Local Bills player relates ‘emotional week’

Nine days ago, Spencer Brown of Lenox and his Buffalo Bills teammates emotionally huddled around a disturbing scene on the field at Paycor Stadium in Cincinnati.

Their teammate, defensive safety Damar Hamlin, collapsed in the first quarter after colliding with Cincinnati Bengals receiver Tee Higgins while making a tackle. He suffered cardiac arrest. The game was postponed and later canceled.

When Hamlin left the stadium in an ambulance, Brown and his teammates and coaches had no idea if he would survive. Since that night, there has been remarkable progress in Hamlin’s condition.

But, in the moment it was terrifying.

“I was sitting down with the other line guys and we were watching on the big (overhead) screen,” Brown said. “Ryan Bates, our right guard, said ‘I think Damar’s down.’ I looked over. I had seen guys go down before. Then he said, ‘Whoa, they’re bringing a stretcher out.’ That’s when all of the players started walking over there.”

Brown said what they saw was a system of emergency medical response that he’d never witnessed. The looks on the players’ faces on the television screen and photographs tells it all. There was shock and horror as a medical response team worked feverishly to save Hamlin’s life.

The on-field treatment for nearly 20 minutes included administering CPR, applying portable defibrillator paddles (AED) and giving him oxygen.

“I’d never seen the controlled chaos of the whole medical staff working together, going through the steps to evaluate and make split-second decisions. Everyone had their own job,” said Brown, the Bills starting offensive right tackle. “I didn’t know they had a medical team on standby for everything like that — CPR, the airway and AED. There was so much preparation that came straight to the forefront that we didn’t even know was a thing. Big shoutout to the medical team. I was just trying to hold myself together and saying prayers.”

Originally, there was some discussion among NFL officials of possibly resuming the game the next day, pending any positive news of Hamlin’s condition. Players waited in the dressing room and eventually boarded buses to take to the airport when coach Sean McDermott returned after going to the University of Cincinnati Medical Center to check on Hamlin’s status. The game was canceled. The team’s plane touched down in Buffalo at 3:30 a.m. local time.

“Our head trainer and general manager stayed back in Cincinnati,” Brown said. “The next day when I came in we heard that Damar was alive and doing better, that the outlook was more promising than what we’d seen on the field. The trainers that came back with us, when I saw them I gave them a big hug and said thank you!”

Brown said the wait in the dressing room after the incident was agonizing.

“We really didn’t know what was going on,” Brown said. “It was the right call to not play anymore. We were all worried about Damar, obviously. The game is a game. That’s a life. We were thinking about him. We just waited to hear something, but nobody had any answers.”

Brown admitted that he was “half tuned in” in viewing videotape and the installation of a game plan for last Sunday’s home victory over the New England Patriots, still distracted by thoughts about Hamlin. Two Zoom meetings with the players from Cincinnati helped to relieve the players’ anxiety and allow them to focus on the task at hand.

“There’s already a physical toll in the game, especially this late in the season,” Brown said. “Put the emotional toll on top of that during those first days, and it was tough. But what really helped was the first Zoom meeting with Damar’s dad, when he said Damar wasn’t awake yet, but his condition was improving. He told us the best thing we could do for Damar was go out and beat the Patriots for him.”

As Brown and his teammates predicted, Hamlin’s first question upon regaining consciousness was if the Bills had won the game in Cincinnati.

Surprise greeting

On Friday, all of the Bills players were assembled for a team meeting when coach McDermott said he had a surprise for them. Hamlin’s breathing tube had been removed, and he made an online FaceTime call to the team. It was reported that Hamlin said “Love you boys” and flexed his biceps and made a heart sign with his hands.

“It was awesome,” Brown said. “Everyone got up and gave him a standing O. Guys were yelling, ‘That’s our guy!’ It really helped everyone’s emotional well-being.”

Hamlin was flown from Cincinnati to Buffalo on Monday, transferred to Buffalo General Medical Center/Gates Vascular Institute. He has already been up walking with physical and occupational therapy, and tolerating a normal diet.

Sunday’s environment

On Sunday, emotional tributes to Hamlin and the medical response team were followed by two stunning kickoff returns for touchdowns by Nyheim Hines as the Bills secured the No. 2 seed in the AFC in a 35-23 victory over New England at Highmark Stadium.

“It had been three years and three months since Buffalo had a kick return touchdown. Damar’s number is 3,” Brown said. “You can’t write it any better. With the week we had, that was pretty special. Before the game they recognized all of the trainers and doctors who had a hand in saving Damar’s life.”

As for most games, including the cancelled game in Cincinnati, Brown had family and friends there in support. At Cincinnati, his mother Liz Jessen and one of her friends were accompanied by Spencer’s former UNI teammates Cal Twait, Jackson Scott-Brown, Nick Phillips and Tim Butcher.

On Sunday, Jessen and Spencer’s brother Garrett, Garrett’s Marine Corps friend Mat Afonso and Spencer’s former University of Northern Iowa teammate Spencer Cuvelier (along with his girlfriend Paige Masters) were seated in the front row.

“It was electric,” Jessen said of the environment in Highmark Stadium Sunday. “They didn’t announce the offense or defense like usual. The players just took the field all together, many carrying flags with tributes to Damar. Then they recognized the first responders. The crowd was amazing.”

Brown said it helped to spend some time with family and friends after the victory.

“It had been an emotional week for everybody, the fans included, as well as the families of everybody involved,” Brown said. “It was a scary thing that happened. After the game, it was nice to embrace my mom and brother and his friends, and my (UNI) teammate. It puts things in perspective. Being able to see them was good.”

Hamlin is expected to continue to undergo a series of tests and evaluations to determine what caused the incident. It was a tackle that resulted in a collision with Hamlin’s chest, which possibly resulted in a condition that’s known as commotio cordis. That’s the result of blunt trauma to the chest, which causes the person to develop an irregular heart rhythm. It can lead to sudden death.

In such cases, there is nothing wrong with the heart and the patient can have a complete recovery. However, doctors treating Hamlin said more tests have to be conducted as his condition improves to offer an official diagnosis.

No second thoughts

Brown said he had no trepidation about taking the field Sunday, just a few days after almost watching a teammate lose his life in a violent sport.

“I don’t think twice about anything happening to me,” Brown said. “It’s out there, of course, but it was kind of a freak deal. For me personally, I didn’t play Sunday thinking anything was going to happen to me. Everybody who plays has something going on physically. I tweaked my ankle a little bit last weekend. But, you go out there with the intent of taking care of business and you’re not thinking about something happening to you.”

The response around the world to Hamlin’s experience was heart-warming, Brown said. For example, Hamlin’s charity drive to raise money to distribute toys to children in his hometown of Pittsburgh around Christmas grew exponentially in the hours immediately following the nationally-televised Monday night game in Cincinnati.

“Damar had stated in the past that his goal for the fund was $2,500,” Brown said. “When we were on the bus two hours later it was already up to $2 million. The last I heard it was up to $8 million.

“Especially in today’s world, sometimes you wonder is the humanity still out there?” Brown continued. “Absolutely. It seems like Damar has brought the whole world together. One of our trainers is from Great Britain and he said it was all over the news back home. Other teams in the NFL did things, other sports were talking about it. There was such an outpouring of love and support.”

While speaking with a reporter Tuesday afternoon by telephone, Brown paused while exiting his vehicle to speak to someone at his apartment complex saying, “I love it! It looks great!”

Brown later explained that a neighbor in Orchard Park, not far from the team’s complex, was showing him another tribute to Hamlin.

“Damar lives in this apartment complex and they had made a sign for him to see when he comes home,” Brown said. “All the prayers and displays of love and support gives me chills.”

The Bills (13-3) host the Miami Dolphins (9-8) in the NFC Wild Card Round of the playoffs at noon Sunday on CBS. Brown, a 6-8, 311-pound offensive tackle, wears No. 79.