The Everett connection impacts this reporter
Commentary
MATT KRUEGER Sports Reporter
Kevin Everett and I were rookies together, in a way. The quiet and reserved tight end was the first Buffalo Bill I ever interviewed. Because of that, I felt a bond with him, like we were connected in our introduction to the NFL.

When the Bee decided to begin covering the Buffalo Bills in 2005, I headed out to training camp with the idea that I would do a question-and-answer story about the rookies. I chased down Everett on the paved walkway stretching from the practice field to the locker room and ran down the typical questions about a player's first training camp. He answered them in his low-key manner, shook my hand and headed to the locker room for a shower.

I only spent a few minutes with him, as he leaned on the chain-link fence, wiping the sweat from his forehead, but it was a big moment for me. This was my entrance to covering the NFL, just as it was Everett's inclusion into a selective fraternity.

I didn't really think much of that quick interview. Everett wasn't the most talkative player. I surely met several more Bills in later practices who could make the dead laugh. But Everett was soft-spoken and there was something I liked about him, something I couldn't quite lay my finger to.

So seeing Everett's limp body fall to the ground Sunday, hit me in the gut like a Joe Mesi body shot. I sat in the press box, far removed from the swarming action around Everett's body on the field, hoping it was just a concussion or a shoulder injury. But the longer he laid on the ground motionless, the longer the medical staff hovered over him, the longer the game stood still waiting for him to get loaded into the back of an ambulance, the worse I felt. I had seen several players suffer neck injuries, but this was the first not on my television screen. This was the first player I had met, interviewed and written about.

Everett told me his favorite food is southern cooking. "Beans, rice and chicken," he said with the smile of a man envisioning sitting down at his mother's table to a fresh meal. His favorite movie is Harlem Nights. And when he's not blocking, running passing routes or covering kicks on special teams, he likes shooting pool. That's about all I know, since we didn't get to know Everett too well in his three years with the team. Injuries sidelined him the entire 2005 season and cut into 2006. And just as he was poised to make an impact on the Bills this year, his career was cut short by a freak accident on a kickoff. How fair is that?

I'm sure Everett doesn't know who I am, other than another reporter lurking in the locker room after games and practices looking for the next good quote. Maybe he would recognize me as the skinny, blond guy. But that doesn't change my sense of connection to him.

I know the prognosis for a full recovery is bleak for Everett. I know the chances of him even walking again are slim at best. I know the possibility that he could die any day has improved since Sunday's game, but not enough to get him out of danger just yet. And I know I'm hoping for a miracle in wanting to see him walk back out on the field at Ralph Wilson Stadium with 70,000 screaming fans celebrating his return.

But hope is a good thing. And I'll keep doing it as long as Everett needs it.

e-mail: mkrueger@beenews.com