Wednesday, November 16, 2005Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
GETTYSBURG -- The life and legacy of Steve Courson, a man who tried to alter the drug-enhanced sinew of sports and saved himself in the process by altering his own, were celebrated in a funeral service inside a wide chapel amid the heart of this city with Civil War significance.
Twenty years ago, Courson fired the first volley that started not a war on steroids, but a gradual, intellectual revolution that seemed to reach the national consciousness in the past year or so. The former Steelers offensive lineman, who went public in 1985 about his own steroid use and that of scores of silent NFL brethren, found his reputation reinvigorated -- from whistle-blowing outcast to outspoken expert -- and then found himself lecturing not only school groups but also a U.S. House of Representatives committee in March.
"Steve changed professional sports," Bruce Courson, his half-brother, said from the pulpit of the St. James Lutheran Church.
Steve Courson was killed Thursday while attempting to protect one of his beloved black Labs, Rufus, from a 44-foot tree Courson felled near his Farmington, Pa., home. The tree accidentally landed atop the sturdy Courson, a weightlifter who boasted that his bench-pressing ability would have earned him third place at the last NFL combine. He was 50.
"He changed me. I think he changed a lot of us, for the better," Bruce Courson said.
About 150 family members, friends, former high school teammates from Longmeadow, Mass., and Gettysburg, former University of South Carolina teammates and former Steelers teammates gathered in Gettysburg to remember a half-century of Courson history.
At dinner Monday night and at a luncheon that followed yesterday's service, his South Carolina pals regaled one another with stories, as did his Steelers teammates throughout their four-hour bus ride from Pittsburgh yesterday morning. "If you were there, you could feel the compassion and love those guys share for Steve," said Gary Dunn, breaking up with emotion. The service was postponed 10 minutes to await the arrival of those Steelers alumni.
"Steve's gift to me was [Monday] night, having dinner with all of his buddies from South Carolina, who came from all over," said Charles Yesalis, the Penn State professor with whom Courson wrote a book about steroids in sports and remained close. "The camaraderie, the teammates for life. ... It was wonderful."
Kerry DePasquale from Pittsburgh and fellow Pennsylvanian Bill Lane were the former South Carolina players who came a short distance compared to the others: Russ Manzari from Maryland, Bill Kitteredge and Bill Cregar from New Jersey, Al Tandy from New York, Jason Adamski from Chicago and South Carolinians Gene Antley, Hugh Bell, Tony Penny, Dave Prezioso and Harold White, who still works as an academic advisor in the university's athletic department.
Neither the Steelers' front office nor the NFL were represented at the funeral. The NFL alumni association sent flowers, and nearly a dozen former teammates showed: Larry Brown, Dunn (who flew into Pittsburgh from Key West, Fla.), Bill Hurley, Jon Kolb, Edmund Nelson, Ted Peterson, Cliff Stoudt, Rick Woods, Tunch Ilkin, Craig Wolfley and Dwayne Woodruff. While the players stayed friends, Courson still harbored feelings of being left alone in the steroid spotlight.
"He was the only Steeler to ever use steroids," Yesalis said sarcastically of Courson, who was with the Steelers from 1977-83 and played in Super Bowls XIII and XIV before finishing with Tampa Bay in 1984-85. "He didn't wear his Super Bowl rings anymore. He was bitter ... ostracized."
"A lot of professional athletes probably still aren't happy with Steve," Bruce Courson said. "But Steve felt what he was doing was right. He wanted to share that. By God, he did."
His half-brother endured so much, Bruce Courson said, from the isolation of a whistle-blower, to suffering from the condition called cardiomyopathy that placed him on the heart-transplant list, to not only almost losing his own life but also losing his wife, Cathy, nearly five years ago.
In the past decade and a half he followed a path of nutrition, careful exercise and outdoor life to remove himself from the transplant list and the rolls of those receiving NFL disability payments. Even his services as a speaker about the hazards of steroids, mostly lectures to high schools and youth groups, was on a rapid rise.
Courson, author of "False Glory," apparently was working on another book, which friends and family plan to publish. Yesalis wants to plan a bike ride for charity, starting near Pittsburgh this summer.
As for his Labs, Rufus --injured when the tree fell -- had surgery on both dislocated hips yesterday in Pittsburgh. Rachel already was in the care of close friend, Barb Rodehaver of Farmington, who is set to adopt Rufus as well.
"That big dope, he looked at me [once] and, just as serious as he could be, said, 'Barb, I would die for Rufus and Ray-Ray,' " Rodehaver said. "And he did."
Her brother, Jud, was bringing a tree splitter to Courson's home at the time of the accident to help cut up the roughly 1-ton tree for firewood. He remembered Courson telling him barely two weeks ago how Rufus, 12, was too old and slow to join him on those tree-cutting expeditions.
"He called me the night before," Barb Rodehaver said. "He said, 'You should see Rufy. He's laying on my lap like he's never going to see me again.' "
Added girlfriend Dee Dee Masciola of Coraopolis, "The way he died was proof of the kind of man he was."
(Chuck Finder can be reached at cfinder@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1724.)
Few are heroes and fewer yet speak the truth. A long ago fan of the 70s Steelers in my teens, I later came re-assess my allegiance. Not only because of the taint of steroids but also because of their culture of bombast (surpassed in degrees only by the insufferable Cowboys?).
ReplyDeleteCourson was a rarity among men who toiled in our 'age of deception'- a truth teller of integrity. Though it has been almost a full four years since his tragic passing, it was good to read your take on both the import of his actions and the callous way in which the morally bankrupt NFL failed to honour this man's character. Thank you.