NYT : Service for Ex-N.F.L. Player Killed in Combat

Service for Ex-N.F.L. Player Killed in Combat

By NICK MADIGAN | May 4, 2004

SAN JOSE, Calif., May 3 — Led by the wails of bagpipes, hundreds of friends, relatives and admirers of Pat Tillman, the football player turned war hero, gathered on Monday in a sun-drenched park in his hometown to hail his life and mourn his death last month in a firefight in Afghanistan.

In a long afternoon of remembrances, there seemed barely enough time to say it all.

As they streamed into the San Jose Municipal Garden, the mourners signed messages of condolence on long white sheets of paper: "God bless a true American." "My fellow soldier, you have joined the ranks of history." "You make all athletes remember that there is more to life than just sports."

Corporal Tillman, who died on April 22 while serving in the Army Rangers, had startled some of his friends here by giving up a lucrative career with the Arizona Cardinals in 2002 and signing up for military service. His first tour of duty overseas took him to Iraq, the second to Afghanistan.

"He had everything going for him," said Charles Ward, a former Marine sergeant who served two tours in Vietnam and came by to pay his respects. "That's what a lot of people strive for, the big bucks, but he said: `I don't need it. I'm going to do what I need to do.' It takes a certain kind of person to just drop everything like that."

Placed in a semicircle under a stand of towering redwoods, enlarged photographs showed moments of Corporal Tillman's life — as a red-shirted football player, in Army fatigues, on his wedding day — and he was smiling in every one. Speaker after speaker recalled his sense of humor, which sometimes involved donning pink slippers, a Christmas sweater and a kimono and acting as though it were the most normal thing in the world.

Corporal Tillman's parents, Pat Sr., as he is known, and Danni, his brothers, Kevin and Richard, and his widow, Marie, his high-school sweetheart, sat in the front row. Behind them, the crowd swelled to 2,000 or more.

Jim Rome, a syndicated radio host who had followed Corporal Tillman's career since the young man's early days as a player at Arizona State University, told the audience that he could not wait to sit down with his 3-year-old son, Jake, when he is older "and tell him about Pat."

"Pat is the man I want to be," Mr. Rome said. "Pat is the man we all want to be."

Maria Shriver, the wife of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, read a letter from the governor, who said he wished he could have attended the ceremony but was in Germany visiting an American military hospital.

"Pat was one of California's golden sons," Ms. Shriver read. "I've been told Pat admired me. Well, let me tell you, it's the other way around."

Ms. Shriver invoked her uncle, President John F. Kennedy, and his inaugural speech 43 years ago, in which he advised Americans, "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." She said Corporal Tillman and his brother Kevin, who is also in the Rangers, "have lived those words."

Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, said that he had not known Mr. Tillman and that he was "poorer for it."

"He loved his country and the values that make us exceptional, and good," said Mr. McCain, who served in Vietnam.

At Arizona State, where Mr. Tillman joined the football team in 1994, he was known as Braveheart, a 200-pound, 5-foot 11-inch linebacker who gained renown as a determined underdog. He received a degree in marketing, graduating summa cum laude in three and a half years.

In 1998, he joined the Cardinals. Approached by the St. Louis Rams in 2001 with a five-year, $9 million offer, Mr. Tillman turned it down, out of what by all accounts was a sense of loyalty to the Cardinals.

Nine months after the Sept. 11 attacks, however, Mr. Tillman walked into the office of his coach, Dave McGinnis, and told him he had decided to join his brother Kevin in the Army. A higher duty called, he told Mr. McGinnis, according to accounts published at the time. By donning a military uniform, Mr. Tillman walked away from a three-year, $3.6 million contract with the Cardinals.

After Corporal Tillman's death, an Army spokesman announced that he would be given the Silver Star, the third-highest award for valor.

The Army also released details of the firefight that took his life. The Army said that he and his platoon were not initially in danger, but that he had ordered his men out of their vehicles to confront small-arms and mortar fire that had pinned down the rear of their convoy.

Corporal Tillman, 27, led his team members up a hill and directed them into firing positions. "Tillman's voice was heard issuing commands to take the fight to the enemy forces," the Army said.

Near the crest of the hill, he was shot while firing his automatic rifle. His actions, the Army statement said, helped the trapped soldiers emerge from their positions "without taking a single casualty." Mr. Tillman protected his team "without regard to his own safety," the Army said. Two American soldiers were wounded and an Afghan soldier was killed.

The firefight occurred near Sperah, a village 26 miles southwest of Khost, during a spring offensive intended to eliminate remnants of the Taliban and Al Qaeda.