The line of vehicles headed to the funeral viewing appeared countless, tying up visitors in Randallstown for hours on the afternoon of Aug. 2, 2021. Thousands of well-wishers had come to pay their respects to Darren Sanders, the previous Baltimore Police detective who served for 18 years because the Ravens’ safety director.
Ravens proprietor Steve Bisciotti, an in depth pal, was in attendance. So have been Ravens front-office officers and coaches. Current and former gamers got here as effectively.
And a bunch of 4 from Pittsburgh.
“I could never have brought myself not to be there for the viewing or the funeral,” stated Jack Kearney, the Pittsburgh Steelers’ longtime safety supervisor, who was joined by three colleagues. “None of us could.”
Hard hits and sharp tongues have lengthy outlined the Ravens-Steelers rivalry, which can play out once more in a Sunday night time recreation ripe with postseason implications. A Ravens win at M&T Bank Stadium would flip their regular-season finale in opposition to the Cincinnati Bengals subsequent weekend right into a de facto AFC North championship recreation. A Pittsburgh win might preserve alive their slim hopes of becoming a member of the Ravens within the playoffs.
For the Ravens and Steelers’ safety groups, although, these video games have come to imply one thing else. They are reminders of whom they’ve misplaced and the group they’ve discovered. It is a rivalry that has fostered a fraternity, one whose bonds have solely deepened since Sanders’ passing final summer time at age 55.
“We, as security, are former police officers, former FBI agents and so on,” Ravens Vice President of Security Craig Singleterry stated in an interview. “But we build a bond. We both do the same job: taking care of the team, players, ownership and executives. And we, as Pittsburgh Steelers and Baltimore, have that rivalry on the field. But the security guys, we’ve got a regular-type bond with each other because of the fact that we do the same job.”
Kearney joked that he met Sanders “when the Baltimore Ravens were still the Cleveland Browns.” Kearney was a sergeant in Pittsburgh with the Allegheny County Sheriff’s Office’s fugitive squad when he took a name from a Baltimore murder detective who believed a suspect was someplace in Western Pennsylvania.
“It was just a cold call,” Kearney recalled in an interview. “I just answered the phone, and it was Darren on the other end.” They clicked instantly. “Loved the guy from the minute I met him,” Kearney stated.
Their paths would cross once more. Sanders joined the Ravens’ safety staff in 2004, 5 years after Kearney, now the chief deputy within the Allegheny County Sheriff’s Office, took a part-time job overseeing safety for the Steelers.
As AFC North brethren, they noticed one another typically. When the Ravens would go to Pittsburgh, Kearney and his staff is likely to be referred to as on to rearrange tickets for a participant’s members of the family, or facilitate resort lodging, or assist with recreation day logistics. When the Steelers would go to Baltimore, the Ravens would return the favor.
“I think you become a police officer because you want to help people. You want to make a difference,” Kearney stated. “That carries over into your other job, if you’re fortunate enough to be one of those 32 people [managing an NFL team’s security].”
They needed to be ready for something. In an August interview with SiriusXM, Bisciotti recalled heading to the Steelers’ former house, Three Rivers Stadium, in 1996 and introducing himself and his household to Kearney, who was then dealing with escorts for visiting groups.
Dozens of Ravens workers had made the street journey, and Bisciotti instructed Kearney he needed to affix them at a tailgate celebration exterior the stadium. Kearney had a “deathly look on his face,” Bisciotti stated. But after two golf carts and an additional safety guard have been summoned, Bisciotti made his solution to the gathering. Kearney, Bisciotti recalled, remained cautious of the journey all of the whereas, retaining his hand on his gun, simply in case.
“When I was leaving that day, he said, ‘You know, that’s the first time in all my years being here that any owner has asked to go to a tailgate party,’” Bisciotti stated. “And I said, ‘Well, it’s going to happen more often than you think, bro.’”
Other incidents required the Ravens’ assist. Before a 2003 recreation in Pittsburgh, Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis obtained into an altercation with Steelers linebacker Joey Porter, who had been sidelined by a gunshot wound. Lewis later instructed reporters that he was providing phrases of encouragement to Porter, who claimed that Lewis was really mocking his signature leg kick celebration and telling him, “This is my house.”
“It wasn’t funny at the time,” stated Kearney, who now calls it one among his funniest reminiscences. “Darren and I had our hands full keeping those two apart after the game.”
Their friendship blossomed over years of street journeys and offseason conferences, bolstered by a mutual respect and an affinity for one another’s firm. After an extra time loss in Pittsburgh in 2008, Singleterry recalled a Ravens official questioning the trail of the staff’s buses to the airport. Sanders stated he trusted the Steelers’ safety staff to not mislead them.
“‘Hey, we run the show,” Singleterry recalled a Steelers official telling the Ravens. “We’re going to take you to the airport and get you there as fast and safely and quickly as possible. We’re not trying to sham you and take you the long way so that you can be miserable after a loss.”
Singleterry added: “That was one of the things that built the bond between us and Pittsburgh security.”
They labored collectively and grieved collectively. In 2013, after Sgt. Richard Fersch, a deputy sheriff for the Allegheny County Sheriff’s Office who labored on the Steelers’ safety staff, died at age 64, Sanders and Singleterry attended his funeral.
“It just showed me what a class act Darren was,” Kearney stated. “All the people in the AFC North are pretty close. I think we’re different from a lot of the other divisions. But all four of us are pretty close.”
“There’s nothing that we won’t do for them or they won’t do for us,” Singleterry stated of the Ravens and Steelers, “as far as security and getting things done with us.”
When Sanders was identified with prostate most cancers in 2011, Kearney was devastated. “That really bothered me,” he stated. Sanders beat that most cancers, just for docs to discover a mind tumor. In December 2019, he had mind surgical procedure and underwent six weeks of chemotherapy and radiation to deal with glioblastoma, an aggressive type of most cancers.
“I couldn’t believe it,” Kearney stated. His voice softened. “I really thought he had a brighter chance of beating the brain cancer than he did the prostate cancer.”
Sanders died July 23, 2021, at his Owings Mills house. He was survived by his spouse and three kids. Singleterry referred to as him his finest pal and a buddy. A portrait of them hangs in his workplace.
“He was my mentor,” he stated. “He taught me a lot of things about security. He taught me a lot of things about life. He was just an all-around good person.”
At Sanders’ funeral companies, Singleterry recalled members of the Steelers’ safety staff approaching him with tears of their eyes. “This is wrong,” they instructed him. “He’ll be sorely missed.” A month in the past, Singleterry even obtained a name from former Pittsburgh quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, whom he’d gotten to know over time. Roethlisberger needed to know the way Singleterry was doing; he knew he was lacking Sanders.
Coach John Harbaugh, who referred to as Sanders “as loyal and genuine and real as anyone I ever met,” remembered being struck by the dimensions of his funeral. At one of many companies, a loudspeaker was arrange exterior to accommodate the overflow crowds.
“I can’t say it was surprising, but you’re always surprised when you go to a viewing and there’s literally thousands of people there,” Harbaugh stated in an interview. “How do you expect that? I knew he was a popular guy and people loved him, but I didn’t expect there to be — were there thousands? Thousands. Thousands and thousands of people. It was crazy.”
Kearney arrived in Baltimore on Friday to start his preparations for Sunday’s recreation. This is his twenty third season with the Steelers, and likewise his final. Sanders’ demise, he stated, has made him notice that “there’s other things in life.”
“Obviously, I’m going to miss Darren not being there,” he stated. “I’ll be happy to see Craig. I couldn’t think of a better place for me to go to. … I couldn’t think of a better city for it to be my last regular-season game.”
Week 17
Steelers at Ravens
Sunday, 8:20 p.m.
TV: Chs. 11, 4
Radio: 97.9 FM, 101.5 FM, 1090 AM
Line: Ravens by 2
()
Source: www.bostonherald.com