Ex-president is “fired up” for the coin toss before the big game.
Former president is feeling spry after battling pneumonia
Expect an emotional crescendo as former President George H.W. Bush, an avid Houston sports fan, flips the coin before kickoff at Sunday’s Super Bowl LI.
It’s a moment that the 92-year-old Bush and his wife, Barbara, easily could have missed if their health had not improved last month.
The 41st president will appear before a global audience just six days after his release from Houston Methodist Hospital, where he was treated for pneumonia, which included a stint in the intensive care unit. At one point, both Bushes were patients at the hospital. The former first lady, 91, was admitted for a few days as a precaution for bronchitis.
The impetus for their appear-
ances at the big game was their love for sports, admiration for their hometown and commitment to the invitation extended in December by NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, Bush family spokesman Jim McGrath said Saturday.
“President Bush is the most goal-oriented person you can meet. When he sets a goal out there on the horizon, it’s almost like he wills himself to achieve it,” McGrath said. “They feel great. They’ve been taking it easy since they’ve both been discharged from the hospital — saving up their strength. They’re just fired up and didn’t want to overexert themselves and risk not being able to make it. They’re so focused on this and so proud of their hometown.” ‘The best of America’
Douglas Brinkley, a presidential historian who teaches history at Rice University, said he was saddened when health reports about the Bushes punctuated coverage of Donald Trump’s inauguration as president last month. All of the other living presidents attended.
“If he’s feeling spryly enough to appear at the Super Bowl, it’s just cause for good cheer,” Brinkley said Saturday by phone.
Bush served as president from 1989 to 1993, after eight years as vice president.
“His legacy is very large, and he’s truly an American icon who transcends party and is just beloved by the public at large,” Brinkley said. “He represents the great American traditions of camaraderie, a gentlemanlike demeanor, finding humor in everyday life, family values and love of local community. He embodies much of what people think is the best of America.”
The former president took celebratory skydives when he turned 80, 85 and 90. And despite suffering from Parkinson’s disease and having to rely on a wheelchair, he remains a frequent spectator at Minute Maid Park to watch the Astros and at NRG Stadium for Texans games.
“George Herbert Walker Bush was a great baseball player at Yale. He actually met Babe Ruth, and there’s a photograph of them shaking hands, which is one of his favorite mementos. He’s been a sports fanatic all of his life,” Brinkley said. “We associate him more with throwing horseshoes and sailing in Kennebunkport, but, in truth, the reason he built his presidential library in College Station was because he’s an Aggies football fan.” ‘Air he breathed’
Bush’s lifelong love affair with sports is detailed in “Destiny and Power: The American Odyssey of George Herbert Walker Bush,” the 2015 biography by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jon Meacham. In a January 2016 interview published in Sports Business Daily, the author explained the importance of leisure and competition to the former president.
“Sports was the air he breathed all of his life. He was an early soccer player at Greenwich Country Day School, he played baseball and soccer for Andover, (was) captain of the baseball team at Yale, went to the first two College World Series (with Yale). One year they played USC and one year they played (California) and they lost both,” Meacham said. “For him, athletics was both an escape and a metaphor, if you will. They were an escape from the day-to-day work of politics and of life. But they also were a metaphor for life.
“He believed — with the Victorians — that athletic success and athletic effort was of a piece with success and effort in life. So, if you follow his life all the way through, and whether it’s tennis or golf, horseshoes or, now, skydiving, he always took the vigorous life seriously.”
Mica and Blas Espinosa, who were visiting the NFL Live festival on Saturday, said they have closely followed news about the Bushes’ health in recent weeks. They said they were heartened to learn he’d be tossing the coin.
“We’re excited for that,” Mica Espinosa, 58, said.
Vice President Mike Pence also is expected to attend the game. Houston proud
The Bushes will appear midfield just before game kickoff at 5:30 p.m. at NRG Stadium. The president and former first lady, who moved to Houston more than a half-century ago and recently celebrated their 72nd anniversary, consider the city’s third Super Bowl in four decades a collective achievement.
“They were so proud of Houston and how the community has come together to take on this massive challenge of hosting the Super Bowl,” McGrath said. “He’s so proud of the city and the thousands of volunteers — all kinds of points of light in their own regard — who have helped pull it off in magnificent fashion.”
So, is it the New England Patriots or Atlanta Falcons for the Bushes?
The former president is “friends with Tom Brady” and “respects Coach (Bill) Belichick” but doesn’t have the same relationship with the ownership, coaches and players of the Atlanta team, the family spokesman said. (A prominent fan of the Falcons is another 92-yearold ex-president, Jimmy Carter).
“As a fan of football, (Bush) respects what Atlanta has done in getting here,” McGrath said, adding that the Bushes are expected to sit in Texans owner Bob McNair’s box to watch at least some of the gridiron action. “I think more than anything they’re just looking forward to a good, close, competitive game.”