In Honor of Steve, Time for a Physical

Posted Nov 19, 2009 by Scott Carter

Updated Nov 20, 2009 at 12:15 AM

The last time I saw him was Sunday at Tallahassee Memorial Hospital. The last time I heard his voice was early Thursday morning when I listened to a voice mail from him the night before. He was checking in to see how I was doing in the new job and said he’d catch up with me later in the week. His voice sounded much stronger than on Sunday when I dropped off a book on national parks—he had been to nearly every one in the U.S.—and a couple of magazines.

As some of you may know, before I rejoined the Tampa Tribune recently, I spent the past three-plus years living in Tallahassee covering Florida State.

During that time, I got to know longtime Tallahassee Democrat FSU beat writer Steve Ellis pretty well. He was an acquired taste for me. We both viewed each other as suspicious competitors at first, but over time, we became friendly rivals. In the end, I simply considered him a friend and one of the hardest-working journalists I have ever met. It was nearly impossible to outwork Steve.

My wife and I made sure to stop by to visit Steve in the hospital on Sunday while I was back in Tallahassee for the weekend. He had suffered a severe heart attack on Nov. 10 and wasn’t bouncing back as quickly as the doctors hoped. Steve was 54 and had covered FSU sports since 1982, becoming somewhat of an institution around Tallahassee and the FSU campus.

Sadly, he died Thursday afternoon, just a few hours after I listened to that voice mail on my cell phone from 9:12 p.m. Wednesday. Click here for his obituary. His heart gave out after a procedure to help correct his illness on Thursday morning. Here is what FSU coach Bobby Bowden had to say about Steve after the Seminoles finished practice Thursday evening:

“He was kind of like a son to me, believe it or not, because when he first came here, he wrote for The Osceola,’’ Bowden said. “And I took a liking to him and used to give him a lot of tips, you know, for stories, so he’d get the story first. One of the best I’ve ever seen – I don’t know if I’ve ever seen them better – at finding out what’s happening before I find out. That guy – he was like a detective, you know it. And I hate to see it, I really do. I’m sad about it.”

Why am I writing about an FSU beat writer that most of you have probably never heard of in my USF blog? Basically, just to share a story that hit close to home and to inspire you to go get a physical if you haven’t recently.

In typical Steve fashion, as he drove to Clemson for the FSU-Clemson game a couple of weeks ago, he called somewhere near Macon and said he was in serious pain. He thought he had acid reflux disease and asked what medicine I took for mine. I told him what brand of medicine helps me and that he should at least stop and get some pain medicine. He did, and that was the last I thought about it until he called me last Wednesday afternoon as I was waiting on my flight in Tampa to head to New Jersey for the USF-Rutgers game.

He joked that I should stay out of the doctor business and stick to sports writing. I promised to do so after he told me he had suffered a major heart attack the night before and that his heart had taken a beating for the past week. In honor of Steve, I’m going to schedule a physical and get checked out in the next few days. I’d like for those of you out there to do the same if you haven’t recently.

And I promise—that’s the only time I’ll give medical advice on this blog.