This is an iHeart Podcast. Hey, it's Bobby from the Bobby Bone Show. I had an incredible time at this year's iHeartRadio Music Festival and even got the chance to hang out with Diplo and Bailey Zimmerman while I was there. How did Ashes come together, Diplo? I pulled up real quick.
He was about to leave on tour. You're about to jump in your tour bus, and we had like three hours. It was really cool. He literally just like randomly showed up to my house. I'm like, oh, hey, Diplo, what are you doing?
He's like, I have a song that I want to show you. And I was like, okay. You can listen to the full episode out now wherever you get your podcast. And big shout out to my friends at Hyundai for making this possible. At a blast, cruising around the festival weekend in the all-new Palisade Hybrid.
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This is your seasonal reset. This is Lee Habib, and this is Our American Stories, the show where America is the star and the American people. The Burrelsworth Trophy is awarded every year to the most outstanding Division I college football player. He began his career as a walk-on. Previous recipients include Tampa Bays quarterback, Baker Mayfield, and Stetson Bennett of the L.A.
Rams. It's named after Brandon Burlsworth, a truly remarkable person on and off the field. Here to get us started with the story is Tommy Tice. Brandon's high school coach. Take it away, Tommy.
Brandon Burrowsworth is the best person I ever met in my life. My name is Tommy Tice. Then I was Brandon's high school coach. I first came in to meet Brandon when he was the seventh grader. And he entered our program and Started his journey from there through the high school.
And I remember being called. By the junior high coach at that time, a man named Inky Williams. And Inky wanted me to come look at this young man. He said, He's really going to be something special.
So I was paying a little bit closer attention to Brannon as he got to be a ninth grader because he's one step away from coming into our high school program. And I looked at him and Brown was a great kid. Certainly everybody was Proud the same. But I didn't see anything special. I kind of thought that Coach Williams might have been maybe imbibing in the spirits a little bit when he made that evaluation.
He was right. The thing that became very apparent to me about Brandon was you weren't going to run him off. He was going to be there every day. He was going to be early. He's going to be one of the last ones to leave.
Sometimes with tears in his eyes or maybe a bloody nose and sometimes maybe both. But he'd be back the next day. And that told you an awful lot about it because we constantly told our kids: if you stay, You'll play. Just stay. Just dig in tough, grit your teeth, and you know, it's all going to be okay.
Now his senior year he really blossomed into an outstanding player. But you know, when you're around kids Every day you don't notice them growing. you know. And by the time I think he came in his senior year, he was probably about six foot tall, maybe two hundred and fifteen, two hundred and twenty pounds. But that spring of his senior year, after going through the season, after he'd made All State, played in the high school All-Star game.
He was about 6'2. 235 pounds. and he was much, much stronger. Again, never took a day off. And one thing he did his senior year one of his goals, and he was a tremendous goal setter.
You know, we talk about goals, and we'd tell them that goals are only dreams unless you write them down and put them someplace in your room where you can see them every day. And he'd repeat that to me. And I know, and I never went in his room, but I know they were there somewhere.
So, one of his goals his senior year. was to beat me to work every morning. And I get there pretty early, about 6 o'clock every morning. And every morning, sometimes in the dark, Sitting by the door. was Brandon.
And every now and then. He didn't say a whole lot. But if I was late He might say, Sleep in today, coach? And I'd say, Burrowsworth, don't quit your day job. You're not that funny.
And so his senior year, we won the conference championship. And uh he was, like I said, an all-state player. He wanted to be a college player. And he continued to work, continued to work, and that spring he went to a couple of basically try out situations. at Henderson State University in Arkadelphia.
and at Arkansas Tech and Russellville. He comes back. First, I get a call from the coach at Arkadelphia. And he said, when did you become a liar? I said, I didn't know I'd ever quit.
Uh He said, Well, you told me this Burlsworth kid was this tall, this weight, this strong, this fast. He said, He's bigger, he's stronger, he's faster. You know? Are the Razorbacks not interested in him? Because we don't want to offer him if the Razorbacks are, you know, are interested.
I said, they're not interested.
So they were going to offer. Same thing from the coach at Arkansas Tech, Brooks Hollingsworth, at the time. And uh On Monday after he got back from those places, called him into the office and I was real excited. that he was going to get an opportunity to play college football. And I was telling him, I said, man, this is great.
You're going to get a chance to continue your career playing. You're going to help your mama out because I know that the financial situation, this is going to be a really big deal for you.
Well, quickly I figured out I'm the only guy in the room that's excited. He's not excited. He's sitting there and he's looking at the floor. And he looks up at me, and this is one thing that I learned about. Brandon and all kids.
Be careful what you say to em. because it may come back at you at any time. And he told me, he said, Coach, you told me and the rest of the team. It didn't matter what anybody else said. It only mattered what we thought.
And I'm going to go ahead and Oh I'm trapped. Coach I want to be a Razorback and I'm going to be a Razorback. What are you going to do? I had Danny Ford's number at the university and we knew each other. And I called him.
And I said, please take one more look at this kid. He's bigger, he's stronger, he's faster. He said, I'll have Harold Horton as head of recruiting at. I'll have Harold look at. I said, no, I don't want Harold look at.
Harold's already looked at him. He's already ruled him out. As a favor, I'd like for you to look at it. And after seeing the new statistics and new little tapes that we've done, some things have been running through ropes and stuff like this. He said, Tommy, we don't have any scholarships.
We'll make him a preferred walk-on. I said, well, what's a preferred walk-on? He said, Nothing, it just sounds good. You know, it's a walk-on situation. If anybody knows what a walk-on is, it's not a real good life.
You get the hand-me-down equipment. You may get a few reps, but you ain't going to get much, and you'll be a. tackling dummy and you know and you're already told from the beginning you're not good enough. And the coaches are not really wanting you because if you come and you make it, it makes them look bad because they didn't recruit you in the first place. And you've been listening to Tommy Tice.
The thing that became apparent about Brandon You couldn't run him off. He wanted to be a Razorback, that is of course an Arkansas Razorback in the SEC. They don't have scholarships, he was told. That did not deter. Brandon.
More of this remarkable story. The story of Brandon Burlesworth. Here on Our American Story. Lee Habib here, and I'd like to encourage you to subscribe to Our American Stories on Apple Podcasts, the iHeartRadio app, Spotify. Or wherever you get our podcasts, any story you missed will be.
or want to hear again can be found there daily. Again, Please subscribe to the Our American Stories podcast on Apple Podcasts, the iHeartRadio app, or anywhere you get your podcasts. It helps us keep these great American stories coming. And we continue with our American stories and the story of Brandon Burlesworth. When we last left off, Brandon's high school coach, Tommy Tice, was telling us about Brandon's career leading up to receiving preferred walk-on status.
at the University of Arkansas. Here to tell us now about the start of Brandon's life is his brother Marty. and Marty's wife Vicki. Take it away, Marty.
Now when Brandon was born, you'll live ten up. really strange for me. I'm 15 at the time, would turn 16 in a couple of months, but having a baby. in the house. Wow.
You know, 15 year old, I'm trying to be cool. you know I don't know what to do with this. He's not going with me. I'm not taking him anywhere. That's not cool.
I'm not hanging out with a two-year-old or whatever, a three-year-old. It was fun. When he got a little bit older, when he, you know, got out of the baby, baby stage, and I could mess with him, have him do silly things and play uh pretend baseball in the living room and have them sliding headfirst on the carpet and All kinds of things like that. It was uh You know, it was a lot it was a lot of fun. But uh You know, as a kid.
Eight or nine, ten years old, there was no indication that you were looking at a future all-American and an NFL player. Nothing. just the same as everybody else. Trying to figure it out. Just a normal Yeah.
Love sports. He shouldn't have any choice because he's going to be with me. We're going to be balling in some way, whether it's football, basketball, baseball, really into baseball. But you know, he was just like everybody else. Love to play ball.
I coach baseball, junior high age. Brandon was eight or nine years old, ten years old. He wanted to come out and be at practice, so I'd always bring him to baseball practice. With my team, the main reason why he just shag balls and just helped me out. And he wasn't very good.
He just wasn't naturally gifted and certainly didn't show it at that age. But uh I knew that we were going to run sprints at the end of practice. And he was kind of chunky. Always felt like he was kind of chunky. Always felt like you, hey man, you need to get after here.
He is, you know, you look back on it, you say, the kids. nine or ten years old and you're trying to make him Act like he's sixteen or seventeen, you know, but He'd run sprints with us and always did. But I'm trying to get some of that weight off of them. And it wasn't like his own healthy, you know. fat kid.
It wasn't just kind of chunky. And he'd like to lay around, watch that TV. He wore out a Star Wars VHS. I don't know how many times I'd come over to the house. He's watching that again.
But when he got older, he got 13 years old.
Now he's old enough to be in our league, on our team. And so he was playing on my team. And I, at that time, told him: all right, here's the deal: there's rules in the league. And I'm saying it much more formal than he and I talked about it, but rules in the league. Everybody bats once, regardless of how good or bad you are.
Everybody. Babs at least once during a game and place two innings in the field. That's the rules. That does not apply to you. Because this is family.
If I want to bench and not play at all. That's what I'm going to do. And the only reason I said that is we're going to set a goal. I want you to lose two pounds every week. You lose those two pounds, or the devil's on play.
He lost those two pounds every week. All season long. Never failed. Put him on the scales. People are so stupid.
The Burlsworth family is a very small family. There was very few of us. And so we were together all the time. And so Brandon lived with his mom. Dad was not around that much, an alcoholic.
He had kind of battled it, had gotten control of it. But he still wasn't in the picture much. You know, we loved him and tried to keep him around as much. But that's why he and Marty, I think. Developed such a bond.
Brandon and Marty were together a lot. Whatever we were doing, we would take him with us. you know, mom was working or Brandon just want to be with us. He really looked up to Marty. A lot of people would say that Marty was the father figure, and we don't like saying that because he d had a dad.
That had some issues, but was still the dad, but they were just really, really tight brothers. And I didn't, I wasn't very fond of being called. Dad. I said, oh, your boy's played a good game. It's not my son.
And that happened a lot. Even happened. Senior year in high school. Which was strange. It happened last week.
Yeah, I did, didn't it? Happened a lot and it's still happening.
Now it makes a little more sense, maybe, you know, as years go by, but when we're. when we've got like a two-year-old or and and I'm being Congratulated on my son. Who's my brother? You know, I wasn't crazy about that. Finally, just like, Fine.
Whatever. They weren't really, really close. It was just a tight bond, the whole family. We called ourselves the inner circle. because we just all knew that we had each other's back and that whatever happened, it it always seemed to be the same little core people anyway.
He was fun to be around.
Now, he wouldn't talk much. If he wanted to start something, he'd get Marty to start it, not him. Tremendous attitude. Everything was yes, sir. No, sir.
If you wanted any more words out of his mouth, you're going to have to drag him out most of the time. But he wasn't holding it in now. He set a really good example. Most of the things that Brandon did, Marty and I found out after the accident. One of my favorite stories.
is humbleness, okay? Brandon Get so silly gosh awful looking glasses. And he's at the house one day. And while he was playing, I said, What are you doing getting those glasses? You look like Drew Carey, you know?
And she said, Oh, coach, I just feel good on my head. I said, really? I said, let me look at them.
Well, we talked a little bit about his goal setting.
Okay?
So one of his goals a senior year was to be All-American. If you look at the nose piece, Right here in the middle, it's etched. All-American. He kept it right in front of his eyes the whole time he was practicing and playing. And I said, I know why you got those glasses.
You did it to get publicity. Oh, no, Coach. Oh, no, no, that's no, I wouldn't do that. I don't you know me, I don't want to draw attention to myself. I won't do that.
That's when I figured it out. Right there it was. I tossed them back to him. I said, I understand where this is at. That's the way it was.
One of my favorite stories about Brennan in his college years, and we didn't know this until after the accident passed away. But a couple of the riserbacks called. at work they were telling us that they had been gone to his room And Brandon was in his room studying, which he did. He was, you know, as well as a great football player, he was a great. Scholar, but he was recopying his notes, which he did all the time.
His writing was tiny. But Very pretty riding. He just had But he was so he from the day's notes he was recopying them. And the Razorbacks said Pearls How do you do it? You're a great athlete, great scholar, you're just a good person.
What are you doing? What's your secret? And they said Brandon never looked up that he reached his hand up, grab his Bible, from a shelf that's there. pointed it at him. Didn't say a word, put it back on his shelf, and went on.
Never said a word, but he said everything. And that M Marty and I are both driven, hard-driven people. We want Brandon's story to be known everywhere. But Brandon had it figured out. He knew where his success was.
And what had gotten him there? He ended my playing career. In my days as a coach, every now and then I would ask for a helmet from one of the younger kids. Show them how to perform a technique.
So I was going to show this sophomore how to perform this defensive line technique where he would engage a blocker and then get off a blocker and make a tackle.
So give me that helmet. I put that helmet on. And I turn around and look and He was in front of the line. And usually I'd perform these techniques on sophomores. and they would always let me win.
So I knew There wasn't any way to get out of this, you know, and I'm thinking, well yeah, Brandon will probably, you know, he'll probably take it easy on me. Uh no. When we came together, bells are ringing and birds are singing. And I knew I had to get up. And I got up.
Ripped that helmet off, threw it to that young man. I got it from him. I turned to Burroughsworth and I said, Now, don't you ever make me have to show you how to do that again. And I went off and said, okay, everybody, get a drink. And oh man, you know, one assistant comes over and says, You all right?
Yeah, I'm good. After practice, to Brandon's credit, he did come by and check on me. But He put me, he put, that was the end of my player career. Never did that again.
So it was a good thing. My wife was tickled to hear it, but I wouldn't play it anymore. And you're listening to Brandon Burlsworth's brother Marty. and Marty's wife Vicki. Talk about the young Brandon and how he matured.
and Marty ended up being sort of a dad-like or father-like figure. I didn't like being called that. But there was adversity. In young Brandon's life, adversity he overcame. when we come back more of the remarkable story of Brandon Burlesworth.
Here on Our American Stories. And we continue with our American stories and the story of Brandon Burlesworth. Telling the story is Brandon's high school coach, Tommy Tice. and Brandon's older brother and his wife, Marty and Vicky Burlesworth. Let's continue with the story.
Here again is Marty. Every boy growing up, myself included. Or be a Razorback.
Now that'd be like saying Uh Oh, they can't city chiefs.
Well, this is how it happened, like Coach Tyson was saying. He had scholarship offers from some smaller schools. That Well, I wanted him. You know, the smaller schools I learned, the Vision I school, you get a scholarship. It's covered.
The smaller, well called division. There's very few full scholarships. They're partial scholarships. We had a coach, he'd call me back, hey. I got him books.
Oh, that's good, Coach. back a week or so later, I got it. Finally he had a complete full ride for divisions. A friend of mine said Call Harold Horton. at the university.
That's what we call it here, the university. In this state, you say the university. No one says uh Arkansas. the university, that's all you need to know.
So we call up I call Harold Horton, the recruiting coordinator. They didn't call us, but I called him. Coach Orton says, yeah, come on over for the game.
So we came over for a recruiting visit with all the other players that were in that probably didn't call. They call them. And I can remember being in the north end zone patio area. That's all been torn down and rebuilt now, but there was a patio area that looked down on the field right where the players come out. standing there with Brandon, we're looking down the offensive lineman come out for Arkansas.
I'm looking down at them, looking at him. And you can tell he's like. This is it.
So what do you take? You just mm-hmm. That's big words there for Brandon. It's a lot of talk.
So when these other schools were calling and saying, we've got him books, we've got him, you know, I knew that. Probably not going to happen. Because he wanted to be a Razorback.
So continued over the Winter we go back over for visits during basketball season. Coach Horton started to warm up a little bit. Term Yeah, you know, I'm cracking how many scholarships are still available.
So Brandon and I were going over to a basketball game. Coach Orton told us where to find him.
So, Brandon, I said, okay, this is what we're going to do. I said, we get over there. I want you to stand as tall as you can. you know, stand close to him and stand up good and tall. He said, okay, so we had to, you know, we planned this out.
So brand is standard, I'd love to see a video of that because it'd have to be. And I'm talking to Coach Horton, Brandon's standing right beside him. Because I've been telling him, he's still growing, he's still growing, he's just 17 years old. Coach Wharton looks up at Brandon, looks at me, said, Well, he is growing, isn't he? Yeah, he is coach.
He's still growing.
So we're trying to, we're still working it.
So things like that on and on over the months. Talks to Coach Orton one time, we're getting right down to the wire. Can we get a scholarship coach? We're just not gonna I don't think we're gonna be able to do that and I said, Coach, what he wants is to have his name announced at graduation, walk across that stage. With an athletic scholarship to the University of Arkansas.
He said, Well, it's pride. It's pride, isn't it? I said, Yeah, pride in a good way. He said, No good way. And that's the time that he said those.
words out there forget. I own the phone comes short and says, well, we're going to make this work. I've talked to some coaches at these other schools that he's going to pass on. But when he gets here, If it doesn't work, he'll be able to go to those. But when he gets here, We'll know.
and he'll know. Pasero. Yeah, but uh He's not going down. Which you know to the lower level he said When he gets a real no, he repeats it. And he'll know.
That's a coach. Listen. He's not going down. They said.
Alright. That's it. He'll show you. And he did. A welcome.
That's not enough. I remember calling after that first year. January after that first season, which he was just scout team. Red shirt. He dressed for a couple of games, which is cool for us.
I took pictures of him with his. Jersey on with his name on the back. I'm like, done. That's awesome. Hey, man, I've got this for your kids one day.
You can show them this. Nope, that ain't enough.
Now I didn't think it was either, but if that would have been me, yeah, I'm probably pretty happy right now, you know, if I don't get a play, okay. I've made the team, I've got a locker, I've got my name on the back of the Razorback jersey. This is forever. But that just wasn't enough for him, nor should it have been. And so he just kept working toward that.
And he showed up over at the university in August. For two a days, and they still were at that time two a days, about 300 pounds, even over some, you know, it's been exaggerated in places, but anyways, way too heavy. And August in Arkansas on the elder astroturf. It was borderline dangerous for him. His face was so red.
But, you know, he's not going to quit. He's going to keep going. But they took all that weight off of him. pretty quickly because they saw the person ahead. Better yet the personality ahead.
That this guy's going to get it done, that he's not going to quit, that he's going to go hard every day. and the coaches stayed around after practice to work with him. And then he got Coach Bender and it was all great from there. Did I think he was ever going to play? No.
but I knew he would be there. when he was a junior. You know, they played in Fedville, played Auburn, and they lost. and I'd never been to the dressing room before. But I felt like I had to go that day.
I knew that he would be terribly upset. Of course, by this time, he's on scholarship, and he's already been all-SEC academic, you know, at this time. And he makes all SEC two years, and then he goes on to All-American. The last game he played, was in a citrus bowl. against Tom Brady.
Michigan. He gets drafted 63rd by the Colts. I mean, this is all. This is unbelievable. I mean, that's why people look, they see the movie and say, well, that couldn't be that way.
Well There was that one.
So I go to that dressing room. I asked where Brandon's locker was and they Told me where it was. I turned the corner and I see him sitting in his locker. He's got blood dripping off the end of his nose. He's real sweaty, he's real muddy.
because it rained that day. He sees me in true Burlsworth style. He jumps to his feet. Comes right at me. We throw our arms around each other and I look at him and I say, Brandon, Have I told you I loved you lately?
And he said, No, Coach, you haven't, but I sure could use it today. And I said, well, Brandon, I love you. We embraced one more time and I left. Being a razorback is such a big deal. In this state, We have no pro teams.
I don't think they could compete really with Ragebacks. There's no second place. to be in a a razorback. And uh I think Brandon had the confidence. I had the confidence in him too, even though sometimes it's portrayed that I was surprised.
I wasn't surprised. You talk about instant celebrity. Oh my goodness. You know, here in town, in Harrison, you know, he'd come back into town, you know, we go to Walmart or something, you know. And never did he ever Vic never did he say to me, I don't want to go.
He was kind of shy, obviously. But he never tried to not go somewhere in case somebody would see him. He would yeah, we go to the Wall Martyr. The ball fields, or a football game, or a baseball game, or our kids' little league game, our oldest little league game. Uh He just acted like he was one of one of the normal people.
He just sit there in the bleachers. And what a story you're hearing here about Brandon Burlsworth. My goodness, he goes from walk on. to second year scholarship and starter. That's crazy in the SEC, which is a semi-professional football league.
He's all SEC in 97 and 98. And in 98 he's also all-American. That's just an unbelievable progression. An all-American was inscribed on those thick glasses.
Now we know why he wore them. when we come back. More of the remarkable story of Brandon Burlsworth here. on Our American Stories. And we continue with our American stories in the final portion of our story of Brandon Burlesworth.
Telling the story is Brandon's high school coach, Tommy Tice. And Brandon's older brother and his wife, Marty, and Vicki Burlsworth. Let's continue with this story. Here again. is Brandon's brother Marty.
His senior year. We started getting calls from agents. Which I thought was really neat. I interviewed a lot of agents, and after a while, a lot of them flew into Harrison, I mean, from Pittsburgh and Canada. California and I mean pretty big time agents.
And he and I talked about it and he said, why don't we do it ourselves? I've not learned anything from them that's not basically business 101. And I've been in business for a long time. If you want to do that, so. I went through about a year-long process and became NFL certified, which was not easy.
One thing they have to accept you. And I think most of them are probably...
Well, not most, but at least half of them are probably attorneys, you know. People like that. I'm a photographer, you know, a studio photographer.
So I didn't know if I'd even get a shot at it, but. They took our money, so our money is as good as anybody else's, I guess the way I look at it. Got a phone call from Indianapolis. You know, tell me I was the newest member of the Indianapolis Colts. He laughs like the rest of us at the Drew Carey comparisons.
He prefers the ones the Colts use. The scouting reports all say Like Steve McKinney, like Steve McKinney.
So if you can get another like that, where we'll have you, we'll take all of the Steve McKinneys we can get. A lot of people say good things like that, and that's all good, you know, but you've got to prove yourself still, and that's the way I look at it. The way the Colts look at it is that Burlsworth is assumed to be starter. Peyton Manning, their quarterback, needs protection, the kind Burlsworth provided for quarterback Clint Stirner at Arkansas. Earlsworth says it'll happen in time.
I talked to the offensive line coach, and he told me that they definitely expect me to play right away. And I think that. They expect me to start at some point, and I think it's something that I'll have to work into through training camp.
Well, we were really focusing, like you say, on a defensive guy in that third-round pick. But Burlesworth was an offensive lineman who we had rated higher than any of the defensive players that we had up there. Our scouts liked him, our coaches liked him, and he graded out real high at the Indy Combine.
So we just felt like he was somebody that we couldn't pass up at that point. What kinds of things does he do? I mean, he didn't allow the sack in the last couple of years, yeah, like that.
Well, he's very athletic. You know, he's got good feet, he's got good skills, you know, athletic skills for a big man. He's 300 and something, 308, 309 pounds. Strong, had one of the best scores as far as the lifting the weights at the combine and all the other little skill tests that they did. He graded out very highly.
Great work ethic, smart, good kid, you know. Football's important to him, all those things. He's already got his master's degree.
So he's an impressive young man. And he looks like Drew Carey too, huh? I know, I know, I know that.
Well, we'll fast forward a little bit. To the day of the wreck.
Okay.
So I'm in Fedville. Send some friends and stopped by the university to see Dean Weber and Coach Houston Nutt at that time. They were going to have they wanted me to stay over For a big uh Championship celebration they were having for winning the West of the SEC, the ring ceremony. I couldn't do it, I had to get back home.
So I had left and done a couple other things before I took off. I got There's a little town out here called Carrollton. And back. I came up on a long line of cars setting still. And I'm in this line of cars.
I'm sitting right beside Fultz's Dairy, which is about a mile back from where the wreck took place. And I uh was sitting there in the car and I think thoughts are going through my head about we had our upcoming banquet, uh sports banquet, and I knew you know Brandon made All American. I thought, well, how can I utilize him as part of this? you know, this celebration for us because I knew they were celebrating in Fedville.
Well I was there an hour. before they got The scene cleared, turned out it was a wreck. came by did not recognize the car. And I get home. And our principal at the time was a man named Danny Gilbert.
And Danny called me and said, Burlsworth has died. And I said How? And he said, I said, I just left him in Fedville not an hour ago. He said, He's died in a car wreck. And then the light comes on.
You are just there. And he said, I said How did it happen? He said, I don't know how it happened, but think about it. It's Wednesday. He's on his way home.
Take his mama to church. as he did on every Wednesday night, or they met at a roadside park on Wednesday and had devotionals and things like that. And so that was important to Brandon. And he had left the ceremony early. Family was That was really, really important.
So that night when I got home, I would got off the phone. My wife's sitting there and I'm I'm upset. teared up and Things of this nature. I said, I can't. She said, You've got to go to that house.
I said, I cannot go. to that house. I said, I can't do that. She said, you have to do it.
So I went and I've never been involved in a scene like that before in my life. And uh Uh it was just so sad. And of course gloom came over the entire state of Arkansas. especially Harrison. Everybody knew Brandon.
Everybody knew the story. And So when uh when the media people Came into Harrison. There were a lot of them. And uh Marty asked me to... talk with them.
And uh so we gathered them all in a room at the high at the high school. And uh no high school at the junior high at that time. at the junior high. And uh got him in a room and I told him, I said, uh I know you've come to cover this story. I know that some of you will not are probably not believing the things you've heard about this young man.
I said, but here's the deal. The family. want you to look. everywhere you want to look. Everything will be an open book for you.
Ask questions you want to ask. Go see what you want to see. and see if you can find anything. that what's been told is not true. They couldn't find anything.
And so Then I spoke at the funeral. That was probably Uh one of the hardest things I've done in my lifetime. He's been gone longer than we had him. See, my memories are not like that. I think of what our boys have done over the years, like the Little League.
I mean He wasn't even here then when they were He was here 22 years, but an hour, in my mind, He's still 22. I mean, we we see him The photographs that we do every day, we talk about him every day, we share him with people, and he just. Once in a while it'll hit Mari and I. He's gone. you know, you know, you just and that and that horrible grief that we had when we found out the accident in that first year.
We were just Walking in mud, and we decided that we were either going to sink or swim because this was absolutely taking our family down. And we just knew that the Lord could take something. Horrible and make something good. You know, Marty and I say all the time: if you took the faith, Out of Brandon's story, there's no story. Because it was absolutely based on everything, and our foundation has been the same way.
You know, I love. talking about Brad. I love talking about Marty and Vicki. I remember You know, and so we're going to put this foundation together. You know, we're going to do this.
In fact, our football camps, he and I talked about. doing those. having kids at NFL games. And it was NFL games after his accident. I talked to Coach Burles actually at the...
What would have been Brandon's first game? We were the owners. box and uh First thing we're going to do, we're going to have a football camp. you're going to run it and I'm going I said, really? Yeah.
I said, really? Yeah, if mama says you go, okay. Ms. Burrowsworth says that I'm doing it. And uh So I'm here in the first camp we had, it was awful, it was hot, it just rained, and we had hundreds of kids out there.
And oh my gosh, and we did some stuff, we've got it.
now where it's a fine tuned machine. But that first one Yeah, in what way? Oh my gosh. You know, but those kids that come to those camps, You know Of course, they come to see those Razorbacks, and they always come back. been done before.
I don't know if anyone else has ever done it. having Similar to NFL where you have kids attend a game. that wouldn't have that opportunity. You know, they just keep coming back. You know.
Because of Brandon. When we say, why does it matter? I've got my one simple answer is selfishly, and I'll just admit it. I don't want it forgotten. Epper.
Ever. And to this day, it hurts my feelings. If someone in Wyoming or Nebraska doesn't know them. about you. I don't know who that is.
I don't want that. bed. I gotta fix that.
So that's what we're That's why we live it. I mean, that's not why we live it. That's my internal motivation. And what a story you just heard. And my goodness, the role Faith played in his life it was a quiet faith, but it was there.
It was the peril of his life. And indeed. He left that championship ring ceremony earlier, and it's a big deal to win the Western Division of the SEC. to take his mom to church. And in route.
Well that's how he died. The story of Brandon Brollsworth here. on our American stories. Hey, what's up, it's Mario Lopez. Back to schools, an exciting time, but it can also be overwhelming and kids may feel isolated, a vulnerability that human traffickers can exploit.
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