The following appeared in the March 4, 2007 edition of The Dallas Morning News
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Anyone who has ever met Ron Springs would know how he went into kidney transplant surgery Wednesday morning. He went in talking. Loudly. Even while lying on a gurney, the mayor of the Cowboys locker room's "Ghetto Row" in the early 1980s could be heard up and down the third-floor surgery corridor at Medical City Dallas Hospital.
As the gurney came to a halt in front of the double doors leading to the operating room, well-wishers huddled around. Mr. Springs leaned left toward his son Shawn, a second-generation NFL player, and instructed, "If anything happens to me, you hold down the fort." His voice still booming, Mr. Springs turned to the right and proceeded to lecture Shreill Walls, whose husband, Everson, was already on an operating table having a healthy kidney removed to be implanted in Mr. Springs' sickly body. "Don't cry too much for me," he said, mocking the friend whom he had never seen shed a tear. Finally, Mr. Springs turned to Ouida Walls, Everson's 72-year-old mother steadied by a walking cane and unnerved by the sacrifice being made by the 47-year-old son whom she still refers to as "my baby." In a voice that could only pass as a whisper in his high-decibel world, Mr. Springs offered a special tribute. "I want to thank you for having that son," he said solemnly. "If you didn't have that son, I'd be in trouble." Goose bumps filled the corridor. But that's not how Mr. Springs ever leaves a room. He offered a joke that would leave them laughing. And off the gurney went to deliver a 50-year-old diabetic with failing kidneys to a better life, courtesy of Mr. Walls, whom Mr. Springs once mentored with the Cowboys and who had graduated into a dear friend. Much to the chagrin of Mr. Springs and Mr. Walls, the transplant had been heralded and anticipated by the national media since it was inadvertently leaked in December. ESPN made the story a SportsCenter staple during the NFL playoffs. CBS focused on it during its Super Bowl pregame show. Still, the men were determined to have whatever privacy they could muster. Advertising that the surgery would come in March, they slipped into Medical City in the early-morning darkness on the final day of February. No blinding lights, no cacophony of camera clicks and no inquiring minds met their separate arrivals from their Plano homes. Only friends, relatives and a minister whiled away the waiting room hours during the transplant. "This is so unbelievable," Washington Redskins cornerback Shawn Springs said while his father and "uncle" were in surgery. "You have teammates, and you have family. But those two teammates - they are real family." The transplant, the first time a former U.S. professional athlete has donated an organ to an ex-teammate, went off without a hitch. "A perfect kidney," Dr. Ronald Aranoff, a member of the transplant team, told anxious family members who gathered around him after almost five hours of surgery. "Praise God," whispered Shreill Walls, whose husband donated it. "Amen," responded Adriane Springs, whose husband now owned it. 'Never wavered' Anyone who has ever met Everson Walls would know how he approached the idea of donating his kidney. Full bore. "He never wavered," Ms. Walls said. Two days before the transplant, Mr. Walls and Mr. Springs visited the hospital for a final walkthrough. Dr. Aranoff asked Mr. Walls if he had any questions. "What happens," Mr. Walls asked, "if you take my kidney and Ron can't accept it? Will you put it back in me?" The doctor assured Mr. Walls that his kidney would not be removed until Mr. Springs was deemed healthy enough to receive it. "Any more questions?" the doctor asked. Throughout the three-month process, it seemed that's how every conversation with every doctor ended. Mr. Walls was tired of those words. The doctors incessantly assured him that he could walk away at any time. Standard procedure in transplant cases, they assured him. He always had a way out despite complications from all the publicity. Most donors don't have their potential sacrifice advertised in the media. If Mr. Walls decided he didn't want to donate, the doctors told him repeatedly, they would supply a medical excuse for public consumption. Dr. Richard Dickerman, who headed the transplant team, pulled Mr. Walls aside Monday and offered him a last chance to withdraw. Dr. Dickerman said it was unusual to make such an offer so close to surgery, but he felt compelled to "as a matter of ethical responsibility." Dr. Dickerman made his admiration for Mr. Walls known to his family just before the doctor entered the operating room. " Everson is the real hero here," he said, words he would use again at a crowded news conference two days after the surgery. In his mind, Mr. Walls believed the doctors were challenging his resolve, as he believed so many coaches had in the past. How could he convince them that he hadn't had a single regret since the autumn day he decided to donate his kidney? After learning that two of Mr. Springs' relatives who considered donating were unable to make the sacrifice, Mr. Walls decided he would try. He first dropped the notion into dinner conversation at home. "You are?" Ms. Walls said without skipping a beat when her husband broached the subject. "What's it going to hurt?" he replied. Several weeks and tests later, Ms. Walls asked, "Are you a match?" "Yeah," her husband said matter of factly. "I'm going to do it. What do you think?" "Go for it," she said. End of a remarkably short conversation about such a serious topic. Consider, however, that the Walls and Springs families long ago bonded into one. What began as a locker room friendship between the husbands grew into a foursome after the wives met. When the Wallses' children came along - Charis, now 22, and Cameron, 18 - as well as the Springses' - Ayra, 21, and Ashley, 18 - the family ties grew stronger. It was always understood that should anything happen to one set of parents, the other would take care of all the children. Shawn, Mr. Springs' son from a previous marriage, wore Mr. Walls' No. 24 and learned many tricks of the cornerback trade in backyard practices. Still, nothing is quite that simple. Over the ensuing months, Mr. Walls contemplated his decision about the transplant. Why would Mr. Springs refuse to allow any of his children to be tested to learn if they might be eligible donors, especially Shawn, the muscular 31-year-old pro footballplayer? Had other former Cowboys teammates, who once shared space on Ghetto Row, actually been tested as they said they would? What if his own daughter or son someday needed a transplant, and he had no kidney to donate? And, worst of all, what if Mr. Springs' body rejected the kidney? He kept those concerns mostly to himself. "When I make up my mind to do something, I do it," Mr. Walls said. "I am very stubborn. It's my best trait." Mr. Walls played 13 NFL seasons without meeting the business end of a surgeon's scalpel or spending a night in a hospital. He was a bit shaken by all the vials of blood taken from him before Monday's walkthrough. Instead of the usual one or two, he watched as his type O-positive filled "six or seven" vials. Asked later in the day if he might finally be getting nervous, Mr. Walls never hesitated. "Nervous?" he repeated. "Not nervous. I'm giddy. I'm ready. We're all ready. Ron has waited so long." Besides, the blood tests and the other tests barely bothered him compared with the questions he had to answer in a battery of psychological tests. Mr. Walls was stopped cold when asked if he ever thought about killing himself. He put down his pencil and swore under his breath at Mr. Springs. "I'm thinking," Mr. Walls recalled, "this mother better appreciate what I am going through for him." Out to prove himself Everson Walls was born and raised in Dallas' Hamilton Park neighborhood, not far from the Cowboys' old, rickety training facility on Forest Lane. He hardly thought joining the Cowboys was an honor. After all, he went ignored in the 1981 NFL draft. His 4.65-second speed in the 40-yard dash was deemed too slow for an NFL cornerback. He suffered the indignity of having to sign as a free agent despite leading the nation in interceptions at Grambling State, known for producing exceptional pro players. His signing bonus was $1,500. His salary, if he made the team, $30,000. If there was one solace, it was that he could save money by living at home with his mother. And he didn't have to worry about supporting an extravagant lifestyle. His girlfriend, Shreill, who also grew up in Hamilton Park, had been with him since their senior year at Richardson Berkner High School. Instead of working out with the other players, an angry Mr. Walls devised his own training regimen that favored basketball and tennis over weightlifting and running. When he did socialize, it was to commiserate with fellow free agents inside the tight quarters of the locker room, where Mr. Springs' barking voice always seemed to hold court. Most of the black players in those days had lockers along what they called Ghetto Row. It was home to the likes of Harvey Martin, Ed Jones, Robert Newhouse, Benny Barnes and Tony Dorsett - veterans who had little inclination to invest time in free-agent rookies not likely to make the team. But Mr. Springs, a running back from Ohio State, was different. Only two years into his career, he made an effort to know the rookies, especially the free agents from historically black universities who he thought would have more trouble adjusting to the NFL. He baited them. He encouraged them. Instead of laughing at them, he laughed with them. He even ate with them. When the team settled at training camp in Thousand Oaks, Calif., Mr. Springs made it his business to visit the rookies in their rooms and encourage them to study their playbooks. He preached that the coaches' words should be taken as gospel. Back in Dallas after Mr. Walls made the team, Mr. Springs invited him to share dinners that his wife prepared. "Ron and Adriane ... Ron and Adriane ... that's all he ever talked about," Ms. Walls recalled. "He told me I had to meet them." The two wives hit it off from the start. They talked constantly. Shopped together. Ate together. Experienced NFL-wife life together. Grew together. When the Wallses' daughter, Charis, was born more than two months premature in August 1984, Adriane beat Everson to the hospital. Before Ayra Springs was born the next year, Ms. Walls hosted the baby shower. Since Everson and Shreill were Dallas natives, their families adopted the Springses, whose families lived in Virginia and Ohio. Holidays and baby-sitting became family affairs. July Fourths were celebrated at the Wallses' house, New Year's Eves at the Springses'. The bonds remained when Mr. Springs left to play for Tampa Bay and Mr. Walls' career took him to New York and Cleveland. The bonds became stronger after the men retired and settled into North Texas homes about a mile apart. And everyone might have lived happily ever after had Mr. Springs not developed diabetes in the early 1990s. He managed to keep it under control for more than a decade. But one New Year's Eve at the Springses' house, Ms. Walls knew something was very wrong. Mr. Springs was not the life of the party. Worse, he didn't even try to be. A couple nights later, the Wallses' phone rang at 2 a.m. Adriane said Ron had suffered some kind of seizure. Would Shreill meet them at the hospital? She left immediately. Trips to emergency rooms became regular. During one episode, Mr. Springs' kidneys shut down. In 2004, Mr. Springs was placed on the national transplant waiting list. The next year, his diabetes forced the amputation of his right foot. His arms, which cradled 73 passes to lead the Cowboys one season, withered and gnarled into loose fists. After the amputation, Ms. Springs and Ms. Walls split shifts in the hospital. When Adriane wasn't there to brush her husband's teeth, comb his hair, wash his face, tend to needs and whims, Shreill was. Ms. Springs, who works full time, has been her husband's primary caregiver. Waking up mornings at 4:30 to tend to his needs before work has taken a toll. It has proved a burden on Ms. Walls, as well. "That has been the X factor in all this - the wives," Mr. Walls said. "I couldn't watch Adriane suffer anymore. And I couldn't watch Shreill suffer watching her best friend suffer. "I love Ron, but I'm not sure I would have been so eager to do this if I didn't think it would benefit Adriane." Ms. Springs said Mr. Walls' words make her feel "blessed" but "uncomfortable." "What's the difference?" she said. "Ron and I are one, anyway." Ever the athlete Mr. Walls' final season with the Cowboys was a disaster. The team finished 1-15 in 1989 under rookie coach Jimmy Johnson. For the first time in his nine NFL seasons, Mr. Walls didn't record a single interception. As a remnant from the Tom Landry era, Mr. Walls was deemed too old, too slow and too much a part of the past for these new-era Cowboys. Mr. Johnson decided Mr. Walls was not one of his best 37 players and released him along with two other Landry leftovers, Ed Jones and Tom Rafferty, on the same February day in 1990. That left Mr. Walls, who had recently celebrated his 30th birthday, determined to show the world how wrong Mr. Johnson had been. The easiest way to impress prospective new employers, Mr. Walls reasoned, was to be in the best possible physical condition. For the first time in his life, he began working out. He hired a professional trainer, started lifting weights, ran long distances and meticulously watched his diet. Mr. Walls signed with the New York Giants, earned a starting position and was eventually entrusted by head coach Bill Parcells and defensive coordinator Bill Belichick to call the defensive signals. Leaving the struggling Cowboys for the powerful Giants was a blessing for Mr. Walls. He led the No. 1 defense in the league with six interceptions. Better still, a personal salvation of sorts came in the NFC Championship Game when the Giants beat the San Francisco 49ers, 15-13. The last time that Mr. Walls had played against the 49ers in an NFC Championship Game was his rookie season of 1981. The game's lasting image has Mr. Walls reaching for receiver Dwight Clark as Mr. Clark leaps to grab the winning touchdown pass from scrambling Joe Montana. Final score: 49ers 28, Cowboys 27. The Cowboys never came that close to playing in a Super Bowl again in Mr. Landry's tenure. Forgotten in the imagery of "The Catch" are Mr. Walls' two interceptions and fumble recovery in that game. In Super Bowl XXV to close the Giants' 1990 season, Mr. Walls was credited with making a game-saving, open-field tackle of Hall of Fame running back Thurman Thomas with less than two minutes remaining. It helped preserve the Giants' 20-19 victory over the Buffalo Bills, a game best known for Scott Norwood's missed field goal attempt. In all, Mr. Walls played five seasons after he was discarded by the Cowboys before retiring after the 1993 season. Teammates who knew Mr. Walls in his Cowboys days might be surprised to learn the extent of the training techniques that he has followed religiously since 1990. "I got hooked on that lifting and running, and that style of workout stuck with me," Mr. Walls said. "You could say I started out working out for dough but kept doing it for show." And as Ron Springs' body began failing him, Everson Walls continued to tone his 6-1, 195-pound body. More than 13 years after his final NFL game, Mr. Walls has not deviated more than a pound or two from his playing weight. "Who knew I was working out all those years so I could have some parts for my friend?" Mr. Walls said. "It just turned out that way." Inspiration from past Eight days before the transplant, Mr. Walls picked up a phone and called a voice from his past. One he hadn't talked to in 27 years but began thinking about more and more as the transplant neared. "This is Cubby," Mr. Walls said, picking up where he and Felecia Allen had left off in high school. Ms. Allen knew immediately whom the voice belonged to. Everyone from Hamilton Park refers to Everson Walls as "Cubby." He was so christened soon after birth by his mother, who took one look at her fuzzy baby and declared him the spitting image of a baby bear. On the night before the transplant, the Walls family gathered at the First Baptist Church of Hamilton Park to pray. At the start of the private service, the Rev. Gregg Foster looked at his boyhood friend and said, "Cubby, I am honored for you to be led by the spirit." Ouida Walls, Cubby's mother, wiped away a tear. And now, Cubby was telling Lisa about the transplant. "Lisa," Cubby said, using the name he had called Ms. Allen since they were children, "I have always thought about you and always thought about what you did. But I have been thinking more and more about it recently, and you are my inspiration. And it's something I didn't realize until right now. I wanted you to know." In 1980, 18-year-old Lisa donated a kidney to her 22-year-old sister, Gwen. Over the phone, Lisa confirmed all the stories that Cubby had heard others tell about her. Yes, the doctors told Lisa how risky the surgery would be. Yes, the doctors told her that even with the new kidney, Gwen would at best have four years to live. Yes, the doctors told her she might not be able to have children. And yes, there looked for a time after the surgery that the kidney would be rejected. But after anxious hours, Lisa's kidney began functioning in her sister's body. And yes, Gwen had 22 happy years before she died of unrelated causes in 2002. "For me to be an inspiration for someone to save a life ... ," Ms. Allen said, her voice becoming softer and softer. "I told him to follow his heart, do this unconditionally, and he would never have a single regret." Cubby Walls hung up the phone. He checked off another item on his presurgery to-do list. "People have been asking me why I was doing this, and I told them things. But always in the back of my mind, I knew there was another reason. All the time it was Lisa and Gwen ... they busted the system. "As my life evolved, nothing I ever did could compare to what she did. Until now." Unbreakable bond At 10 a.m. Thursday morning, the day after the transplant, Mr. Walls, who had undergone a laparoscopic procedure to remove his kidney, left his room pushing a pain pump and slowly made his way across the hospital to the intensive-care unit to check on his old friend. Moments earlier, he had raised his hospital gown to show the scars from five relatively small incisions. He remembered little about the surgery. But he did remember waking up and calling the name of a former coach. He had no idea why he had shouted for Bill Parcells. As he slid open the glass door and pulled back the curtain, Mr. Walls found Mr. Springs sitting in a chair, eating Jell-O. "How are you doing, killer?" Mr. Walls asked as he walked across the room to bump fists with Mr. Springs. Neither had the strength to offer a hug. "What's up, bro?" Mr. Springs said. "I can really call you that now and mean it. What you did for me is something a brother does, a brother who loves a brother. "We really are part of each other now."