Shock Gives Way to Grief, Disbelief

A state of disbelief stretched from Los Angeles to Macon, Ga., a day after Avenger lineman Al Lucas died during an Arena Football League game.

His family in Georgia and teammates at the Avenger practice site at West Los Angeles College tried to cope with emotions brought on by the tragedy, while team and league officials sought to understand what happened and look for ways to help provide for Lucas’ wife and daughter.

Lucas died from injuries sustained during the Avengers’ game Sunday against the New York Dragons at Staples Center. An autopsy performed Monday, at the family’s request, deferred listing a cause of death until further tests are completed, a spokesman for the Los Angeles coroner’s office said.

Doctors who treated Lucas at California Hospital Medical Center said in a statement that they suspected Lucas suffered “the most severe type of spinal cord injury, extreme damage to the cord at a high spot in the neck.”

The death of the 26-year-old Lucas left those who knew him stunned.

“You don’t expect this to happen to a guy who weighed 300 pounds and could bench [press] 600 pounds,” said his father, David Lucas. “You think of this happening to the little species out there.

“My son was fun. He was playful. He was a heck of a kid. He’d gone out and done the things he wanted to do. He wanted to play professional football. He played professional football.”

David Lucas, a state representative in Georgia, said the family would travel to California to bring his son’s body back to Macon.

The Avengers are scheduled to play at Nashville on Sunday, but that could change, depending on funeral plans, which were pending. Avenger receiver Brian Sump said the team would prefer not to play if a memorial service is scheduled for the weekend.

“We’re operating like we’re going to play the game,” owner Casey Wasserman said. “That’s the true sadness of the situation.”

Wasserman will attend a previously scheduled owners’ meeting today, where memorial and tribute plans will be discussed, along with ideas on how to help Lucas’ family financially.

A trust fund to aid Lucas’ wife, De’Shonda, and daughter, Mariah, is being set up by the National Football League Players’ Assn., which includes AFL players.

Lucas’ family will receive money from a life insurance policy, arranged for players by the league, with the amount based on years of service, according to Chris McCloskey, a league spokesman. The amounts are confidential, McCloskey said. This was Lucas’ third AFL season.

Lucas also has 401(k) plans in the AFL and NFL, where he played two seasons with the Carolina Panthers.

“We’re obviously going to do whatever we can do to generate as much money for his wife and child,” Wasserman said.

The Avengers and team staff underwent grief counseling Monday. New York Dragon players will do the same today.

Avenger players also took time to recount Lucas’ love for the game. Quarterback John Kaleo played with him in Tampa Bay, helping the Storm win the ArenaBowl in 2003, and the two were among six Tampa Bay players who left the team and received cubic zirconia instead of diamonds in their championship rings.

Replacement rings, which Tampa Bay agreed to provide after a grievance was filed by the players’ union, were to be delivered this month. But phony diamonds still represented a championship to Lucas, Kaleo said.

“One thing that he cherished football-wise, and that was wearing that fake ring,” Kaleo said.

“It’s going to be hard to go on this season. We’re going to dedicate the championship to him. Obviously, it’s tough to everyone here, losing a family member. Knowing Al, the big fellow was always easy to follow, always an intimidating guy, and now we’re going to try and win it all for him.”

Avenger players gathered for a barbecue Sunday night “to talk about everything and how this thing went down,” receiver Greg Hopkins said.

“There’s always a guy in the film room who liked to poke fun on somebody else, who missed a block, missed a tackle or play,” Hopkins said. “The person who made jokes on our team was Al.”

That grief was felt in Macon, where Lucas lived and coached football at his alma mater, Northeast High School, last fall. David Lucas remembered his son “getting direction in his life” following a serious automobile accident in 1999.

“He was thrown out of an SUV window and almost got killed,” Lucas said. “From that point, Al seemed to change as an individual. He knew where he wanted to go.”

The following fall, Lucas was named NCAA Division I-AA defensive player of the year playing for Troy State. He parlayed his skills into a professional career, spending the 2000 and 2001 seasons with Carolina and 2002 playing in Frankfurt, Germany, before joining the AFL.

But those football abilities came second when teammates remembered him Monday.

“He cared about everyone on the team and treated all of us like family,” receiver Traco Rachal said. “He prayed before every game wanting to make sure that our families were OK. He’s a good Christian man and good representation of all of us.”

Wasserman and AFL Commissioner David Baker said that the procedures followed after Lucas was injured will be reviewed. Representatives of Schaefer Paramedics, which handled the case, declined to comment, but Wasserman said, “I’m confident everything was done to the best of their abilities.”

Lucas arrived at the hospital with “no blood pressure and no pulse, showing only faint signs of electrical activity,” according to a statement released by California Hospital Medical Center.

“Unfortunately, he was way too gone,” Dr. Gudata Hinika, the trauma medical director, said in the statement. “There was no sign of him trying to breathe at all.”

The game continued, as AFL and Avenger officials learned that Lucas had died “about five minutes into the third quarter,” Baker said, and waited to tell players until after the family had been notified. The players were not told until after the game.

“It wasn’t a good scene. We thought that Coach [Ed] Hodgkiss was going to say that Al was paralyzed, or something. Not death,” Hopkins said. “It’s going to be tough to play football again, no doubt about that. But it’s like riding a bull, if you fall off you have to get right back on.”

Only this time, with a heavy heart.

“I guess football will help us with the healing down the line, but it’s secondary right now because of what we’re going through,” Rachal said. “If anything, it brought a reality that we’re not promised tomorrow. Things can happen unexpectedly. This just puts everything in perspective.”

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Times staff writers David Wharton, Helene Elliott and Lonnie White contributed to this report.