Ken Nance Loved A Sports Movie

Ken Nance loved a sports movie. 

That’s not specific to Ken, per se. Loving sports movies is one of those dad rites of passage. Like one day you’re cool and at the forefront of culture and the next you’re saying things like, “I will turn this car around.” Or you go to grab something off your bookshelf and think “where did these 37 books about World War 2 come from?” Loving sports movies comes in the dad job description. 

It makes sense. Men sometimes have a tough time expressing their emotions and sports movies sometimes help us communicate life lessons in a way that is understandable and relatable. Sports movies are typically about teams, and they showcase how everyone on the team plays their part. Winning and losing is not defined not by the individual - it’s how those individuals work together for a common goal. They celebrate the underdog - the overlooked people who society puts in one bucket when they really can be so much more. It’s not really about proving everyone else wrong - it’s about proving yourself right. A great sports movie is one you can watch over and over and, even though you know the outcome, the tension builds to the final game. The score swells. Slow motion is typically involved. You sit on the edge of your seat and you hope that Roy Hobbs, down to his last strike, bleeding through his uniform, can connect. And then he does. And the camera pans to his dugout and the team watches the ball climb through the air. And the look on their faces isn’t joy or jubilation. Not yet, at least. Their faces are the same as ours - because we, the audience, know, in life, it could go either way. But then the ball smashes the lights, sparks rain down on the field and Roy rounds the bases - securing the Knights’ ticket to the World Series.

Ken Nance loved that stuff. Ken Nance loved a sports movie. 

He loved Rudy. He loved Field of Dreams. He loved Hoosiers. Any time you mention the movie Hoosiers, Ken would stop whatever it was he was doing and say,”Oh, Hoosiers? That’s a wonderful film.”

So, naturally, when I became a dad - I started to amass my own personal sports movie classics that I can share with my kids and grandkids. One of my favorites is Moneyball. Moneyball is the story of Billy Beane, the general manager of the Oakland A’s. The A’s lose their star players to free agency at the end of the 2001 season and can’t afford to keep them due to their limited budget. So Beane and his front office, rather than chasing marquee players that they know they can’t afford, go out and get undervalued players that are just marginally better than their current roster. They look for people that are just 4% better. Forget home runs - just get on base. They gamble on the fact that the 4% increase in base hits, stolen bases, and strike outs could help them compete. This sort of thinking flies in the face of decades of baseball logic. And, at first, it didn't work. But, ever so slowly, the 4% starts to add up. The A’s start winning. In fact, the A’s achieved the longest win streak in baseball history. They fundamentally reinvented the world of baseball just by being 4% better than they were before. Great movie. You should watch it sometime.

Sports played a big role in Ken’s childhood growing up in his hometown of Griffin. Ken loved basketball and would shoot hoops with his older brother Jim at the Salvation Army. Jim wrote, “Being four years younger than me he loved that, and I enjoyed the time with him.” Donald Goodman lived just up the street from the Nances and played Little League baseball and high school basketball with Robin. He said he spent many hours in their backyard shooting hoops. Donald said, “Ken was the very best big brother to Robin.” The Nances lost their father Wendell when they were very young and the three boys formed a bond that not even death can break. Ken was unbelievably proud of his brothers and the families that they built. 

Ken had an incredible brain. His friend Sid Bell said that Ken “had a remarkable memory and was the go to guy for historical dates and facts.” Tommy Fields, his roommate at West Georgia, labeled himself as a poor student and said that Ken showed him how to study. “I credit him with any academic success I had,” he wrote. After college, he put that brain to use and served his country as a Lieutenant Junior Grade in the United States Navy. The service took him to naval stations in Rhode Island, Newfoundland, Cuba, and San Salvador. His brother Jim said that Ken searched “for enemy subs. Most of his work was top secret that he could not speak about.” He made lifelong friendships with his fellow sailors. Robert Hickman served with Ken at US Naval Facility Argentia Newfoundland. He wished Ken a sailor’s goodbye, “Fair winds and a following sea, shipmate.”

As big as his brain was, his heart was twice as big. Marsha Dempsey recalled a time during the spring of 2014 when her husband, Wayne, was nearing the end of his life on this earth. The pollen was so bad that spring, she would wash her house off with the hose every day. A few days before his death, Wayne was in the hospital and she wasn’t able to keep up. After he passed, their family returned home from the hospital to find Ken washing the house.  Marsha said, “What an act of love! But as we all know that was the kind of person Ken was -- always giving so much more love than you could ever imagine.”

Ken didn’t just love his friends and neighbors, he loved his neighborhood. He and his wife Mary have lived in Summerville Park for over 45 years. When they moved in on Halloween night in 1974, they were the youngest couple in the neighborhood. These are his words: “Quite frankly, our older neighbors were thrilled to see us move in. Not because of who we were: but because we were young and idealistic and energetic.” In 2019, he and his Summerville Park neighbors helped organize when plans were being made to build a motel on Charlton Street. They won their appeal, and helped, in his words, “keep this neighborhood as nice in the future as it has been for 106 years.” “Listen,” he said, “ if you get a chance to move into Summerville Park - take it.”

Ellen Greer said that every time she saw Ken, she was always greeted with a smile, wisdom, and love. Nowhere was that more on display than right here at First Baptist Church. Miriam Peterson, Ken’s cousin, credits Ken as the reason she and her husband, Carroll, are at First Baptist. When they first moved to Rome 22 years ago and started looking for a church, they visited First Baptist and found Ken standing on the front porch. She said, “He was so excited and joyful to see us and immediately started introducing us to just about everyone.” Hands down, the most messages I received this week were about his work here at First Baptist. Miram put it best, “Carroll and I both are just a ripple in the many, many ripples that went out from Ken’s warm welcome ministry.”

He took his love for Jesus and servitude outside of these walls too. After Katrina, Ken and a team from First Baptist traveled to New Orleans on a mission trip to help those ravaged by disaster. Ken saw how a tragedy could elicit a number of responses from the people that needed help - ranging from bitterness to gratitude - sometimes from the same person. When he got home, he literally dropped to his knees and kissed his living room in appreciation for all that he had.

And, boy, did he appreciate what he had. According to Tripp Bagby, as much as Ken loved the church, “he really loved his family.” He and Mary were married April 13, 1974. Sandra Allen wrote, “Ken loved Mary with all of his heart. He told me once that, after they married, he wondered why he had waited so long.” I had a front row seat for the love that Ken had for his three langers, Mary, Kathyrn, and Anna. Sandra Allen again, “He loved being a daddy. When Kathryn was born, I remember him washing his car because he said that couldn’t bring home a baby in a dirty car.” There wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do for his girls. After spending all day at work, Ken would graciously play tennis for hours into the evening with Anna to help her excel at a sport they both loved and bonded over. When my beautiful wife, Kathryn, ran afoul of the law, Ken helped her do her community service. He didn’t do it for her - he did it alongside her. Because when someone you love makes a mistake, you don’t turn your back - you help them through it. That love and generosity amplified with the arrival of his grandchildren - Cooper, Clara, and Savanna. They are the living ripples of his spirit - and I see in them his compassion, love of sports, and silliness. Your Poppy was so proud of you and loved you so, so much. 

I’ve had the pleasure of knowing Ken for over 20 years, but I’ve only known him in his retirement. I spent some time looking through his records this past week as we were preparing for his arrangements and I found really incredible stats about his career. Through his work as a rehabilitation counselor, he helped countless differently-abled people find employment and became an advocate for businesses to become more accessible for people with disabilities. He even hosted an event with the first deaf Miss America Heather Whitestone at Berry College to help raise awareness for the cause. I found his notecards from that event and, in the mid-90s, he wrote that the organization had already helped place over 200 differently abled people into jobs and careers and helped advocate for the same number of businesses to make their buildings handicap accessible. Think about that for a minute. Right now, there is someone having a meal with their family at their favorite restaurant. They have never met or heard the name Ken Nance. But they don’t have to find another place to visit because of his advocacy for accessibility. Those ripples are incalculable. Sandra Allen summed it perfectly when she said that “he quietly changed lives.”

Ken Nance couldn’t dunk a basketball. He couldn’t hurl a 90 mile-per-hour fastball in the ninth inning to win the divisional series. He never lifted the trophy at Wimbledon - though Tony Triplitt said that he played tennis with Ken for a decade and never was able to beat him. Tony referred to him as the “human backboard.”  But what he did understand is that life is a team sport - not an individual game. He understood that you never count out the underdog. Ken understood that he could use his talents and what he was given to make the world around him 4% better. And that 4% is why we’re all here today. So take tonight to reflect and remember Ken. Maybe watch Hoosiers. It really is an excellent film. And starting tomorrow, if we all strive to make ourselves just 4% better, just imagine what we can do. We can quietly change lives.

Ken Nance loved a sports movies. And I loved Ken Nance.