Jim Brown, All-Time NFL Great And Social Activist, Dead At 87

FILE - Jim Brown, who set the National Football League rushing record of 12,312 yards while playing for the Cleveland Browns, sits pensively in his home, Tuesday, Sept. 19, 1984, Los Angeles, Calif. NFL legend, actor and social activist Jim Brown passed away peacefully in his Los Angeles home on Thursday night, May 18, 2023, with his wife, Monique, by his side, according to a spokeswoman for Brown's family. He was 87. (AP Photo/Lennox McLendon, File)

BY TOM WITHERS

CLEVELAND (AP) — Jim Brown was virtually unstoppable in every arena.

Whether on the field, as a Hollywood film hero or civil rights advocate, Brown was a force.

One of the greatest players in NFL history, Brown, who retired at the peak of his playing career to pursue acting and remained in the public spotlight as an activist — and due to off-field transgressions that included allegations of violence against women — has died. He was 87.

A spokeswoman for Brown’s family said he died peacefully in his Los Angeles home on Thursday night with his wife, Monique, by his side.

“To the world, he was an activist, actor, and football star,” Monique Brown wrote in an Instagram post. “To our family, he was a loving husband, father, and grandfather. Our hearts are broken.”

One of pro football’s first superstars, Brown was a wrecking ball while leading the league in rushing for eight of his nine seasons with the Cleveland Browns. He never missed a game, playing in 118 straight before his sudden retirement in 1965 — after being named Most Valuable Player.

Brown led the Browns to their last championship in 1964 before quitting football in his prime at age 30 to make movies. He appeared in more than 30 films, including “Any Given Sunday” and “The Dirty Dozen.”

A powerful runner with speed and endurance, Brown’s arrival sparked the game’s burgeoning popularity on television and he remained an indomitable figure well after his playing days ended.

Brown was also a champion for Black Americans and used his platform and voice to fight for equality.

“I hope every Black athlete takes the time to educate themselves about this incredible man and what he did to change all of our lives,” NBA star LeBron James said. “We all stand on your shoulders Jim Brown. If you grew up in Northeast Ohio and were Black, Jim Brown was a God.”

In June 1967, Brown organized “The Cleveland Summit,” a meeting of the nation’s top Black athletes, including Bill Russell and Lew Alcindor, who later became Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, to support boxer Muhammad Ali’s fight against serving in Vietnam.

In later years, he worked to curb gang violence in LA and in 1988 founded Amer-I-Can, a program to help disadvantaged inner-city youth and ex-convicts.


On the field, there was no one like Brown, who would blast through would-be tacklers, refusing to let one man take him down before sprinting away from linebackers and defensive backs. He was also famous for using a stiff arm to shed defenders in the open field or push them away like they were rag dolls.

Indeed, Brown was unlike any back before him, and some feel there has never been anyone better than Cleveland’s No. 32. At 6-foot-2, 230 pounds, he was relentless, fighting for every yard, dragging multiple defenders along or finding holes where none seemed to exist.

After Brown was tackled, he’d slowly rise and walk even more slowly back to the huddle — then dominate the defense when he got the ball again.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell offered his condolences on behalf of the league.

“Jim Brown was a gifted athlete — one of the most dominant players to ever step on any athletic field — but also a cultural figure who helped promote change,” Goodell said. “During his nine-year NFL career, which coincided with the civil rights movement here at home, he became a forerunner and role model for athletes being involved in social initiatives outside their sport.”

Off the field, Brown was a contentious, complicated figure.

While he had a soft spot for those in need, he also was arrested a half-dozen times, mostly on charges of hitting women.

In June 1999, Brown’s wife called 911, saying Brown had smashed her car with a shovel and threatened to kill her. During the trial, Monique Brown recanted. Jim Brown was acquitted of a charge of domestic threats but convicted of misdemeanor vandalism. A Los Angeles judge sentenced Brown to six months in jail when he refused to attend domestic violence counseling.

He also feuded with Browns coach Paul Brown and later with the team’s management, although he played his entire career with Cleveland.

When his playing days ended, Brown set off for Hollywood and eventually settled there. Brown advised Cleveland coach Blanton Collier of his retirement while the team was in training camp and he was on the set of “The Dirty Dozen” in England.

Among his films were “100 Rifles,” “Mars Attacks!” Spike Lee’s “He Got Game,” Oliver Stone’s “Any Given Sunday,” and “I’m Gonna Git You Sucka,” which parodied the blaxploitation genre. In 2002, Brown was the subject of Lee’s HBO documentary “Jim Brown: All-American.”

In recent years, Brown’s relationship with the Browns was inconsistent. He served as an adviser to owner Randy Lerner and was hired to counsel the team’s younger players. However, in 2010, Brown parted ways with the team after having his role reduced by incoming team president Mike Holmgren. Brown felt slighted by the perceived demotion — when the club unveiled a “Ring of Honor” inside its downtown stadium, Brown didn’t attend the ceremony in protest.

The Browns erected a statue of Brown outside their stadium in 2016.

Brown made only a few public appearances in recent years. In February, he attended the NFL Honors ceremony when the league announced it had renamed its league rushing title as The Jim Brown Award.

Brown was an eight-time All-Pro and went to the Pro Bowl in each of his nine years in the league. When he retired, he held the league’s records for yards (12,312) and touchdowns (126).

“He told me, ‘Make sure when anyone tackles you he remembers how much it hurts,’” said Hall of Fame tight end John Mackey. “He lived by that philosophy and I always followed that advice.”

Born on Feb. 17, 1936, in St. Simons Island, Georgia, Brown was a multisport star at Manhasset High School on Long Island. He averaged 14.9 yards per carry in football and once scored 55 points in a game.

A two-sport star at Syracuse — some say he is the best lacrosse player in NCAA history — Brown endured countless racist taunts while playing at the virtually all-white school at the time. Still, he was an All-American in both sports and lettered in basketball.

Brown was the sixth overall pick of the 1957 draft, joining a team that routinely played for the title. He was the Offensive Rookie of the Year that season.

Running behind an offensive line featuring Hall of Fame tackles Lou Groza and Mike McCormack, Brown set a league mark with 1,527 yards and scored 17 TDs on his way to the league’s Most Outstanding Player award — a precursor to the MVP — in 1958. Over the next three seasons, he never ran for less than 1,257 yards before finishing with 996 in 1962.

He led the NFL in rushing eight times, gaining a career-best 1,863 yards in 1963. He averaged 104 yards per game, scored 106 rushing touchdowns and averaged an astounding 5.2 yards per carry. A dangerous receiver as well, Brown finished with 262 catches for 2,499 yards and another 20 TDs.

“I’ve said many times, and I will always say, Jim Brown is the best,” Hall of Fame running back Gale Sayers once said, “and he will still be the best long after all his records are broken.”

Brown’s No. 32 was retired by the Browns in ’71, the same year he entered the Hall of Fame. But he rarely visited Cleveland during the 1970s and ’80s. He and Cleveland owner Art Modell were at odds over his sudden retirement; the two later patched up their differences and remained friends.

Brown supported Modell’s decision to move Cleveland’s franchise to Baltimore in 1995. It was both a reflection of his loyalty to Modell and another sign of his fierce independence. Brown was one of the few former Browns players not angry with Modell for moving the team.

Many modern players couldn’t appreciate Brown or his impact on American sports.

“They have grown up in a different era,” former Browns coach Romeo Crennel said. “He’s one of the greatest players in NFL history and what he was able to accomplish in his time was tremendous. I don’t know that anybody could do what he did, the way he did it, under the circumstances that he had to operate and the things that he had to endure.

“And for him to go out on top, that’s something that not many guys are able to appreciate either.”

Brown is survived by his wife and son, Aris; daughter, Morgan, son, Jim Jr.; daughter, Kimberly; son, Kevin; daughter, Shellee; and daughter, Kim. He was preceded in death by his daughter, Karen Ward.

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NFL Player-Turned-Doctor Leads Mission In His Native Homeland Of Nigeria

Dr. Samkon Gado

BY JOSEPH COUCH

Whether he was running through defenders in the NFL or studying relentlessly for medical school exams, Dr. Samkon Gado, M.D., (’05) has led a life marked by resiliency and obedience to God’s leading.

Gado was born in Kafai, Gombe State, Nigeria. His family moved to South Carolina before high school so that he could pursue an American education.

After a standout athletic career in high school, where he lettered in three sports and received all-state football honors as a senior running back, Gado received a football scholarship from Liberty, a Division I-AA program at the time.

Following the 2004 season, Gado was recognized as an All-Big South Conference selection but was bypassed in the 2005 NFL Draft. He was signed as an undrafted free agent by the Kansas City Chiefs, where he spent less than two months before being signed by the Green Bay Packers. He impressed the league enough in his rookie season to remain there for six years, spending time with six different teams and racking up 12 touchdowns and over 1,000 yards of offense during his time in the NFL.

But football was never his intended career. Gado’s goal in the NFL was certainly an unconventional one: to save his earnings to pay for medical school and fulfill a dream of serving in medical missions.

Gado married his wife, Rachel, in 2010, and with her support traded a football uniform for a white coat, starting medical school at Medical University of South Carolina. Near the end of his time there, he traveled to Nigeria to do a one-month rotation of his ENT (ear, nose, and throat) residency with Saint Louis University.

He had first considered medical missions when he was a Liberty student, but working in Nigeria only further confirmed a desire God had laid on his heart years earlier.

“I always felt a tug toward cross-cultural missions. My grandfather was a local missionary to Nigeria, and my father was a pastor and minister and has been in the ministry my whole life. I kind of resisted until I came to Liberty,” he said. “I was ready to go somewhere where the Gospel had never gone before. But my idea of missions began morphing a bit, and instead of setting up a hut and serving as many people as I could until I die, I started thinking, ‘What if missions could be a little more organized?’ and I began thinking more about infrastructure.”

In 2019, Gado and his sister, Ruth, founded The Jonah Inheritance with the purpose of reimagining healthcare in Nigeria from a Gospel perspective. The name comes from both sets of their grandparents’ names: Yunana, a version of “Jonah,” and Gado, which means “Inheritance.”

Gado said the nation is desperate for this type of medical relief.

“Nigeria’s strength is it is one of the top exporters of physicians in the world, but it has one of the worst healthcare systems and the worst infrastructure, so there is a disconnect there,” he said.

The vision includes building a self-sustaining hospital on a 28-acre campus in Nigeria’s capital, Abuja. Gado said they have raised enough funds to build a border fence and hope to break ground on the hospital this year. The Jonah Inheritance is already actively at work training in-country doctors and medical staff.

Nigerian partners have been overseeing the projects while Gado is in Lynchburg, where he returned in 2020 to work as an ENT surgeon. He is working with his former roommate from Liberty, Dr. Jay Cline (’05); the two are partners at Blue Ridge ENT.

While Gado serves patients locally, he’s also making plans to someday move with his wife and four sons to Nigeria and focus his full attention on The Jonah Inheritance.

“The idea of going to Nigeria, for both of us, is very difficult,” he said. “That’s why what really keeps us moving in that direction, truly, is what the Lord is doing in both of our hearts.”

Gado said his ultimate goal is to not only help people heal physically but also share the Gospel message with them.

“I started seeing medicine from a slightly different perspective, using the Gospel as a framework to actually break down disease,” he said. “I think diseases preach the Gospel to us, and if you think of how diseases happen, you can see and preach through a disease.”

He said cancer is one example.

“Cancer is a cell creating its own agenda. It doesn’t really matter what that agenda is; it’s just an agenda different than what it was designed to do. When it reproduces itself, it destroys the organ and eventually can metastasize to the body and end in death. That’s no different than the sin of Adam.”

Gado said God looks at the heart of the issue, and that is how healing truly comes.

“He doesn’t go after the behaviors. The only way that sin can be addressed is by changing the heart. Once you fix the broken DNA, the body naturally takes care of the cancer.

“Couple our understanding of the Gospel and how it affects medicine with doctors who are of the same mind and who are capable, and teaching them how to marry the Gospel with medicine … now, the whole healthcare encounter is a Gospel presentation.”

While Gado has always had a warrior spirit, he said it was awakened, shaped, and encouraged the most during his time at Liberty, where he encountered LU founder Jerry Falwell Sr. and others whose hearts were on fire for the Gospel and displayed how that message can change the world.

“Spiritually and practically, Jerry Falwell has really been a role model to me,” Gado said. “The biggest thing that Liberty has been to me is that it was an incubator for many things. It allowed me to find godly relationships. For the first time in my life, I was meeting people my age who had a deep passion for the Lord and a passion to serve Him. And that, more than anything, is what the Lord used to deepen my faith. I found brothers, a community of believers, who were following hard after the Spirit of Christ.”

Although securing the finances for The Jonah Inheritance is essential to the project’s success, Gado said he is choosing to look back at the example Falwell gave in achieving his own God-given dream.

“I think of Falwell often, and the parallels are amazing,” Gado said. “He had a vision, and he was unwavering. He knew the power his vision had, and what would fuel his vision wasn’t money; it was prayer. (Dr. Falwell) acquired as much land as possible — long before Liberty was even capable of filling that land. But he, in faith, trusted that the Lord was going to bring the vision to fruition, and he literally took that step (of faith).”

Gado said he will continue to visit Nigeria each year until they move there permanently.

“That’s not something that we would have naturally chosen for ourselves; that wasn’t something that I wanted to do,” he said. “But my commitment to the Gospel needs to be unwavering and, in the end, it will be shown to be true just like it has been for Liberty.”

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

5 Ways Pressuring Young Athletes To Perform Well Does Them Harm

Damar Hamlin

BY EVA B. MONSMA

When Buffalo Bills player Damar Hamlin collapsed during a Jan. 3, 2022, NFL football game, much of the public attention was on the pressures athletes face to perform despite the perils they face on the field.

However, as a scholar who specializes in youth sports, I have found that this pressure often begins well before a player enters the pros – often very early in a young athlete’s life. And sometimes the biggest forces behind this pressure are coaches, peers and parents.

Here are five ways young athletes experience unhealthy pressure, and what those influences do to their minds and bodies.

1. Harsh criticism

Coaches who belittle athletes, yell and emphasize winning over personal improvement use what is known as a “controlling style” of coaching. Rather than provide information and feedback about technique, tactics and attitude, controlling-style coaches tend to communicate objections to obvious mistakes and personal insults during crucial moments.

This style of coaching shifts athletes’ attention away from their abilities and toward mistakes, a win-at-all-costs attitude, unethical behavior, injury and burnout. Many athletes value their coaches’ perceptions more than their own self-perceptions.

When coaches focus on the negative, they influence their athletes to do the same. But it’s much more effective to tell athletes what they should do with concrete specifics, like “push the ground away” or “aim for the rim.”

Often, these sorts of old-school controlling-style coaches use methods that were used on them as young people, despite years of research showing such methods are dangerous. For instance, it is now known that punishing athletes with physical activity – running so-called “suicide” sprints, staying late to run laps, and dropping for 20 pushups – does more harm than good. Expending energy randomly at the end of practice increases the likelihood of fatigue and injury.

2. Peer pressure and influence

Peers also follow the behavior they see from coaches.

Athletes who perform well in matches and within-team scrimmages find acceptance and opportunities for meaningful connections with their teammates. For many athletes, making friendships outside of sport is challenging, especially in collegiate athletics.

But teammates who observe and repeat ridicule, bullying and exclusion can create conflicts with other team members. As a result, their fellow athletes may approach practice not seeking to master skills, test abilities and make friends but rather to avoid conflict and targeting. Those mental and emotional distractions break their performance focus and consistency.

Coaches and players who focus on athletes’ looks and weight – often in aesthetic or weight-restricted sports like gymnastics and wrestling – contribute to a culture of body shaming that values athletes’ physical attributes rather than what their bodies can accomplish. Athletes who think that others want them to be smaller or bigger than they are can experience anxiety, depression and eating disorders. Expectations like participating in public weigh-ins, avoiding sweets and wearing revealing competitive uniforms are common in upper echelons of sports like cheerleading.

3. Parental expectations

The effects of competition begin long before the start of a season, game or match. How kids feel about themselves in sports, especially after a loss, is often linked to how parents view, value and teach competition.

When parents pay their kids for scoring points or winning the game, they turn their kids into selfish teammates and decrease their long-term motivation. Of course, most parents can’t continue opening their wallets forever, and even students who earn scholarships to college tend to lose their motivation when they’re paid for performance.

Parents can behave badly when they are looking for external signals of their children’s achievements, like championship trophies, selection for elite teams, scholarships, endorsements and, now, name-image-likeness deals, in which student-athletes can earn money from product endorsements and advertising appearances. But those goals can conflict with children’s natural motives in sports – including to demonstrate competence, make decisions and be with friends.

When kids sense their parents’ stress over expectations, they shift their ideals and become more prone to perfectionism, burnout, anxiety and depression and eating disorders.

4. Early specialization

Parents push their kids into year-round intensive training in a single sport as early as age 7. Overuse injuries, psychological stress and burnout are well-documented consequences of specializing before 12. But is this necessary? Super-early training isn’t really helpful for sports whose athletes tend to peak later in life, like marathon runners, for example.

Transitioning to higher levels of play during adolescence strengthens athletic identity as training expectations expand to diet and exercise. To conform, athletes may begin using anabolic steriods, overtraining, playing through injury and restricting their diets. Encouraging a healthy diet for training purposes can translate to compulsive ingredient checking, food planning, restricted eating and other symptoms of a relatively new eating disorder: orthorexia nervosa.

Trying out various sports while young helps athletes discover what they enjoy most, and which activities work well for their body types.

5. Overtraining

Overuse injuries like “Little League elbow” and Osgood-Schlatter disease, a cause of knee pain, are becoming more common. American high school athletes who specialize in just one sport are 50% more likely to experience an injury from overuse than people who play multiple sports – and athletes who focus on two sports are 85% more likely. High-pressure environments that expect athletes to endure injuries can lead to long-term conditions like arthritis and tendonitis.

In such sports as football, boxing and mixed martial arts, the culture even rewards injuries and risk-taking. But when an injury forces an athlete into an early and unexpected retirement, coping with the transition is tough. Identity loss and purpose can exacerbate mental illness and even increase the risk of domestic violence, particularly when the injury involves mild traumatic brain injuries.

Witnessing sports-related injuries – just as the millions of NFL fans who watched Hamlin did – has consequences for observers, too, such as psychological trauma. Symptoms, which can include intrusive thoughts linked to the injury, nightmares and anxiety, can last from a single day to more than a month. The situation can even escalate to post-traumatic stress disorder. In the coming weeks, teammates who witnessed Hamlin’s collapse may be up to 25% more likely to develop symptoms of psychological trauma than the rest of us.

That’s something to keep in mind as people watch and cheer young athletes to run faster, jump higher or score more points. The question becomes: At what expense?

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

Damar Hamlin’s Toy Drive: What’s The Plan For The $8.6M?

FILE - Fans stand in support for Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin (3) before an NFL football game against the New England Patriots, Sunday, Jan. 8, 2023, in Orchard Park, N.Y. Damar Hamlin plans to support young people through education and sports with the $8.6 million in GoFundMe donations that unexpectedly poured into his toy drive fundraiser after he suffered a cardiac arrest in the middle of a game last week. (AP Photo/Adrian Kraus, File)

BY THALIA BEATY

NEW YORK (AP) — Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin plans to support young people through education and sports with the $8.6 million in GoFundMe donations that unexpectedly poured into his toy drive fundraiser after he suffered a cardiac arrest in the middle of a game last week.

He will also use proceeds from the sale of new T-shirts, emblazoned with “Did We Win?” along with his hands in the shape of a heart, to raise money for the trauma center in Cincinnati that treated him. Hamlin, who live-tweeted through his team’s victory over New England on Sunday, tweeted Tuesday that he has returned to Buffalo but is still in the hospital being evaluated.

The 24-year-old has teamed with The Giving Back Fund, a nonprofit that helps athletes and celebrities manage their charitable giving, to host the “The Chasing M’s Foundation” Charitable Fund. GoFundMe representatives told The Associated Press the crowdfunding platform will soon transfer the donations that have come in since Hamlin’s injury Jan. 2 to the new fund. Chasing M’s is Hamlin’s apparel company.

Hamlin and his family “are humbled by the tremendous support that has been shown as he recovers,” according to his marketing representative, Jordon Rooney. “They are incredibly grateful for the continued prayers and outpouring of concern that has been exhibited by people all over the world,” Rooney wrote in an email, adding that they plan to communicate with donors over time. The new fund is now soliciting donations online and via text.

“We are working as a team to facilitate the transfer as soon as practical,” said the Giving Back Fund. It plans to disclose the final total of all donations, which include support from star quarterbacks Tom Brady and Russell Wilson. As a fiscal sponsor for the donations, The Giving Back Fund is compensated for collecting the funds. The University of Cincinnati Medical Center did not respond to a request for comment.

Hamlin’s injury and recovery have created a boomerang of solidarity within the football community with fans donating, players honoring him and Hamlin tweeting appreciation back at all of them.

The largest public donation to Hamlin’s GoFundMe as of Tuesday was $33,333 from the Staten Island, New York-based ADCO Electrical Corp. Owner Gina Addeo didn’t want to give an interview, but the donation itself shows support — repeating Hamlin’s jersey number five times.

Similarly, Carl Fochler decided on a donation of $25,003 on behalf of the sustainable laundry company Sheets Laundry Club he co-owns. He stayed up late the night of Hamlin’s injury waiting for an update on his health. The next morning, he logged on looking for news and saw a link to a video of Hamlin talking about his fundraising for kids.

“I just knew right then it’s something we had to do,” he said, after talking with his business partner.

Fochler said he was born in Buffalo and adopted at six weeks old, adding another reason, besides being a die-hard Bills fan, to donate to Hamlin’s work to give children hope.

“I know how lucky or unlucky you can be. Paths can change quickly,” Fochler said.

Anna Isaacson, the NFL’s senior vice president of social responsibility, was watching the donations roll in, even as Hamlin’s health remained the priority. She began reaching out to “make sure that we all surrounded Damar and his family with the resources to really take on this massive project, which is going to be millions of dollars worth of contributions back to youth in the community.”

The league’s Player Health & Safety team is already reviewing their practices and policies following Hamlin’s injuries, which Isaacson said was part of their responsibility.

“People are watching our games and we have fans all over the country. And with that comes a responsibility to give back and to use these moments, often tough moments in time, and challenges to impact our society for the better,” she said.

Fochler hopes the Bills make it to the Super Bowl, a dream for him and many fans. Asked how he was making sense of a moment with so many emotions mixed together – of watching a terrible injury and then the rebound of generosity, he said Damar had already made sense of it for him.

Pointing to a tweet where Hamlin wrote that he’d rather be running out of the tunnel at the start of the game with his teammates but, he said instead, “God Using Me In A Different Way Today.”

“When he wakes up and gets back to being Damar, and sees over $8 million,” Fochler said, “he’s got a lot of planning to do and it’s just going to be good vibes everywhere.”

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Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.

Bills Safety Hamlin Back In Buffalo To Continue Recovery

Fans stand for photographs by a sign in support of Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin outside Highmark Stadium before an NFL football game against the New England Patriots, Sunday, Jan. 8, 2023, in Orchard Park, N.Y. Hamlin remains hospitalized after suffering a catastrophic on-field collapse in the team's previous game against the Cincinnati Bengals. (AP Photo/Adrian Kraus)

BY JOHN WAWROW AND CAROLYN THOMPSON

ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. (AP) — Bills safety Damar Hamlin said he returned to Buffalo on Monday “with a lot of love on my heart” to continue his recovery in a hospital there, a week after going into cardiac arrest and having to be resuscitated on the field during a game in Cincinnati.

Hamlin was discharged from the University of Cincinnati Medical Center in the morning and flown to western New York. He was listed in stable condition at Buffalo General Medical Center/Gates Vascular Institute.

“I can confirm that he is doing well. And this is the beginning of the next stage of his recovery,” said Dr. William Knight, one of his doctors in Cincinnati.

Doctors said Hamlin has been walking since having a breathing tube removed on Friday, eating regular food and undergoing therapy. They said he was on a normal or even accelerated trajectory in his recovery from cardiac arrest, which is considered a life-threatening event, and that normal recovery can be measured from weeks to months.

“We continue to be ecstatic about his recovery,” Dr. Timothy Pritts said.

Hamlin’s return comes a day after he cheered on the Bills from his hospital bed during their regular season-ending 35-23 win over the New England Patriots. The game proved to be a cathartic outpouring of support for the Bills and Hamlin.

“Headed home to Buffalo today with a lot of love on my heart,” Hamlin said in a tweet. “Watching the world come together around me on Sunday was truly an amazing feeling.”

Hamlin was so excited watching teammate Nyheim Hines return the opening kickoff 96 yards for a touchdown that “he jumped up and down, got out of his chair, set every alarm off in the ICU in the process,” Pritts said with a laugh. “But he was fine. It was just appropriate reaction to very exciting play.”

Pritts said it was still premature to comment on the potential cause of Hamlin’s cardiac arrest and that more testing would be done.

“The goal of the transfer .... is to get him closer to home for further evaluation, recovery and eventually discharge and rehabilitation,” Buffalo General Medical Center/Gates Vascular Institute said in a news release.

The Bills wore No. 3 Hamlin patches on their jerseys Sunday and honored their teammate by raising three fingers in the closing minutes, while tight end Dawson Knox celebrated his touchdown by forming his hands into the shape of a heart. Fans joined in, with many holding up red heart and No. 3 signs.

“The same love you all have shown me is the same love that I plan to put back into the world n more,” Hamlin tweeted Monday.

Bills coach Sean McDermott and general manager Brandon Beane briefly saw Hamlin after he landed in Buffalo.

“We’re happy to have him back.” McDermott told reporters on a conference call. “He’s a little bit tired, but it was good to get to see him in person for the first time in a while.”

The 24-year-old from the Pittsburgh area has made significant progress in his recovery since spending his first two days at the University of Cincinnati Medical Center under sedation and breathing through a ventilator.

He was awakened on Wednesday night and was eventually able to grip people’s hands. By Friday, Hamlin was able to breathe on his own and even addressed the team by videoconference, telling the Bills, “Love you boys.”

The last update from doctors came on Saturday, when they described Hamlin’s neurological function as “excellent,” though he remained listed in critical condition.

Pritts said doctors were able to upgrade his condition from critical on Monday, clearing the way for the flight home.

“We want to ensure that each organ system is stable to improving and that he needs a minimal amount of assistance such that he does not need intensive nursing,” Pritts said. “We have some awesome rock star nurses who’ve been with him from the beginning, but he no longer needs that level of nursing care and no longer needs intensive respiratory therapy from our respiratory care practitioners and is able to then move to a setting where he would have less intensive care.”

A doctor accompanied Hamlin to the airport.

Doctors declined to speculate about whether Hamlin would be able to attend a game in person. By beating New England, the Bills (13-3) clinched home-field advantage through the first two rounds of the playoffs. Buffalo is preparing to host division rival Miami in a wild-card playoff matchup on Sunday.

“Right now it’s just a young man recovering from a very serious illness, and we think that he will recover well from this,” Pritts said. “He has a great positive attitude.”

Hamlin’s heart stopped on Monday night after making what appeared to be a routine tackle in the first quarter against the Bengals. The game was initially suspended before officially being canceled later in the week.

News of Hamlin’s discharge from the hospital in Cincinnati was greeted with enthusiasm.

“That’s unbelievable,” Bengals coach Zac Taylor said.

“I mean, just think about it — that was one week, not even a week ago. There’s no one in this room that would have expected he’d be in Buffalo,” he added. “God is great. He works miracles. This is certainly a miracle, there’s no question. ... And just an amazing moment for Damar.”

AP Sports Writer Mitch Stacy in Cincinnati contributed to this report

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Analysis: Teammates Gave Damar Hamlin The Ultimate Tribute

BY ROB MAADDI

The Houston Texans and Indianapolis Colts gather on the field before their NFL football game in support of Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin, Sunday, Jan. 8, 2023, in Indianapolis. (AP Photo/AJ Mast)


An emotional week for the NFL filled with fear, tears, prayer and uncertainty ended with exciting games, dramatic finishes and a celebration for Damar Hamlin.

When Hamlin left the stadium in an ambulance Monday night fighting for his life, football didn’t matter. A pivotal game between the Bills and Bengals suddenly was irrelevant.

The primary concern for players, coaches, the league and fans around the world became Hamlin’s health. The 24-year-old Bills safety went into cardiac arrest after making a tackle and needed to be resuscitated on the field in a scary scene witnessed by millions watching “Monday Night Football.”

For a couple days, it was unknown when the NFL would resume playing. The league announced Wednesday that Week 18 was still on schedule, and Hamlin made remarkable progress in his recovery by Thursday. He spoke to teammates for the first time Friday, telling them: “Love you boys.”

Inspired by his motivational words, the NFL community returned to work filled with hope instead of heavy hearts.

The league honored Hamlin in various ways this weekend, dedicating all the games to him and recognizing the first responders and doctors who saved his life.

Then, players gave Hamlin the ultimate tribute with their performance.

Nyheim Hines returned the game’s opening kickoff 96 yards for a touchdown in front of a charged-up crowd at Buffalo’s Highmark Stadium on Sunday.


“We’ve had so many prayers and so much support and to be able to start the game like that, it was amazing,” Hines said. “All that was for him. I felt like he was out there with us. .... This is bigger than me. It’s bigger than the 10 guys blocking for me.”

Hines did it again in the third quarter, taking a kickoff 101 yards for a go-ahead score in a 35-23 win over the New England Patriots that locked up the AFC’s No. 2 seed for the Bills (13-3).

The Bills hadn’t returned a kickoff for a TD since Oct. 20, 2019, a span of nearly three years and three months. No. 3 just happens to be Hamlin’s number and it was on display everywhere from Buffalo to Green Bay on outlines on the 30-yard line to T-shirts, sweatshirts and jackets worn by players and coaches across the league.

Josh Allen choked up talking about it.

“It was just spiritual,” Allen said. “I was going around to my teammates saying: ‘God’s real.’ You can’t draw that one up or write that one up any better. ... Pretty cool.”

Another Josh Allen made the defensive play of the season for Jacksonville on Saturday night, returning a fumble 37 yards for a TD with 2:51 remaining to help the Jaguars beat Tennessee 20-16 and secure their first AFC South championship since 2017.

The Jaguars (9-8) completed a worst-to-first turnaround and became the third team in NFL history to reach the playoffs after starting the season 4-8 or worse.

On Sunday night, the Green Bay Packers (8-9) had a chance to become the fourth team to do it. But Aaron Rodgers threw an interception late in the fourth quarter and the Detroit Lions beat the Packers 20-16 to give the Seattle Seahawks (9-8) the NFC’s final wild-card spot.

Rodgers soaked in the atmosphere and slowly walked off Lambeau Field perhaps for the last time in his career with his arm around his buddy, wide receiver Randall Cobb.

Though he has two years remaining on a $150 million, three-year contract, there’s a possibility the 39-year-old Rodgers may retire or ask for a trade.

The offseason is the time to appreciate Rodgers’ career. This weekend was all about Damar Hamlin.

Follow Rob Maaddi on Twitter at https://twitter.com/robmaaddi

AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl and https://twitter.com/AP_NFL

Fans Give Millions To Damar Hamlin’s Toy Drive For Kids

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Fans gather outside of University of Cincinnati Medical Center, late Monday, Jan. 2, 2023, in Cincinnati, where Buffalo Bills' Damar Hamlin was taken after collapsing on the field during an NFL football game against the Cincinnati Bengals. (AP Photo/Jeff Dean)

BY TIM REYNOLDS

Damar Hamlin’s goal was simple: He wanted to raise $2,500 online to buy toys for needy kids.

It took about two years.

Then came Monday, when the Buffalo Bills safety was critically injured and needed his heart restarted on the field in a chilling scene that unfolded during a nationally televised game against the Cincinnati Bengals. He instantly became one of the biggest stories in sports, and thousands of people found his GoFundMe page.

The result: roughly $5.5 million donated in the first 24 hours after his injury. And the number is climbing.

A fundraiser that as of last month had raised $2,921 was up to $5,495,550 by 9 p.m. Eastern on Tuesday — with about 183,000 people going online in that span to donate, on average, about $30. Some of the donations were smaller. Some were more than $5,000. A number of NFL players donated as well, including members of the New England Patriots, who are scheduled to play at Buffalo on Sunday for the regular-season finale.

On average, about 2.2 donations were made through his GoFundMe page every second in the first 24 hours after Hamlin got hurt. And many came with messages of hope for a 24-year-old player in his second season, sedated in a Cincinnati hospital, listed in critical condition and with some teammates unwilling to return to Buffalo just so they could remain close to him.

“There are moments in life that stop the world,” wrote Michael Lynch, who donated. “We all pray for two things. Your speedy recovery and that your impact to the world is enhanced by your go fund me.”

The messages poured in from different fan bases, many of the donors letting the world know that they support other teams. One came with a hashtag that read, “we are all Bills fans.”

Hamlin started the GoFundMe in December 2020. He was just wrapping up his college career and getting ready for the NFL draft process. And he wanted to have a toy drive at Kelly and Nina’s Daycare Center — a facility co-owned by his mother — in his hometown of McKees Rocks, Pennsylvania, a place with about 6,000 residents along the south bank of the Ohio River.

“As I embark on my journey to the NFL, I will never forget where I come from and I am committed to using my platform to positively impact the community that raised me,” Hamlin wrote when setting up the drive. “I created The Chasing M’s Foundation as a vehicle that will allow me to deliver that impact, and the first program is the 2020 Community Toy Drive. This campaign gives you the opportunity to contribute to our first initiative and positively impact children who have been hardest hit by the pandemic.”

He pulled the first event off with about 10 days of planning. Gifts poured in, some of it clothing donated by Pitt, where he had just finished playing. Hamlin’s upbringing was far from easy: He lost three friends to gun violence while growing up and saw his father incarcerated for about 3 1/2 years for selling drugs. But as soon as he was able, Hamlin wanted to help others.

So, he started the toy drive. And his foundation will now have the ability to do more good than it likely ever thought possible.

“Damar created The Chasing M’s Foundation to use as a vehicle to bring lasting impact to his community,” his foundation wrote in a message posted to the donation page Tuesday. “The foundation supports toy drives, back-to-school drives, kids camps, and more.”

Many of the donations came from Bills fans, affectionately known as Bills Mafia, and this is far from the first time they’ve gone online to show support. In recent years, Bills fans have shown support for Miami quarterback Tua Tagovailoa’s foundation after he left a game — also in Cincinnati — with a concussion; for Baltimore quarterback Lamar Jackson’s charity after the Ravens lost a playoff game to Buffalo; and many made donations of $16.88 to the P.U.N.T. Pediatric Cancer Collaborative in western New York following the death this summer of FIU player Luke Knox.

Luke Knox’s brother, Dawson Knox, is a tight end for the Bills. The $16.88 was a nod to their jersey numbers.

AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl and https://twitter.com/AP_NFL

Arizona Cardinals Add Offensive Lineman From NFL’s International Pathway Program

BY SETH COX

Haggai Chisom Ndubuisi

The Arizona Cardinals have added another player from the NFL’s International Pathway Program.

From the team:

The Arizona Cardinals Football Club today announced that the team has signed offensive lineman Haggai Chisom Ndubuisi (HEY-guy / CHE-some / oon-doo-BEE-see).

Ndubuisi (6-6, 298) is a Nigerian native who began his football career in 2017 when he was noticed by American coaches at a basketball all-star game in Lagos, Nigeria. The 21-year old Ndubuisi was selected as part of the NFL’s International Pathway Program in January prior to signing with the Cardinals. He played both soccer and basketball while growing up before joining the Uprise Academy, which is a football program in Nigeria run by former NFL star Osi Umenyiora and former NBA player Ejike Ugboaja.

Of course the Arizona Cardinals added Austria’s Bernhard Seikovits last year, so this is something they have been doing a bit more recently.

Welcome to Arizona, Haggai.

PHOTO RELEASE: MAYOR GARCETTI AND CINCINNATI MAYOR PUREVAL ANNOUNCE SUPER BOWL LVI WAGER

Mayor Aftab Pureval of Cincinnati (L) and Mayor Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles (R) announced wager over the outcome of the Super Bowl LVI. Image: LA Mayor via Alex Comisar

LOS ANGELES (LA MAYOR) – Mayor Eric Garcetti and Mayor Aftab Pureval of Cincinnati today announced a wager over the outcome of Super Bowl LVI on Sunday, a championship showdown at SoFi Stadium between the Los Angeles Rams and the Cincinnati Bengals.

The bet has two parts. The losing mayor will wear the winning team’s jersey at an upcoming public appearance. And the winning mayor will personally contribute to the losing city’s children’s hospital – Children’s Hospital Los Angeles or Cincinnati Children’s – and encourage their constituents to do the same.

“Angelenos fight hard and we win graciously,” said Mayor Eric Garcetti. “We can’t wait to host Super Bowl LVI on Sunday, and when the Rams win, L.A. will show our friends in Cincinnati how much heart we have by chipping in together to help the kids at Cincinnati Children’s.”

“In Cincinnati, we're incredibly proud of our children's hospital,” said Mayor Aftab Pureval. “It provides world class care to both our residents and families across the globe. This is an opportunity to highlight its incredible work. Cincinnati fans are so passionate about the Bengals and our city that I’m confident they will commit themselves with the same passion to this philanthropic effort.”

Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and Cincinnati Children’s are both world renowned healthcare institutions that lead in pediatric health with innovation and cutting edge techniques.

The wager was inspired by the compassion the Kansas City Chiefs and their fans showed after their dramatic win against the Buffalo Bills in the AFC Championship. After that win, the people of Kansas City banded together to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for the Buffalo Children’s Hospital. Mayors Garcetti and Pureval will join with their own cities to carry that example forward, and continue leading with compassion and generosity.

Osi Umenyiora Has Been Finding Football Talent in Nigeria, But He Wants To Do More

Osi Umenyiora

BY JELANI SCOTT, NFL

Osi Umenyiora's feats on and off the football field provided him with an opportunity to become a hero in more ways than one.

For 20 years, the former New York Giants defensive end has quietly donated resources to his homeland of Nigeria, but over time, those efforts began to feel to Umenyiora like "pouring a cup of water into the ocean." So he regrouped and soon realized he could use his influence to give his people something invaluable: "The opportunity to help themselves."

As Umenyiora explained: "Education is the most important thing, and I think that you'll realize that most people who come from Africa, it's like a mindset, it's something that is instilled in them."

In a recent interview with NFL.com, the NFL star-turned-businessman discussed his latest humanitarian effort, known as The Uprise, a football program established in Nigeria by Umenyiora and former Nigerian pro basketball player Ejike Ugboaja, whom Umenyiora has known for nearly a decade, earlier this year.

The program was recently spotlighted in an episode of NFL Network's NFL 360, which chronicled a group of talented prospects as they competed for a chance to train at the NFL Academy in London or for a spot in the NFL's International Player Pathway Program.

But the work that was covered there is now behind them -- and Umenyiora's hoping the work that lies ahead will go beyond football. He said while he's proud of the overall level of talent he's seen thus far, the organization still has "a long way to go."

"We had some of the guys come over to the UK combine, and the people who saw them were wowed," Umenyiora said. "They were amazed by the level of size, strength and athleticism these guys have, and I was just telling them there's so many more of them there who just need that opportunity, right? And the mentality and the work ethic that they all have, it's not just, 'Oh, I need to make it the NFL.' They want to go to school, they just want a chance to do something better with their lives, and American football is pretty much a sport that gives them that opportunity."

Umenyiora was born in London and made his name as a 21-year-old standout at Troy University. But from the ages of 7 to 14, he lived with his family in Nigeria. And that upbringing appears to have played a sizable role in determining both who he was as a player and who he is as a man.

So when Umenyiora speaks of a "mentality," it's clear he's not talking about a team mantra or writings on a chalkboard, but a state of mind shared by those who grew up in a similar environment.

"My parents didn't want me to play football, and that story is very common amongst a lot of African households," he explained. "The parents aren't really interested in sport; they're very interested in education. So, for me, I got my degree in business administration; whether or not I made it to the NFL, I might not have been super successful but at least I would've been OK. Like, I would've been better than I was when I was over there.

"I think that the main principle of this whole program is the kids who are coming, the people who are coming, they need to understand that yes, football is great, yes, football can do incredible things for you, but the percentage of people that make it is so low that you have to be focused on your education, so we're going to make sure that they do that."

The three young men who had the chance to travel to the International Combine in London in October -- Kehinde Oginni Hassan, Haggai Chisom Ndubuisi and Chigbo Roy Mbaeteka -- were representing not just The Uprise, but the power of having an opportunity to overcome your surroundings.

What cannot be overlooked about The Uprise is its function as a potential beacon of hope in a society where those that are fortunate enough to go to college struggle mightily to find employment after graduation. Those under Umenyiora and Ugboaja's tutelage could have additional doors opened to them by their participation in the program.

Umenyiora, a former mid-major star, hopes their efforts steer an abundance of prospects to HBCUs, a previously underserved sector of talent that the NFL has made a recent attempt to show more support toward.

"Why does Texas and Oklahoma and Alabama," Umenyiora expressed, "why do they have to have all the five-star athletes? Why can't Troy and FAMU [Florida A&M University] and ... the HBCUs, why can't they have five-star talent also? We can provide that. So, as long as there's demand and we have the athleticism to provide, we're gonna be fine."

Could The Uprise one day cultivate a high school phenom whose signing sends Jackson State-level shockwaves across the country? It's certainly possible, based on what the program has accomplished already.

It was abundantly evident in speaking with Umenyiora that he is as focused on getting players into classrooms as he is getting them into the end zone. When asked to look ahead, he made it clear that the future of the program will be centered around accomplishing that goal.

"If we're able to get hundreds of players into schools in America, a bunch of players into the academy in the UK, prep schools, high schools, colleges, if we're able to get that, that's pretty much the only thing that I'm going to consider a success, and I believe it's very possible, because the level of talent is there," he said.

As for what's up next for The Uprise in 2022, Umenyiora said there are plans to host high-level camps in Kenya, Senegal, Cameroon, Uganda and, of course, Nigeria. He said they are looking at a "bunch of companies to host these camps," but those talks are ongoing.

From there, the top 50 prospects from those sessions will be sent to a NFL-operated camp in Ghana in June, where NFL players and coaches, and potentially a few colleges, are scheduled to be on-site. Only the top 20 will move on to one of the NFL's programs.

Umenyiora said the main camp in Ghana is meant to be a showcase of "what we're all about." So far, the chances of that being a good impression are trending upward.

Odenigbo Active For Vikings Vs. Saints In Wild-Card Round

Minnesota Vikings defensive end Ifeadi Odenigbo, right, recovers a fumble before running it back for a touchdown during the first half of an NFL football game against the Los Angeles Chargers, Sunday, Dec. 15, 2019, in Carson, Calif. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez)

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Minnesota Vikings defensive end Ifeadi Odenigbo is available to play against the Saints in Sunday’s NFC wild-card playoff game after being listed as questionable earlier in the week.

Odenigbo, who has played in all 16 games for the Vikings and has seven sacks, was limited in recent practices with a hamstring injury.

He was the only player listed as questionable for either team this week.

Linebacker Manti Te’o and safety D.J. Swearinger are among the healthy Saints veterans deactivated for the game. Also sitting out are offensive linemen Will Clapp and Ethan Greenidge and defensive end Noah Spence.

Cornerback Eli Apple (ankle) and fullback Zach Line (knee) already had been ruled out.

The Vikings have six healthy scratches, including receiver Laquon Treadwell, defensive end Eddie Yarbrough and offensive linemen Dru Samia, Oli Udoh and Aviante Collins.

Cornerback Mackensie Alexander, who also is inactive, had been ruled out with a knee injury on Friday, when fellow cornerback Mike Hughes was listed as out and placed on injured reserve.

10 Ex-NFL Players Charged With Defrauding Healthcare Program

Assistant Attorney General Brian Benczkowski, center, in charge of the criminal division at the Dept. of Justice, U.S. Attorney Robert Duncan, of the Eastern District of Kentucky, left, and FBI Special Agent George Piro, right, in charge of the FBI’s Miami office, appears at a news conference to announce charges against ten former National Football League (NFL) players who are accused of defrauding an NFL health care program, at the Justice Department in Washington, Thursday, Dec. 12, 2019. (AP Photo/Cliff Owen)

BY MICHAEL BALSAMO

WASHINGTON (AP) — Ten former NFL players were charged in a multimillion-dollar scheme to defraud the league’s health care benefit program by submitting false claims for medical equipment, including devices used on horses, the Justice Department said Thursday.

The players were charged in two separate indictments filed in federal court in Kentucky, accusing them of conspiracy, wire fraud and healthcare fraud. Prosecutors allege they submitted nearly $4 million in phony claims, leading to payouts of about $3.4 million between June 2017 and December 2018.

Those charged include five former players on the Washington Redskins, including Clinton Portis and Carlos Rogers.

Prosecutors allege the players targeted the Gene Upshaw NFL Player Health Reimbursement Account Plan, which was established as part of a collective bargaining agreement in 2006. It provides tax-free reimbursement of out-of-pocket medical care expenses that were not covered by insurance and that were incurred by former players, their spouses and dependents.

“As outlined in the indictments, a group of former players brazenly defrauded the plan by seeking reimbursements for expensive medical equipment that they never purchased,” said Assistant Attorney General Brian Benczkowski, who leads the Justice Department’s criminal division.

The players claimed to have purchased hyperbaric oxygen chambers, ultrasound machines and electromagnetic therapy devices that were designed to be used on horses, he said.

Prosecutors say the group’s alleged ringleaders, Robert McCune and Correll Buckhalter — who they allege broke off to create his own similar ring — would recruit former players by offering to submit fake claims to the health care plan. The ringleaders would then demand thousands of dollars in kickbacks for each fake claim, prosecutors allege.

The suspects are accused of fabricating letters from health care providers about using the medical equipment, fabricating prescriptions that were purportedly signed by healthcare providers and creating fake invoices from medical equipment companies in an effort to prove the equipment was purchased, according to court documents. In reality, they had never purchased or received the medical equipment, prosecutors said.

Investigators believe the defendants had forged the prescriptions and authorization letters and uncovered no evidence that any doctors were complicit in the scheme, Benczkowski said.

After the phony claims were submitted, the former players would receive reimbursement checks and pay a kickback to the ringleaders and recruiters, the indictments charge.

Prosecutors moved to bring charges, in part because the scheme put the health care plan’s tax-exempt status at risk, which could’ve forced other former players using the plan legitimately to pay more, Benczkowski said.

Four of the suspects, McCune, Rogers, John Eubanks and Ceandris Brown, were arrested Thursday morning by the FBI. Six others had agreed to surrender to authorities, the Justice Department said. They are: James Butler, Fredrick Bennett, Etric Pruitt, Tamarick Vanover, Portis and Buckhalter.

The Justice Department has also filed court papers in Kentucky noting that it plans to file charges against two other players as well, including Joe Horn, a four-time Pro Bowl wide receiver for the New Orleans Saints, and Donald “Reche” Caldwell.

The investigation was continuing, but because the plan involves only former players prosecutors do not expect any current NFL players to face charges, Benczkowski said.

Portis’ lawyer, Mark Dycio, said his client “had no knowledge that his participation in what he believed to be an NFL sanctioned medical reimbursement insurance program was illegal.”

“He is completely taken aback by the indictment and will move forward with the process of clearing his good name and those of his fellow NFL alumni,” Dycio said.

Vikings’ Bisi Johnson Has A Family Full Of Believers

Bisi Johnson. Image: NFL

BY CHRIS TOMASSON

Bisi Johnson’s great uncle once convinced Hakeem Olajuwon he should play basketball. That was very good advice. Johnson’s father once tried to dissuade his son from playing football. That was bad advice.

Johnson, a rookie from Colorado State, has become the Vikings’ No. 3 wide receiver and has eight catches in the past two games. His father is a native of Nigeria, and his great uncle is Ganiyu Otenigbagbe, a longtime basketball coach in Lagos, the country’s biggest city.

“My uncle was instrumental in Hakeem coming to the United States because when he was a basketball coach, he recruited Hakeem to play basketball from soccer when he was about 16 years old,’’ said Johnson’s father, Bode Johnson. “He was a goalie, and he told him, ‘Come play basketball based on your build.’ ’’

Olajuwon excelled quickly, starring at the University of Houston and led the NBA’s Houston Rockets to two NBA titles in the 1990s. He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2008.


With that in mind, Bode Johnson was asked if he ever advised his son, a Wheat Ridge, Colo., native, to play football when he was growing up in suburban Denver.

“Actually, my advice was, ‘Hey, stop playing football. Let’s do other things,’ ” he said.

Johnson, 22, said his father had pushed him to play soccer. He first played football with the Bear Greek Grizzlies in Lakewood, Colo., when he was 7 and he hasn’t slowed down since.

“He’s pursuing his passion,” Bode Johnson said. “That’s good, you know.”

Bode Johnson has gotten in on the passion as well. He has attended all of the Vikings games this season as part of a group that has varied between 10 and 20 supporters. It always includes his wife, Baliyat Mallam-Johnson, and Johnson’s mother, Traci Johnson. Johnson’s parents were divorced when he was 1 but they had joint custody of their son and remained friendly.

Most in the group wear Johnson’s No. 81 jersey. Johnson said there will be 12 family members and friends on hand for Sunday’s game against Philadelphia at U.S. Bank Stadium.

“I have a whole crew,” Johnson said. “They’ve been going to support me no matter what the circumstances have been — since I’ve been in pee-wee football all the way up to the NFL.”

There has been plenty to cheer lately. Johnson, who made the team as a seventh-round pick, didn’t have any catches in the first three games. But after No. 3 receiver Chad Beebe was lost for at least eight weeks with an ankle injury, Johnson caught for passes for 35 yards on Sept. 29 at Chicago and four for 43 yards last Sunday against the New York Giants.

“It’s unfortunate what happened to (Beebe), and I’m wishing him a speedy recovery,” Johnson said. “I want to see him out on the field, too, but once I got my shot, I just ran with it. I think just knowing the plays and just being prepared to be out on the field has been the biggest part. And I pride myself on my route-running.’’

Johnson has been preparing 15 years to be an NFL player. When he first joined the Bear Creek Grizzlies, he made a vow to his mother.

“He said, ‘I guarantee I’m going to play in the NFL,’’ ’ she recalled.

And her reaction?

“I said, ‘Sounds good,’ ” said Traci Johnson, a licensed professional counselor. “You always want to be supportive, and at the same time a very small percentage get to that point that he’s at, but of course I always believed in him.

“I’m just over the moon that he’s in the NFL. I still can’t believe it’s real. But he’s living his dream.’’

When Johnson was at Bear Creek High School in Lakewood, he was better at track than football. He won state in the 110-meter hurdles as a junior. He didn’t move from the secondary to wide receiver until he was a senior.

“We really weren’t figuring things out very well until his senior year,” said Bear Path coach Zach Morris. “We probably should have been using him a lot more on offense, but we kind of got that rectified by his senior year. … Offensively, he was really explosive.”

Johnson did well academically but received just four scholarship offers for football. He chose Colorado State over Army, Wyoming and Northern Colorado. With the Rams, Johnson put up good but not spectacular numbers, catching 54 passes for 796 yards as a senior.

“I wish the numbers could have been better, but I did enough to get where I am now, so that’s all that matters,” Johnson said.

Johnson did well enough to earn an invitation to the NFL scouting combine in Indianapolis, where he ran the 40-yard dash in 4.51 seconds. That played a role in the Vikings selecting him with the No. 247 overall pick.

In training camp, he joined a wide-open field to become the No. 3 receiver behind starters Adam Thielen and Stefon Diggs. That field included Beebe, as well as Dillon Mitchell, a draft pick from Oregon with the No. 239 pick in the seventh round, veteran Laquon Treadwell, free agent Jordan Taylor and practice squad holdover Jeff Badet.

“I knew I definitely was going to make an impact on special teams,” Johnson said. “But then when training camp went on, I saw that maybe the No. 4 spot is open and maybe the No. 3 spot. I just hunkered down and learned the playbook.”

When the 53-man roster was set, the only receivers on it were Thielen, Diggs, Beebe and Johnson. Now, there are five including Treadwell, who re-signed after being cut, and undrafted rookie Davion Davis. Beebe is on injured reserve.

Treadwell hasn’t been targeted once in his two games back, and Davis hasn’t been active in two games since being promoted from the practice squad.

“The biggest thing he’s done is be very reliable,” head coach Mike Zimmer said of Johnson. “He gets to the right places, he can play all three (receiver) positions.”

His father is quite excited. Bode Johnson, 54, came to the United States in 1988. He settled in the Denver area and began exporting cars to Nigeria. He began to learn about the NFL and became a Denver Broncos fan. He followed the Vikings in the 1990s when Dennis Green was the coach and later followed the Atlanta Falcons.

“Now, I’m the number one fan of the Minnesota Vikings,” he said.

He has made it a point to pass on many elements of his Nigerian heritage to his son. It starts with his full first name. In Nigerian culture, Bode said, the grandfather names a male grandchild. Johnson’s late father, Joseph Ulijobi Johnson, named him Olabisi, which he said means “God at your wealth” in the Yoruba language.

Bisi has been to Nigeria twice, in the summer of 2005 when he was 8 and summer of 2014 at 17.

“I grew up with two very different cultures, Iowa and Nigeria,” said Johnson, whose mother is from Cedar Rapids, Iowa. “But it was nice just to get to see both sides. I would go over to my dad’s house and have different types of foods and just different traditions and things like that. And my grandma was around a lot, so I would see her and she would try to teach me stuff.”

Johnson’s favorite Nigerian foods include jollof rice, a bean pudding called moin-moin and suya beef kabobs. He also likes his mother’s Iowa pea salad.

Johnson’s grandmother, Rosaline Johnson, 87, inspired Johnson to wear traditional Nigerian buba and sokoto garb underneath his high school and college graduation gowns. He has a degree in hospitality management from CSU.

“My grandmother would have (the traditional garb) made in Nigeria,” Johnson said. “It’s nice to express my culture and just having people see that part of me that they probably usually don’t see. It’s just fun.”

Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins loves having another receiving threat. He had Johnson as his guest on his KFAN radio show last Tuesday and they talked about his Nigerian background and ascension to being Minnesota’s No. 3 wide receiver.

“I’m excited for what he’s going to continue to grow into, and he’s done a great job with a lot asked of him as a rookie,” Cousins said Wednesday. “I think he’s a work in progress. Time will tell. It’s still early, but he’s caught a few balls and we think he has a lot of potential.”

Johnson is getting help from Thielen and Diggs, who have become top NFL receivers despite, like Johnson, not being high draft picks. Thielen was undrafted in 2013, and Diggs was taken by Minnesota in the fifth round in 2015

“It’s very inspiring,’’ Johnson said of their success. “I watch a lot of film on them. When I make a mistake, they get on me, but it’s constructive criticism. It’s really easy to learn from them.’’

Thielen was on the practice squad in his first Minnesota season, then played sparingly for two years before becoming a starter. Diggs, like Johnson, had his first NFL catch in his fourth game and went on in 2015 to catch 52 passes.

“We spend a lot of time together, and I just respect (Johnson’s) approach to the game, and how he takes it real seriously,’’ Diggs said. “Seeing him have early success isn’t a surprise seeing the fact I was in camp with him all summer and I saw the same guy.”

Johnson is happy have his father as one of his biggest supporters, early advice notwithstanding.

“Not a lot of Nigerians, I think, look to play football or their families don’t want them to play, so I think that’s why he did that,” Johnson said. “But now that I’ve been in it so long now, he’s definitely embraced the fact that I’ve played football.”

SOURCE: TWIN CITIES PIONEER PRESS

Nigerian Roots At Core Of Motivation For Seahawks Rookie DB Ugo Amadi

Free safety Ugo Amadi practices during the Seahawks training camp, Thursday, Aug. 15, 2019.


BY BEN ARTHUR

The boy was never supposed to have been conceived.

A Nigerian-immigrant mother, who'd already had four children, was dealing with serious health issues. She had heart problems during the birth of her most recent child. The doctor wasn't sure that her heart could handle the process again, so the message was clear and stern:

No more kids.

But she became pregnant again. Another child was on the way. She didn't tell the doctor that she was expecting a baby until four months later. Concern for her well-being grew to a peak.

No issues emerged throughout the pregnancy, however. And on May 16, 1997 in Nashville, she gave birth to a boy. There were no adverse health issues during labor. No heart issues. No side effects. Nothing. A miracle.

So she named the child 'Ugochukwu.' In the Nigerian language of Igbo, it means, 'a precious gift from God.'

It's a backstory to his life that Ugochukwu Amadi — Ugo for short — doesn't take for granted.

"People say how cool my name is and stuff like that," the Seahawks defensive back said. "It's a lot that I take pride in, especially the (Nigerian) culture that I'm from."

Amadi, a 2019 fourth-round pick out of the University of Oregon, takes pride in his game on the gridiron, too. Particularly with his versatility. The Seahawks are comfortable moving him around the secondary. And they like him for his special teams value, as both a punt returner and a gunner.

His big hit last Sunday on Vikings returner Olabisi Johnson in punt coverage, after beating a double team at the line of scrimmage, went viral on social media. It's been called perfection. In an era where rule changes have many football people scratching their heads on what it means to properly tackle, the 5-foot-9 Amadi showed the world how to do it in a nine-second span — with perfect timing and anticipation.

His emerging playmaking ability has made it hard to imagine a Seahawks' 53-man roster without him.


"He's just done something every time he's been out on the field," Seahawks coach Pete Carroll said. "He's been a really exciting player for us."

On defense, Amadi is shuffling back and forth between free safety and nickel for Seattle. He's been primarily used at the former, but Carroll said he's still very much in the competition for the slot cornerback role — Justin Coleman's spot last season. It's a starting position by default because of how frequently the Seahawks play in nickel packages.


Amadi said it's not challenging juggling multiple responsibilities. He understands that he's a rookie, and that it's important for his role to be fluid. He's new, so Seattle is trying to find the best spot for him. But he hopes that his plays, like his bone-crushing tackle last week, shows that he's eager to make a big impact as a rookie.

Amadi leads the Seahawks in the preseason so far in punt return attempts at four, netting 19 yards. He's tied for second with two special teams tackles. He has five tackles on defense (including a quarterback hit) and a pass deflection. He's even done kickoff return, too. Amadi returned one kick in the preseason opener against Denver for 15 yards.


"This is how I want to be able to come into the NFL," Amadi said. "I want my presence to be felt. I want to just make sure that I'm not here to play around. I'm here to make a living, to make a name for myself."

He was a big playmaker for the Ducks, especially on special teams. A Pac-12 All-Conference second-team selection in 2018, Amadi led the league with 15.93 yards per punt return. He became the first FBS player since 2015 and the first Pac-12 player since 2007 to record two pick-6's and a punt-return TD in the same year. As a senior, he was one of four Power 5 players with at least two interceptions returned for scores.

Amadi on defense posted 55 tackles, including five for loss, and 1.5 sacks in 2018. He was named a semifinalist for the Jim Thorpe Award, which is given annually to the top defensive back in college football.

He's been a humble learner in Seattle, according to teammate and fellow defensive back Bradley McDougald. He has stayed ahead of the game by constantly studying his playbook. He speaks less and listens more.

"If one player is getting coached, he takes the same advice for himself," McDougald said of Amadi. "You don't see him making a mistake that another rookie makes. That's a good trait to have."

Amadi has already performed a perfect tackle, but he doesn't know what his perfect rookie season would like yet. Why? He doesn't necessarily know what to expect. He's learning each day. He wants to run with the first-team defense in practice before he looks too far ahead.

But he does know the kind of effect he wants to have with the Seahawks in Year 1. He wants his competitive edge to show. He wants his teammates and peers to know that he's a playmaker — that when he gets the ball, he's going to do something with it. Something exciting.

He sees football as part of his name's meaning, his 'precious gift from God.'

"I'm going to be able to take care of my family with this career," Amadi said.

SOURCE: MY SAN ANTONIO

The Latest: Mahomes Sets Up FG, Chiefs-Patriots Going To OT

BY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Kansas City Chiefs running back Damien Williams (26) makes a touchdown reception against New England Patriots outside linebacker Dont'a Hightower (54) during the second half of the AFC Championship NFL football game, Sunday, Jan. 20, 2019, in Kansas City, Mo. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)

The Latest on the conference championship games (all times EST):

10 p.m.

The Patriots and Chiefs are headed to overtime in the AFC championship game after a frantic fourth quarter in which New England scored a pair of touchdowns and Kansas City scored three of them.

Harrison Butker added a 39-yard field goal with 8 seconds left in regulation to send the game to overtime tied at 31. It followed an overtime finish in the NFC title game won by the Los Angeles Rams, the first time that both Super Bowl participants were decided after regulation.

The Patriots had taken a 31-28 lead on Rex Burkhead’s touchdown run, but the Chiefs needed only two big completions from Patrick Mahomes to set up Butker’s tying field goal.

9:50 p.m.

Tom Brady threw a 25-yard pass to Rob Gronkowski on third down to set up Rex Burkhead’s 4-yard TD run, giving the Patriots a 31-28 lead over the Chiefs with 39 seconds left in the AFC title game.

Brady’s throw to Gronkowski came moments after his pass had skipped off the veteran tight end’s hands for what appeared to be a clinching interception. But a flag on the far side of the field wound up being offsides on Chiefs linebacker Dee Ford, giving the Pats another chance.

The throw to Gronkowski was completed over the top of Chiefs safety Eric Berry, who is playing in just his third game all season because of a heel injury.

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9:40 p.m.

Damien Williams has a touchdown rushing to go with two through the air, and this one has given the Chiefs a 28-24 over the Patriots with 2:03 left in their AFC championship showdown.

The Pats had regained the lead on Sony Michel’s 10-yard TD run, only for Kansas City to answer with a quick 68-yard drive. The Chiefs can thank Patriots cornerback J.C. Jackson, whose holding call gave them one first down and whose pass interference call gave them another.

Patrick Mahomes then connected with Sammy Watkins for 38 yards to reach the New England 2, and Williams pounded in one play later to give the Chiefs the lead.

Tom Brady and the Patriots offense took over with three timeouts remaining.

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9:35 p.m.

The Patriots are back on top of what’s suddenly a back-and-forth AFC championship game.

After the Chiefs marched downfield to take their first lead of the game, the Patriots used 10 plays to cover 75 yards. Sony Michel finished the drive by going 10 yards on fourth-and-inches to give New England a 24-21 lead with 3:32 left in the game.

The Patriots converted a crucial third down on the drive when Chris Hogan speared a third-down pass from Tom Brady for a first down. Chiefs coach Andy Reid challenged the catch, but it was upheld, so New England not only got a first down but it cost Kansas City a timeout.

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9:15 p.m.

Patrick Mahomes threw a screen pass that Damien Williams turned into a 23-yard touchdown catch, giving the Chiefs a 21-17 lead over the Patriots with 7:45 left in the AFC title game.

The Chiefs thought they had gotten a break when Julian Edelman muffed a punt moments earlier — the ball was mighty close to touching his right thumb — but the officials overturned the call with replay. No matter, though. Edelman had a pass skip off his hands two plays later and Daniel Sorensen was there to pick it off.

Two more plays and Mahomes had found Williams for their second TD connection of the game.

The Chiefs trailed 14-0 at halftime but, much like their shootout loss in Week 6 at Gillette Stadium, their high-powered offense has come alive out of the break.

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9:10 p.m.

The Kansas City Chiefs refuse to go away in their first AFC title game in 25 years.

Patrick Mahomes flipped a short touchdown pass to Damien Williams on the second play of the fourth quarter, pulling the Chiefs within 17-14 of the New England Patriots with 14:51 to play.

It was the All-Pro quarterback’s second TD throw of the second half, and he suddenly has 186 yards through the air. Much of it has gone to Sammy Watkins, who has three catches for 76 yards.

Kansas City got the ball back moments later in a wild sequence. Moments after officials determined via replay the Patriots’ Julian Edelman had not touched a potential muffed punt — the ball was mighty close to his right thumb — Daniel Sorensen intercepted a pass that bounced off Edelman’s hands and gave Kansas City the ball in New England territory.

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8:40 p.m.

Stephen Gostkowski has given the New England Patriots a 17-7 lead over the Kansas City Chiefs with just over a quarter left in the AFC championship game.

The Patriots held the Chiefs deep in their own territory to get the ball back midway through the third quarter. And while their drive went nowhere, Gostkowski managed to drill a 47-yard field goal through a whipping wind to make it a two-possession game again.

The Chiefs seemed to be seizing momentum after their quick touchdown and forcing a punt, but Mahomes was sacked for the fourth time to spoil their drive.

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8:25 p.m.

The Los Angeles Rams will rock their royal blue-and-yellow uniforms at the Super Bowl in Atlanta.

The team announced the jersey selection on Twitter after beating the Saints 26-23 in overtime in the NFC championship game.

The Rams wore similar uniforms for much of their first stint in Los Angeles but ditched the royal blue for a navy-and-gold scheme in 2000 while in St. Louis.

The franchise moved back to LA for the 2016 season, and after an outcry from fans, it again adopted the royal blue jerseys as a primary home look this season.

8:15 p.m.

The Chiefs needed just four plays in the second half to make the AFC championship a game.

Patrick Mahomes threw a 54-yard strike to Sammy Watkins to convert on third down, then hit tight end Travis Kelce on a skinny post for a 12-yard touchdown to get within 14-7 of the Patriots.

The play to Watkins went for 20 yards more than Kansas City managed the entire first half.

Still, the quick-strike drive by the league’s highest-scoring offense brought the crowd back into the game, and it put some pressure on Tom Brady and the Patriots to respond.

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7:55 p.m.

The New England Patriots took a 14-0 lead over the Chiefs into halftime of the AFC championship game, their offensive and defensive lines manhandling Kansas City on a crisp, cold night.

The Patriots had 245 yards while the Chiefs managed 32 yards.

It could have been even worse for the Chiefs. One first-half Patriots drive ended when Tom Brady was intercepted in the end zone.

It was Brady’s first career interception from the 1-yard line. He was 49 of 71 with 43 TDs before that play.

The half was summed up by the closing minutes, when the Patriots marched 90 yards in 2:41 and Brady hit Phillip Dorsett for a 27-yard touchdown reception. The Chiefs got the ball back with 27 seconds left and Patrick Mahomes nearly fumbled it away on their only snap.

Mahomes was just 4 of 8 for 65 yards while getting sacked three times.

It was the first time Kansas City was shut out in a half this season.

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7:30 p.m.

Saints coach Sean Payton says the NFL told him officials botched a crucial pass interference call late in the fourth quarter of the NFC championship game. New Orleans was eliminated by the Rams 26-23 in overtime one game from the Super Bowl.

The Saints faced third-and-10 from the Rams 13 in the final two minutes when Los Angeles defensive back Nickell Robey-Coleman slammed into Tommylee Lewis, connecting helmet-to-helmet, while Drew Brees’ pass was still in the air. Payton and the Saints were livid when no flag was thrown. The missed call started a sequence that pushed the game to overtime.

Payton says officials on the field told him Robey-Coleman “arrived at the same time that the ball did.” Payton got on the phone with the league to discuss the call immediately after the game.

“We lose a chance to go to the Super Bowl with a call like that, it’s just disappointing,” Payton said.

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7:10 p.m.

The Patriots lead the Chiefs 7-0 at the end of the first quarter, though Tom Brady and Co. are poised to score again after a dominant first 15 minutes in the AFC championship game.

Kansas City only had the ball for 2:22 in the quarter, picking up a first down only on a defensive holding penalty. Patrick Mahomes was 0-for-2 passing and Damien Williams ran twice for 3 yards.

Throw in a sack of Mahomes, and the Chiefs had minus-11 yards in the first quarter.

Brady was 7 of 9 for 64 yards, clinically slicing up the Chiefs’ defense.

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6:55 p.m.

The Patriots have taken a 7-0 lead over the Chiefs after a grinding, 15-play, 80-yard drive that consumed more than half of the first quarter and ended with Sony Michel’s touchdown plunge.

New England was 3 for 3 on third down, but Michel did most of the work, carrying seven times for 32 yards against what was statistically the worst rush defense in the NFL this season.

The draining drive also deflated a raucous crowd packed inside Arrowhead Stadium.

Now, it’s up to Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes and the league’s highest-scoring offense to provide an answer.

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6:40 p.m.

The AFC championship game is under way with the Kansas City Chiefs kicking off to the New England Patriots and seeking their first trip to the Super Bowl in 49 years.

The Patriots are trying to make it back for the third straight year.

Melissa Ethridge performed the anthem, and the crowd packed inside Arrowhead Stadium was roaring as Tom Brady led the Patriots onto the field for the opening drive.

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6:35 p.m.

Greg Zuerlein kicked a 57-yard field goal in overtime, sending the Los Angeles Rams to the Super Bowl with a 26-23 victory over the New Orleans Saints.

New Orleans received the ball to open overtime, but Drew Brees was intercepted on a pass near midfield.

The Rams got one first down before getting stopped on third and 7 from the New Orleans 39. Zuerlein came on and drilled the winning kick dead-center with room to spare, ending a wild game that included a blown pass interference to stall the Saints in the red zone late in the fourth quarter.

It will be the Rams’ first Super Bowl trip since returning to LA from St. Louis for the 2016 season.

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6:20 p.m.

The Saints and Rams have gone to overtime in the NFC championship game after a wild and controversial ending to the fourth quarter.

The teams exchanged field goals in the final six minutes. The first came when Rams coach Sean McVay, known for his bold decision making on fourth downs, opted for a field goal at the goal line to make it 20-20 with 5:06 left.

Drew Brees quickly drove the Saints downfield on the next possession, but New Orleans was stalled when officials missed a pass interference call on third down. Rams defensive back Nickel Robey-Coleman slammed into Tommylee Lewis while the ball was still in the air, and Saints coach Sean Payton was livid when no flag was thrown.

New Orleans’ Wil Lutz followed with a 31-yard field goal with 1:45 left. Los Angeles then drove into Saints territory to set up Greg Zuerlein’s tying 48-yard field goal with 19 seconds left to make it 23-23.

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5:50 p.m.

Greg Zuerlein made a 24-yard field goal with 5:03 remaining in the fourth quarter and the Rams tied the Saints 20-20 in the NFC championship game.

The kick capped a nine-play, 85-yard drive for the Rams, who trailed 13-0 after the first quarter.

Jared Goff completed passes to Josh Reynolds for 33 yards and to Gerald Everett for 39 yards on the drive.

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5:30 p.m.

Patriots defensive end Deatrich Wise Jr. and defensive tackle Danny Shelton are inactive for their AFC championship game against the Kansas City Chiefs.

Both are a bit of a surprise. Wise has been dealing with an ankle injury but was taken off the report this week, while Shelton is a helpful body when it comes to stopping the run.

The Patriots are choosing instead to go with an extra defensive back.

Chiefs right guard Laurent Duvernay-Tardif also is inactive. He returned to the active roster from IR this week after missing time with a broken leg. But the Chiefs chose to stick with Andrew Wylie, who has been playing well in a starting role.

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5:20 p.m.

The Los Angeles Rams cut New Orleans’ lead to 20-17 with a short touchdown pass from Jared Goff to Tyler Higbee late in the third quarter.

Higbee was wide open in the right flat on a third-down scoring pass after Saints defenders packed the middle in apparent anticipation of a run on third-and-goal from the 1.

The touchdown capped a 10-play, 75-yard drive highlighted by a 25-yard pass to Brandin Cooks and a 16-yard run by receiver Josh Reynolds to the New Orleans 1.

The score came after New Orleans had gone up 20-10 on its previous possession.

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5:05 p.m.

The New Orleans Saints have regained momentum early in the second half and widened their lead to 20-10 on a short touchdown catch by versatile third-string quarterback Taysom Hill.

After allowing the Rams to score the last 10 points of the first half, New Orleans’ defense quickly forced a punt on Los Angeles’ opening possession of the third quarter. After retaking possession, Saints methodically drove 71 yards with a mix of power runs by Mark Ingram and short receptions by Alvin Kamara.

Kamara caught four passes on the drive and has been the Saints’ top receiver in the game with 10 receptions for 88 yards. Ingram rushed three times for 25 yards during the series, including a 16-yard carry.

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4:40 p.m.

The Rams have pulled to 13-10 at halftime following a two-minute drive highlighted by Jared Goff connections of 17 and 36 yards to former Saints first-rounder Brandin Cooks.

Cooks’ longer reception along the right sideline set up Todd Gurley’s 6-yard touchdown run.

The Saints opened up a 13-0 lead with a pair of Wil Lutz field goals and Drew Brees’ 5-yard touchdown pass to seldom-used tight end Garrett Griffin on their first three possessions. New Orleans’ second field goal was set up by linebacker Demario Davis’ interception of a short pass that deflected off Gurley’s hands.

But Los Angeles, which will receive to open the third quarter, responded with 10 points in the second quarter. The touchdown capped an 81-yard drive that took just 1:29 off the game clock.

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4:40 p.m.

The New Orleans Saints will be without tight end Josh Hill for the rest of the NFC championship game.

Hill left the game with a concussion after hauling in a 24-yard pass from Drew Brees.

While making the tackle, Los Angeles Rams linebacker Cory Littleton delivered a forearm to Hill’s head. No penalty was called, but Hill staggered off the field to be evaluated by the medical staff. Just before halftime, the Saints announced he was done for the game.

The loss of Hill led to a much bigger role in the offense for Garrett Griffin, who spent most of the season on the practice squad and had only one career catch coming into the game.

Griffin hauled in a 5-yard touchdown pass and finished the half with two catches for 12 yards.

— Paul Newberry reporting from New Orleans.

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4:05 p.m.

A fake punt gave the Rams their first first down on their third possession and led to their first points of the game on a field goal.

Jonny Hekker’s pass to Sam Shields along the right side caught the Saints off guard on fourth-and-5. The play sustained a drive that produced three more first downs before Los Angeles stalled on running back Todd Gurley’s dropped pass inside the New Orleans 20.

Greg Zuerlein kicked a 36-yard field goal to make it 13-3 with 9:45 left in the second quarter.

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3:45 p.m.

The Saints have taken a 13-0 lead on Drew Brees’ 5-yard pass to seldom-used tight end Garrett Griffin. It was Griffin’s first career TD and second career reception.

New Orleans used a little gamesmanship to sustain the drive after their third third-down failure in the red zone on three possessions to start the game. The first two ended in field goals. This time, they kept the offense on the field and drew the Rams’ aggressive front offside for the first down.

Brees capitalized soon after, rolling right to buy time before Griffin came open running along the goal line.

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3:25 p.m.

The Saints have converted an early turnover into a second field goal to take a 6-0 lead.

New Orleans’ second possession began on the Rams 16 after Jared Goff’s short pass over the middle deflected off running back Todd Gurley’s hands and into the arms of Saints linebacker Demario Davis.

It marked the Saints’ second time in the Rams’ red zone, and the second time they stalled on third down with a short field. Wil Lutz, who kicked a 37-yard field goal on the opening drive, came back out to hit from 29 yards.

The silver lining for Los Angeles is that it trailed by only one TD after its defense held twice inside its 20.

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3:15 p.m.

The New Orleans Saints have opened the NFC title game with a field goal after very nearly scoring a touchdown.

Drew Brees converted third-down passes of 9 yards to Ted Ginn and 21 yards to Alvin Kamara to sustain the drive, which stalled when tight end Dan Arnold was unable to hold on to a third-down pass in the back of the end zone.

Wil Lutz came on and connected from 37 yards to give the Saints a 3-0 lead.

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2:15 p.m.

There are no surprises among the Los Angeles Rams’ and New Orleans Saints’ inactive lists for the NFC championship game.

Both teams came in largely healthy and most of those not in uniform are healthy reserves.

The Saints already had ruled out receiver Keith Kirkwood with a calf injury that sidelined him during practice the past week. Kirkwood’s absence comes one week after he caught a critical fourth-and-2 touchdown pass in New Orleans’ comeback victory over Philadelphia in the divisional round.

Also scratched from New Orleans’ lineup is veteran tight end Ben Watson, who has been ill this week. He is in the Superdome with the Saints and even could be seen stretching on the field, raising his prospects for returning if New Orleans advances to play in the Super Bowl in two weeks.

Los Angeles did not have a single player on its injury reports last week.

Here are the full inactive lists for both teams.

Rams: RB Justin Davis, OL Jamil Demby, OLB Ogbonnia Okoronkwo, DT Sebastian Joseph-Day, DT Tanzel Smart, DB Darious Williams and OLB Trevon Young.

Saints: TE Ben Watson (illness), WR Keith Kirkwood (calf), DL Tyrunn Walker, OL Will Clapp, LB Manti Te’o, OL Derek Newton and RB Dwayne Washington.

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2 p.m.

The Los Angeles Rams are back inside the stadium where they lost for the first time this season, looking for retribution and a Super Bowl berth as they face the New Orleans Saints in the NFC championship game.

The Superdome is coming alive for the last time this football season as predominantly Saints fans arrive for just the second NFC title game to be held at the site of seven Super Bowls.

The previous time the Saints hosted a game this late in a season, they pulled out a hair-raising overtime triumph over Minnesota en route to their first Super Bowl appearance — and championship.

That was the 2009 season. Some nine seasons later, coach Sean Payton and 40-year-old, record-setting quarterback Drew Brees are back with a largely different cast, one victory away from the team’s second trip to the NFL’s biggest event.

When these teams met in Week 9, running back C.J. Anderson had not yet joined Todd Gurley in the Rams’ backfield and Los Angeles cornerback Aqib Talib was not healthy enough to play. Their availability puts the Rams in a stronger position than they were in back on Nov. 4, when they fell to New Orleans 45-35.

This is the first NFC title game for Rams 32-year-old, second-year coach Sean McVay and his 24-year-old quarterback, Jared Goff.

On the AFC side, the New England Patriots are in their eighth consecutive conference championship game and trying to reach the Super Bowl for the fourth time in five seasons and the ninth time overall in the Bill Belichick-Tom Brady era.

The Kansas City Chiefs, led by quarterback Patrick Mahomes, are hosting the AFC title game for the first time at Arrowhead Stadium, and are trying to get to the Super Bowl for the first time since the 1969 season.

One thing that is unusual is that the Patriots are a slight underdog against the top-seeded Chiefs.

“We’re going against a team that’s the No. 1 seed in the league,” Brady said after the team’s final practice on Friday. “I’m sure there’s a lot of people that are thinking they’re going to win. Everyone can have their own opinion. We certainly have an opinion, and we’ve got to go out there and execute our best in order to accomplish that.”

The winners that emerge from the conference championship games will meet in Atlanta on Feb. 3 in the Super Bowl.

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