Padecky: Tribute to Jason Franci a reminder of late coach's legacy

It was Jason Franci’s voice, his wife was sure of it. It was 1:01 a.m. Saturday. Michelle was on the deck outside. She sleeps out there a lot since her husband died 10 months ago. She can’t fully explain why. Probably because nature seemed so natural to them.

“Hoss, is that you?” Michelle asked. The sound was coming from inside their house. She went inside. A video screen was turned on, illuminating family pictures.

“Hey Momma, you there?” Michelle remembers hearing. She answered quietly in the affirmative. Better to back into a moment like this cautiously.

“Don’t worry. It’s gonna be all right. And bring mah boots.”

Michelle stood there, somewhere between dumbfounded and panic. She had been dreading the memorial to her husband on Saturday afternoon. She would be asked to speak. Didn’t want to. She knew she’d clutch up. Words would stick in her throat like peanut butter and she’d start sobbing like a soap opera star. She would end up standing in a pool of her making.

Michelle was not alone. Gary Galloway, the retired St. Vincent all-everything coach, and Dante DePaola, the defensive coordinator at SRJC, already had declined invitations to speak. Both knew they couldn’t keep it together, their affection ran so deep for Jason, the longtime prep football coach and mentor to so many.

Maybe, however, they would have if Hoss had asked them to present his cowboy boots to the 250 people who attended his memorial at Montgomery High’s Jason Franci Field. Those cowboy boots kept her from unraveling. It was the emotional anchor she needed. She dragged a chair to the podium, placed Jason’s boots on the chair, and faced the crowd.

“All men die,” she said, “but not all men live. Jason lived life the way he wanted to live it. He danced his dance. He invited us to dance with him.”

Michelle grabbed the boots, thrust them skyward. She was high-fiving him. Like Jason, she’d be damned if she worried about anyone thinking her nuts for hearing his voice at 1:01 in the morning.

Who wants to get in the way of that kind of love? Who wants to throw reality, common sense or disbelief into that kind of affection? Who wants to be that petunia? And who, especially, wouldn’t want to feel that close to someone?

It’s the kind of love that shares a breath, a thought, a vision. It doesn’t have to be romantic love either.

It can be Todd Vehmeyer’s. Yes, that Todd guy, Jason’s defensive coordinator for 13 years. The guy who looks like a defensive line all himself.

“I spoke with Jason about a week before he passed,” said Vehmeyer, one of eight speakers. “He gave me this box and told me to open it up after (he) died. So here I go.”

Vehmeyer produced a cardboard box that looked like it was delivered by FedEx. He cut it open. He produced a letter Jason wrote for Vehmeyer and read it.

“Dear Todd, you’re my favorite coach. I love you more than (Frank) Scalercio (once a Franci coach). I don’t care if we (Montgomery) go 1-9 as long as we beat (Cardinal) Newman, so here’s a beer. Now drink it and shut up.”

Out of the box Vehmeyer pulled out a Coors Light, Franci’s favorite beer. In front of everyone, Vehmeyer popped the top and guzzled it without stopping, without effort. The man may have done this before.

The crowd went nuts. Great theater. Yeah, that Vehmeyer, he’s a Franci guy all the way.

Too bad it was all made up.

“Yeah, it was a joke,” said Vehmeyer. “I didn’t know how I could bring a beer in here. So I decided to do this. I packed the box this morning.”

So before anyone could say “You can’t drink booze in here,” Vehmeyer had his scam and he had his beer. Brilliant game plan, coach. Yes, most definitely, you’re a Franci guy. You’re a guy who can fill up the room.

Some people can walk into a room, stand right next to you for two hours, and you don’t know they are there. Then there’s Jason Franci, who filled a room with oxygen that everyone breathed.

“There was a timeout,” said Steve Ellison. “It was when coaches could go onto the field. So I went to talk to my defense. Jason was out there talking to his offense. We’re both near the 50-yard line.”

Ellison coached Petaluma High School football for 30 years.

“All I hear is this barrage of unmentionables coming from Jason,” Ellison said. “It was unreal. All my guys are looking at Jason, listening to him. They could care less what I had to say.”

Jason, how shall I say this, could be a bit salty. When he bellowed, even the ants went underground. Franci was surround sound before there was surround sound. Franci’s booming voice and highly animated gestures would make it convenient to typecast him as The Crabby Human Megaphone Who Didn’t Get A Lot of Sleep The Night Before.

If that was the case, Jeremy Joerger wouldn’t have flown all the way from Sarasota, Florida, to make the memorial. Jeremy could have stayed home and listened to the audio tapes. Jason’s bombast? That’s a footnote for Joerger, who was an outside linebacker for Montgomery in the mid-’90s.

“The last time I talked to him was 2008,” the Floridian said. “I bumped into him at halftime of a game. He saw me. He shouted, ‘I love you buddy!’ He kept talking. I kept saying, ‘Coach, your team is on the field’. He kept talking. He didn’t care if players were running past him.”

Joerger was almost blushing. Men don’t usually talk about loving each other. Typically it’s because of the Man Code. To be strong is to be silent. Emotions are for cheerleaders.

Not if Jason Franci is your coach.

“What did I learn from him?” said Koa Misi, repeating the question. “What didn’t I learn from him?”

Misi played in the NFL for seven seasons after he played for Montgomery, SRJC and University of Utah. He had more than 15 years of football. Misi has no doubt where Jason Franci stood with his peers, professional or otherwise.

“I never played for a coach that I was more comfortable with,” said Misi, who now lives in San Diego. “The first time I walked onto this field I felt at home. He was like a father to me. But he was like that to everyone who played for him.”

Jason Franci was intimate. That’s the short and long of it. He was intimate. He was in your face because he wanted to be in your life. All he asked was for his players to bust their hump for him because he was busting his for them.

Effort. Passion. Give a damn. Reach across the aisle and lend a hand. Life is too short to be otherwise. Life wasn’t complicated for Jason. Neither was their affection for him.

So hear his voice in the middle of the night. Fly across the country for a 90-minute ceremony. Scam ’em so you can drink a beer. Have friends too emotional to speak.

Shoot, who wouldn’t want to be remembered like that?

To comment write to bobpadecky@gmail.com