Kenny Easley credits the Hall of Fame with helping him get back on his feet.
CANTON, Ohio — Kenny Easley plans to start Saturday, the day he will become the fourth player who spent his entire career with the Seahawks to be enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, the same as he has every other for the past year or so — with a one-mile walk at 5:30 a.m.
It’s a ritual he started on the day last August when he found out he had been nominated for the Hall by the Senior Committee.
At the time, Easley was about three weeks removed from triple bypass heart surgery to fix an ailment that had arrived almost over night — he had trouble breathing one evening while watching TV and was told the next day he needed the surgery after his pulse rate was measured at 30.
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Following the surgery, Easley says, “I was in a real funk. I just could not believe this had happened to me. Anything but my heart. My heart had taken me in athletics to the heights of competitiveness.’’
The call from the Hall, Easley said, also served as a signal to start getting on with his life.
“The Hall of Fame was the thing that pulled me out of it,’’ Easley said.
So he began waking every morning at 5:30 and walking a mile or so, a routine he has continued during his weekend in Canton. He says fans waiting outside the hotel greet him asking for autographs. He tells them they can walk with him and get an autograph when they are done.
“It’s a beautiful thing,’’ Easley says, calling the walks “spiritual and cleansing.’’
His walk Saturday morning will begin a day that has been long in coming.
Easley played for the Seahawks from 1981-87 during which time he was generally acknowledged as one of the best safeties in the NFL. But due in part to playing only 89 games (his career ended at 28 due to kidney issues brought on by an overdose of painkillers) he never received serious consideration for the Hall until the Senior nomination last year — he was elected in February.
Easley, now 59, says he has no bitterness about having to wait 25 years after he was first eligible to get in, having said he thinks he may even appreciate the moment more now than he would have had been elected then.
The years, in fact, have gradually washed away any hard feelings Easley had about his football career.
He sued the Seahawks after he retired alleging the painkiller use led to his kidney condition, winning an out-of-court settlement. That led to a roughly 15-year estrangement from not only the Seahawks but the game of football.
That relationship, though, began to renew when he got a call in 2002 telling him that Seahawks owner Paul Allen had decided there would be no more additions to the team’s Ring of Honor until Easley agreed to go in. Easley said yes and was inducted that fall beginning a reintegration into both the Seahawks organization and football in general (he has said wanting to share his accomplishments with his three children was also a motivating factor as was the fact the team now had new management).
Friday, as he talked to reporters in a press conference previewing Saturday’s ceremony, Easley revealed that along the way he has also mended another frayed relationship with a key Seahawk of his playing days — receiver Steve Largent.
Easley was Seattle’s player representative during his playing days, an era that included strikes in 1982 and 1987.
Largent, meanwhile, crossed the picket line in 1987 one of the more notable players to do so, an occurrence that some felt helped derail a season that began with Super Bowl hopes.
“I think it’s fair to say that when Steve and I were teammates we weren’t the best of friends,’’ Easley said. “Because I was the player rep and when we went into those strikes there were some things that happened with certain players crossing the picket line that made it untenable for me and other people.’’
Largent, who became the first Seahawk Hall of Famer in 1995 and is attending this week’s ceremonies, said Friday “it was hard for me because I felt like I had a great relationship with all of my teammates all of the time except for Kenny… It was never issues on the field, just off the field.’’
The strained relations lasted until about five or six years ago, Largent said.
Largent was due to give a speech near Easley’s home in Norfolk, Va., when he was told Easley had asked to give the introduction.
“I honestly didn’t know what Kenny was going to say about me, good or bad,’’ he said.
Turned out it was all good, with Largent saying the speech Easley gave “really reconciled any differences we had and from that point on there have been no scars or issues between me and Kenny.’’
In fact, Easley has invited Largent to play in his golf tournament with Largent accepting the last few years.
“He’s buried the hatchet and I’ve buried the hatchet and it’s been a fantastic relationship,’’ Easley said.
Saturday, Easley and Largent officially again part of the same team.
“Without a doubt he’s a guy that deserves to be in the Hall of Fame,’’ Largent said. “I really think had Kenny not had an injury-shortened career he would be a first ballot Hall of Famer.’’
That the Hall call helped him get back on his feet, though, has convinced Easley the timing may have been right all along.
“People say you should have gotten in earlier,’’ Easley said. “I’m here now. So that means that’s when I was supposed to be here.’’