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DL Mike Kudla (R.I.P.)

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He lost close to 40 pounds due to a viral infection shortly after the NC game. Here's a link to his profile:

http://ohiostatebuckeyes.collegesports.com/sports/m-footbl/mtt/kudla_mike01.html

Here's another link to an article, you have to register to Akron Beacon-Journal (full article pasted below)

http://www.ohio.com/mld/ohio/sports/colleges/ohio_state_university/5180055.htm

Mike Kudla's fog has lifted. After being seriously ill for two weeks in January, the Ohio State freshman defensive end now understands the severity of the medical crisis that nearly claimed his life.
``It was definitely a weird experience being so close to dying,'' Kudla said Wednesday. ``I was pretty much out of it. People were talking to me, but I didn't know what was going on. It wasn't until about a week and a half ago that I knew how bad it was.''

The Division III co-defensive player of the year, Associated Press All-Ohio pick and a Beacon Journal all-star as a senior at Highland, Kudla thought he had recovered from a late-season bout with mononucleosis that wasn't diagnosed until he came home for Thanksgiving. He was cleared to play in the Fiesta Bowl on Jan. 3 and saw action as the backup to Darrion Scott as the Buckeyes defeated Miami. He was on top of the world in Arizona.

Then he hit rock bottom. After a team meeting on Jan. 10, Kudla had a relapse.

``After the meeting, I was pretty tired,'' he said. ``I went back to my dorm room and slept. I felt horrible. I knew I was sick.''

Kudla said his immune system shut down, and he was hospitalized for a week at the Ohio State University Medical Center. His mother, Mary Fran Kudla, stayed at his bedside as her son contracted seven different maladies. He lost more than 30 pounds. He remembers that a priest came to visit.

``It was pretty iffy for a couple days,'' Kudla said. ``They didn't know what I had, what was attacking me. Everything on my face was bleeding. My mouth and lips were covered with sores; for two weeks I couldn't eat or drink anything.''

Kudla said he battled two life-threatening infections, mycoplasma pneumonia and Stevens-Johnson syndrome, an immune system disorder involving the skin and mucous membranes that can cause respiratory failure, blindness and death.

``Stevens-Johnson syndrome is a fatal infection that attacks organs,'' Kudla said. ``If it gets in your eyes, you're blind. If it gets in your throat, it will kill your voice box. It's a nasty, nasty infection.

``I had so many things; they really hadn't seen this combination. I had symptoms of one thing and they said, `That can't do this, it's got to be this.' It was rough.''

Asked what was going through her mind, Mary Fran Kudla said, ``You just rely on your faith.''

Dr. John Lombardo, head physician for the OSU football team, said he had seen similar cases, but never in an athlete.

``It was very unusual,'' Lombardo said. ``It was a strange confluence of events and a difficult diagnosis. We knew he had some kind of infection, but we couldn't tell what the cause was. The severe syndrome could have been a reaction to certain infections, medications, other things could do it.''

Once he was on the road to recovery, Mary Fran Kudla said she set out to ``fatten him up a bit.'' Thirty pounds came back in about a week, most of it water weight as his body rehydrated.

While his mother praises the support he received from OSU's coaches, academic staff and physicians, Kudla is also grateful for the friendship of his teammates.

``Justin Zwick, we're real good buddies; he's been real supportive,'' Kudla said. ``Simon Fraser called me a lot while I was home. He and Alex Stepanovich were like, `If you need anything, give me a call.' Those are some great guys right there, looking out for each other.''

Since he returned to school, Kudla is receiving personal training from OSU's strength coaches. The football counseling staff kept in touch with his professors while he was gone and helped arrange make-up work.

``Luckily Mike has always been an honor student,'' Mary Fran Kudla said. ``He's got his work cut out for him. He's anxious to get back in the weight room to get a jump on everything he missed in January.''

Kudla was still worried about his medical condition and his football future until Monday, when he learned that his most recent blood tests had come back normal.

``Until then, I really didn't know what was going to happen,'' he said. ``If it didn't come back right or it had spread, I could relapse.''

As antsy as he is to start preparing for next season, he must force himself to take it easy.

``I'm resting, taking vitamins,'' he said. ``People come to see me, I do school work or lay around in my dorm room watching TV or playing Nintendo.''

Lombardo said Kudla will have to be eased back into football condition.

``He may not be full-go in the spring, but by fall he'll be ready,'' Lombardo said. Lombardo said Kudla should not be at an increased risk of contracting these infections again.

Kudla, 18, has had plenty of time to consider what he's been through. He said the crisis changed him.

``It really opened my eyes to a lot of things,'' he said. ``Being grateful for every day I have, grateful for my family. Knowing they care so much for me, that's the main thing.''

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That's an incredible story. It's really amazing how far he has come since then, I mean he was close to dying and now he is getting ready to start for the best D1 team in the country. That doesn't even include his accomplishments in the weight room this summer. I hope he has a monster season, which he could since it's obvious he has the right mindset and attitude with what he's been through. Simply amazing.
 
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To read all these posts here on Kudla and how amazingly strong this youngster is, i keep thinking that he may see alot of action at NoseTackle. To me this is one the hardest and thankless positions in Football - college or Pro. Last year Anderson did one hell of a job at that position. Maybe Mike could fill in nicely there. With a man of his strength plus if he can add quickness also, then he could see plenty of double-team on him which could free up the D/E for a blitz.
 
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Kudla article from the PD

http://www.cleveland.com/osufootball/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/sports/1092573198295323.xml

Kudla carries load on defensive line
Junior is expected to fill huge hole
Sunday, August 15, 2004
Bruce Hooley
Plain Dealer Reporter
Columbus- The bench-press record Mike Kudla set this summer at Ohio State proves the junior defensive end capable of heavy lifting.

Only the season ahead, however, will show whether Kudla can handle the weight on his shoulders as the replacement for Big Ten defensive Player of the Year Will Smith.

"It's going to be tough to fill his shoes," said Kudla, a junior from Medina Highland High School. "He did a lot of great things here, but. . . . I think I'm ready to get going. I put in a lot of work in the off-season, so I think I'm definitely ready to go."

Kudla benched 555 pounds during summer workouts to establish a new team mark.

He also ran 40 times comparable to Smith, whose 20 negative- yardage tackles in 2003 leave a sizeable gap for Kudla to fill.

"It's very important for Mike to step up," defensive coordinator Mark Snyder said. "He's played a lot of football for us. We lost a lot of defensive linemen and those guys played a lot for us. [Kudla] is one of the guys who needs to step up just like Will and Tim [Anderson] did when they were young."

Smith, Anderson and Darrion Scott were the defensive line backbone of OSU defenses that limited opponents to less than 75 rushing yards a game the past two seasons.

All three were three-year starters now playing in the NFL, which concerns coach Jim Tressel as much as any personnel gap created by graduation.

"A lot of people talk about our offense and the holes we have there, but we have to find out exactly who we are defensively, too," Tressel said. "Some of the things we did that featured Will Smith, Darrion Scott or Tim Anderson, we might have to have guys doing different things this year."

Kudla believes he can duplicate what Smith provided, including occasionally dropping into pass coverage.

"Will and I are a lot alike with our physical attributes, our power and speed combination," Kudla said. "I was originally a linebacker coming out of high school, so the [coverage] drops are more toward what my position was. As far as pass-rushing, that's stuff I picked up watching Will and Darrion and guys like that."

Kudla gained an up-close look at the havoc OSU's defensive line caused last year in an overtime victory against Purdue.

Scott and Smith pressured quarterback Kyle Orton into a fumble on the goal line and Kudla fell on the football for the Buckeyes' only touchdown in an eventual 16-13 win.

Kudla has two career negative- yardage tackles and has never made more than four tackles in a single game.

But this season, he and fellow first-year defensive line starters Quinn Pitcock and Marcus Green will be asked to continue OSU's dominance up front.

"I definitely have high expectations for myself this season," Kudla said. "I definitely want to go out and perform as hard as I can, to the best of my ability, and go out and have a great season. That's our team's attitude and that's our defensive line's attitude.

"My standards are extremely high. I'm probably putting more pressure on myself than I probably should, but that's the way it has to be."
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http://www.1460thefan.com/tf.php?story=dispatch/2004/08/16/20040816-D7-01.html

OSU FOOTBALL
Kudla is product of parents’ beliefs, a lot of hard work
OSU defensive end likes physical approach
Monday, August 16, 2004
Ken Gordon
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH



Even while relaxing in a chair, Mike Kudla appears capable of committing great harm, like a bouncer to an unruly bar patron.

The Ohio State defensive end is massive, in a good way. His upper arms bulge out of his cutoff T-shirt and his belly remains flat. Kudla carries his 270 pounds on a 6-foot-3 frame with less than 9 percent body fat.

"Oh, Mike is a beast," fellow OSU lineman Quinn Pitcock said, eyes widening.

Not surprisingly, Kudla enjoys pushing around weights.

"I love the weight room," he said. "That’s where I’ve always excelled, and it’s an area I’m attracted to. I get addicted to it."

The proof lies not only in his arms but in a new Buckeye bench-press record of 555 pounds Kudla set in the offseason, breaking the previous mark by 20 pounds.

"He works very hard," OSU strength and conditioning coach Allan Johnson said. "He has excellent work habits, and he’s very enthusiastic about anything physical."

But Kudla is much more than a workout warrior. Despite his love for pumping iron, he attributes his strength less to the stale air of the weight room than to the fresh air of the farm.

Kudla grew up in rural Medina County and spent many of his teenage days helping out at the 1,500-acre farm of a friend, Bobby Guccion.

That’s where he said he learned about the value of hard work.

"A lot of work with hay, and daily work with cattle," Kudla recited. "And then harvesting and then just daily maintenance — you’ve got to work on your tractors, you’ve got to work on the facilities.

"We did that for years and years. That’s what high school was for me — we’d get up, work out, farm and do it again.

"So that’s where I kind of got (his work ethic) from. I don’t know any other way."

His values were not learned solely from nature, though. Nurture had a hand, as well, in the form of his parents, Paul and Mary Fran.

"Everything I had, I had to earn," Mike said. "They really pushed me really hard, and they had a lot of belief in me and taught me self-confidence.

"They told me at a young age that nothing comes free in this world, so whatever I wanted I had to go out and get. When I was 16, I wanted a car, and I had to go out and work and get money and get that car."

A linebacker at Medina Highland, Kudla was converted to end his freshman year at OSU. He was not redshirted and has been a valuable reserve the last two seasons, playing in all 27 games.

Now, though, he must step out of the considerable shadow left by Will Smith, a first-round draft pick of the New Orleans Saints.

Kudla’s play will be crucial to the success of the rebuilt OSU line this fall. He must play well enough to take pressure off the other starting end, Simon Fraser.

"It’s very important for Mike to step up," defensive coordinator Mark Snyder said.

"The more people you have up there that (offenses) have to worry about, it just makes everybody better."

Kudla has spent years making himself better and working toward a goal. But true to a blue-collar lineman’s mentality — what car did he buy when he finally had saved up enough money?

His father’s old one.

"A 1997 Chevy Malibu, with only about 50,000 miles on it," Kudla said. "I loved it, it was my favorite car."

Now, like then, Kudla has worked hard to earn his turn in the driver’s seat.
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I knew that damn Paul Keels effed up when he started off the 1460 Sportscenter update with, "The Buckeye football team is all healthy leading up to the Jersey scrimmage this Saturday"


Ass.


Anyway.. Let's hope its not bad.
 
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Good news so far....



<TABLE cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=5 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD class=headings vAlign=top bgColor=#eeeeee>Author </TD><TD class=headings vAlign=top bgColor=#eeeeee>Comment </TD></TR><TR bgColor=#cccccc><TD vAlign=top noWrap align=left width="20%">SteveHelwagen
Administrator
Posts: 2433
(8/18/04 5:05:27 pm)
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Update On Mike Kudla ... <HR SIZE=1>... through an associate who tracked down an OSU spokesman, I just learned that:

Mike Kudla went down after a hit in a contact drill today at practice. In reviewing the tape, the hit did not seem to be significant.

But when medical personnel examined Kudla on the field, they had enough signs to indicate he needed further tests. As a precaution, he was put on a back board and taken to the hospital.

The spokesman said Kudla underwent X-rays and tests, but all were negative, which is obviously good news. In fact, Kudla either has or should be discharged from the hospital soon. No word on how long he may be out, if at all.
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