NFL’s Titans say ‘thank you’ to Fort Campbell troops
FORT CAMPBELL, Ky. (AP) — Tennessee Titans kicker Joe Nedney thinks he was on the wrong side of the table Thursday when he spent 75 minutes signing autographs for soldiers and relatives at Fort Campbell.
“They should be the ones behind the table, and I should be the one getting their autographs,” he said.
Nedney was among seven Titans making what’s become an annual visit by the NFL team to the post that straddles the Kentucky-Tennessee border.
“You feel a lot less important when you step into an area like this and realize who the true warriors are,” said Nedney, the son of a U.S. Navy veteran.
Nedney had been here in 2002, but this trip was more poignant because former teammate Pat Tillman, who left the Arizona Cardinals to become an Army Ranger, died in Afghanistan last week.
The kicker, whose younger brother played with Tillman in high school, knows the soldier’s family. He called Tillman’s death a painful loss.
“If you knew Pat, you knew that football wasn’t his calling. He was looking for something a little bit more meaningful to do in life,” Nedney said. “He died doing what he wanted to be doing, which was protecting the country.”
Chief Warrant Officer Scott Loose was among those who stood in line for autographs. He said he took time away from work so he could be with his 11-year-old son Scotty, who clutched a brand-new football with the Titans’ logo.
“You miss a lot of the little things like this, the little things he really enjoys,” Loose said of his military intelligence career.
Loose became a Titans fan when based at Fort Campbell nearly three years ago. He was on duty in Iraq in January but kept tabs on the team’s 17-14 playoff loss to New England by sneaking peeks at a television in the mess hall.
“Each person has a favorite team, and there was a Titans’ group and a Patriots’ group. We went back and forth talking football. We followed it real closely for a taste of home,” Loose said.
Staff Sgt. Colin Brelsford missed the Titans’ last two visits because he was deployed to Afghanistan for eight months and Iraq for a year to keep Chinook helicopters working.
He tracked the Titans on the Internet and satellite television whenever possible.
“It’s something I look forward to. I enjoy it even if for a minute, even if it’s in a different setting,” he said. “It makes you wish you were back here.”
When the Titans visited last year, about 20,000 soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division had been deployed to Iraq. The last planeload returned home in March, and six offensive linemen ate lunch Thursday with the Third Brigade and watched some of the division’s training, including a visit at the Air Assault School.
Right tackle Fred Miller also took advantage of the visit to announce a $250,000 grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that will expand his “Nurses for Newborns” program to the post. Nurses are sent into homes to help prevent neglect and abuse by teaching better parenting skills.
The Titans didn’t leave empty-handed. Many soldiers shared mementoes with them including an American flag patch given to Nedney, which he promised to store in a special place.
“This is a story I’ll tell my children, that I got to visit these people during this tense time,” he said. “It’s nice to see some of them back, and hopefully soon we’ll have them all back.”