TheStatehouseFile.com

INDIANAPOLIS – He’s just a guy.

Over the years, I’ve run into Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay a few times.

John Krull, publisher, TheStatehouseFile.com

I don’t know him well, but I’ve been impressed the times I’ve been around him. He seemed like a sharp guy, a man with charm, smarts and drive.

Perhaps the best of those occasions was when I got to attend a sneak peak at the Indianapolis Museum of Art of the exhibition of Jack Kerouac’s original manuscript of “On the Road,” which Irsay had bought for $2.43 million. Years ago, I taught a course on Kerouac and the Beat Generation, so I have an understanding and appreciation for the novel. A few minutes conversation with Irsay about the writer revealed that, while the Colts owner may be a billionaire and an NFL powerhouse, he also was just a guy who loved a book and knew it well.

Just a guy.

When Jim Irsay was stopped for erratic driving near his home late Sunday night and police found four different controlled substances in his car, the chatter went into overdrive. There was speculation about what this would mean for the Colts, for the National Football League and for Indianapolis’s bid to host another Super Bowl.

There was not much thought given to what it might mean for the man.

From left, former Colts center Jeff Saturday, Colts owner Jim Irsay and Mark Miles, who headed up the city’s previous Super Bowl bid, talk during an announcement that the city will compete to host the game again in 2018. Photo by Jesse Wilson, TheStatehouseFile.com

We tend to think of wealth, power and prominence as forces that insulate human beings from trouble and misfortune. We tend to think that people with money, influence and fame can’t have doubts, can’t have weaknesses, can’t stumble, and can’t fall.

We tend to forget that a guy like Jim Irsay is, in fact, just a guy.

Right now, he seems to be a guy who’s dealing with some difficulties.

He’s going through a divorce. He and his estranged wife, Meg, married when he was 21. They have been separated for a decade, but it’s no easy thing to put an end to a marriage that has lasted for more than 30 years, produced children and, for all of his adult life, helped define who Jim Irsay is.

He also has some health troubles, a back and hip that don’t work quite the way they used to – typical stuff for middle-aged guys. Particularly middle-aged guys who used to be jocks and subjected their bodies to repeated poundings.

Colts owner Jim Irsay said at an announcement in 2012 that he would support and participate in another Super Bowl bid for Indianapolis. Photo by Kendra Rhonemus, The Statehouse File.

And he’s has a history, a father who had his own struggles with substances, a sister and a brother who died young, a fight with his stepmother over who would control the family business, which just happened to be a world-famous sports franchise.

And then there’s Jim Irsay’s own history, which is well-publicized. He’s admitted that he had a problem with prescription drugs in the past, one that brought him to the edge of serious legal trouble, but he’s said he dealt with it.

While it’s important to note here that Irsay hasn’t been convicted of anything – and if he can produce prescriptions for the four controlled substances, the felony charges go away – the notion that his drug problem was something he could put in the past tense might be part of the issue.

The really nasty thing about addiction is that it never goes away. Every day is another day to fight, another opportunity to slip and fall.

Perhaps Irsay has taken another stumble.

He certainly wouldn’t be the first guy to do so.

The difference between Jim Irsay and a lot of other guys is that hundreds of thousands of people are fans of his football team and the city is banking heavily on again landing the biggest event in the world of sports.

For those reasons, Irsay doesn’t get to make his mistakes in obscurity.

And, for those reasons, we sometimes forget that there’s a human being at the center of the sports franchise and the spectacle.

We forget that Jim Irsay is just a guy – a guy going through a rough patch.

He’ll either deal with his difficulties, make peace with his past and handle his health problems or he won’t – and he’ll continue to stumble.

In that way, Jim Irsay is just like the rest of us.

He’s just a guy.

John Krull is director of Franklin College’s Pulliam School of Journalism, host of “No Limits” WFYI 90.1 Indianapolis and publisher of TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.