From Boise to the bowl, this Oregon fan gets his money’s worth

Tony Seminary never expected to experience Pasadena in January after enduring Boise in September.

Yet there the Oregon football fan was Friday afternoon at the Rose Bowl, a T-shirt with quarterback Jeremiah Masoli’s No. 8 on his back and a plastic duck call draped from his neck.

“To be here today from that,” Seminary said, referring to the Ducks’ 19-8 loss to Boise State in their season opener, “I would have never guessed.”

Seminary was so disgusted with the Ducks’ listless play against the Broncos -- not to mention the infamous postgame punch by running back LeGarrette Blount -- that he e-mailed Oregon Coach Chip Kelly and jokingly attached an invoice for his travel expenses.

A few days later, Seminary received a response asking for his address. Several days after that, a check for $439 arrived in the mail.

“He became my coach that day,” Seminary said. “He could do no wrong in my eyes.”

A talkative sort who was left “totally speechless” by Kelly’s gesture, Seminary returned the check and never intended to make the story public. He photocopied the check for fun and told several buddies who “just went viral.”

The next thing Seminary knew, he was being interviewed on national television. But the 38-year-old who runs a technology company in Portland has never met Kelly.

“I would like to meet him, sure,” said Seminary, a 1996 Oregon graduate who once attended 67 consecutive Ducks games -- home and away -- in the early part of the last decade. “That would be great.”

Seminary never dreamed four months ago this would be the season he finally got to attend a Rose Bowl game. He made the 16-hour drive with a group of friends, with a strategic stop in Redding, Calif., for In-N-Out burgers.

They ran into a large group of like-minded Ducks fans there and one Ohio State fan who became the subject of some good-natured ribbing.

It turns out they had a common bond: Neither expected to be here after early-season setbacks. How was Oregon, whose high-powered offense sputtered so badly in its opener, able to win 10 of its next 11 games to make its first Rose Bowl appearance since 1995?

“A lot of it is believing and confidence and just getting on one of those rolls,” Seminary said. “We definitely have a swagger about us.”

So Kelly can expect another e-mail from Seminary following Oregon’s 26-17 loss to Ohio State. What does Seminary plan on writing?

“Congratulations,” Seminary said, “on a great season.”

ben.bolch@latimes.com