color commentary on the Titans' radio broadcasts with Mike Keith. He also teamed up with Kevin Ingram and Mark Howard on 104.5 The Zone for what became the most popular morning radio show in middle Tennessee for more than a decade. The chemistry between Kevin, Mark and Frank was easy and natural, like catching radio lightning in a bottle. Because of what I believe was his declining physical and emotional health, Frank left both jobs with little fanfare and became somewhat of a recluse. It was strange, to me, for someone who had been in the public eye for so long, and seemed to enjoy it, to virtually disappear.
Although the details aren't fully known, what has been reported is that Frank died at his house in Chattanooga after a fall in which he hit his head. The fact that he had dealt with significant health issues due to multiple concussions and head trauma during his football career was the worst kept secret in town. Losing Frank Wychek at such a young age makes me feel, unquestionably, that the fame and fortune that came with being an All Pro NFL tight end were not an even trade for the pain and anguish he endured after he retired and, of course, his untimely death.
I've thought about my mom a lot since Frank died. She loved him as a player, for sure, and maybe loved him even more as a radio personality. My mom often called me on the mornings, on her way home from working the night shift at Baptist Hospital, to tell me about an argument she had heard Frank and Mark Howard having on the radio. She loved the Wake-Up Zone and Frank, Mark, and Kevin so much.
For the first time in years, I tuned in to a local radio sport talk show so I could hear Paul Kuharsky talk about Frank Wychek for the hour he was on the air. Listening to Paul and his stories brought back a lot of memories for me of a time when the sport scene in Nashville was completed different than it is now. In those days, what sports columnists like David Climer, Larry Woody, and Joe Biddle wrote was important. And what sports talk show hosts like George Plaster said on the air was important, too. Not so much anymore, because the sports media landscape is so diffused.
Those days are gone forever.
R.I.P. Frank Wycheck
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