Commentary: John Madden meant so much to football, his family, and me

PLEASANTON – John Madden and I were long past lunch and just shooting the bull at Vic’s All-Star Café when a woman walked by with her son. She instantly recognized Madden and stopped in her tracks.

“Oh my gosh, you’re my hero!” she gushed. “You taught me football. I grew up without a lot of men around me, and you explained everything about football so clearly to me.”

She asked for a hug, then a picture. He made her day. He made it his life’s work doing that for others, typically on Sundays, first as the Raiders Super Bowl-winning coach and later as an Emmy-winning broadcaster.

Madden, at least to me, was more than America’s all-time best spokesman when it came to football – and steak houses, athlete’s foot, hardware stores or, of course, video games.

He was a blend of father figure, good buddy, esteemed colleague, late-night comedian, writing muse, national icon and everyday sports fan.

He oozed common sense more than anyone I’ve ever met. A Pro Football Hall of Fame inductee. A Super Bowl-winning coach with the Raiders. A family patriarch whothat left his award-filled broadcasting career to spend more time with his grandchildren.

I relished every conversation I ever had with him, just as I did with Bill Walsh and Al Davis, two of Madden’s football compatriots who preceded him in death. Yes, death. Madden – or, John, as I always called him – died Tuesday at age 85.

“Hey, Wait a Minute (I wrote a book!)” is the title of a book he wrote in 1984. It’s in my bookcase, in well-read paperback. Flip three pages and you’ll see this: “To Virginia, Mike and Joe,” a dedication to his wife and two sons.

John’s family extended beyond them and to anyone who ever watched football – and those who didn’t. He touched so many people, and won so many more friends than measly football games.

He taught us so much. He shared his insights, his humor, his love. I never took it for granted.

As I drove out of my neighborhood a few years ago, I came to a fork in the road. Turn left and go to the 49ers’ facility for their latest news? Or turn right and see if Madden was at his nearby office?

“He’s heading to lunch, but he wants to know how soon you can get here,” Joan, his long-time assistant, said on the phone.

Two minutes and a mile later, I walked into the lobby of Madden’s office and found him sunk in a comfy, leather chair while one of his cherished grandsons kept him company.

After grabbing a quick quote for a football-related story, we sat and gabbed for 45 minutes. As usual. As awesome as ever.

In recent years, with his health declining and him losing his hearing, we mostly kept in touch via text, though I recall a phone call two years ago when he was with Vic – from Vic’s All-Star Café – and suggesting I do a Super Bowl-week story on Vic’s memorabilia – a Joe Montana helmet that was part 49ers, part Chiefs.

Oh, remember that lunch date I wrote early about from our time at Vic’s? We swapped tales about football, about our alma mater Cal Poly, about our Pleasanton-based families, about anything and everything, including some NFL big wigs he counseled long ago but now had lost respect for them.

We sat, in fact, at a table with his nameplate on it by the front door, ordering the “Coach Madden” menu item of corned beef hash and eggs. We spoke with no tape recorder or notepad on hand this time. We were catching up, continuing a friendship and mentorship that spawned over a decade ago.

A few months earlier, we sat at the other end of Main Street in the lobby of his family-owned Rose Hotel, and we recorded his first-ever podcast. It was a timely if not invigorating chat in the heart of football season, seeing how Madden became synonymous with Thanksgiving from his “Turducken” broadcasts.

That sitdown was especially comforting just to see Madden emerge from a hellacious year of health issues, starting with heart surgery in December 2015.

He noted he caught hell for that podcast for something he said. We struggled to remember what it was. Then we remembered it was about “Thursday Night Football,” and how he suggested the NFL give bye weeks in advance of those games which posed physically and mentally unfair demands on players. (It holds true as a serious issue.)

Before I really got to know him, John wandered into the 49ers locker room one day some 15 years ago. As I introduced myself to him, so did a cocky running back who told him he was going to win a bunch of Super Bowl rings. “Win the first one,” Madden advised.

How did Madden and I click? I’d like to think we had similar backgrounds and perspectives. We both grew up in the Bay Area (he in Daly City, me in Cupertino). We both went to Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo. Our professional careers started in Santa Maria (he at Hancock College, me at the Santa Maria Times). We both moved to Pleasanton and started families.

Last but not least, we both shared a love for the game of football, resulting in the best impromptu chats you can imagine.