GARDENA, Calif. - When Serra linebacker Ardis Perez takes the field, he’s surrounded by constant reminders. These are things that go a little bit further than your standard mental notes.
There’s the neck roll he wears for protection, not for show. Before he steps onto the field he and his dad, Rico, share a moment.
“I tell him ‘Keep your head up’ and we shake hands,” Rico said.
It’s a constant reminder for something Ardis doesn’t need reminding of. What he went through in the fall of 2010 was traumatic enough.
It was December and the then-sophomore Perez laid on the field at Serra High School.
“Get up, Ardis!,” he heard his teammates say.
It was supposed to be simple. It’s something he’d done since he was six-years old, when he began playing the game of football. He’d make a play and get up, and run back to the sideline or the huddle.
This time, he couldn’t.
“I tried to get up but I couldn’t and I knew that it wasn’t good,” Perez said. “I didn’t know what to do. I just started tearing up because I didn’t know what was going on. I just knew I couldn’t move. I couldn’t get up.”
It was Serra’s semifinal game against Paso Robles in 2010. Perez, a starter on special teams and linebacker, was playing on kickoff for the game’s opening kick.
Like he’d done a number of times before, he flew up the field looking to take down anything in his path as he tried to get to the ball carrier.
He got there, but upon arrival, it was a moment that would change his life.
He hit the Paso Robles returner on the hip. Perez’s body went numb as he fell to the turf.
“When I hit him, I ducked my head and then it felt like I was floating,” Perez said.
Added Rico: “I knew it was bad then because I saw how he rolled off the hit.”
Rico rushed to the field where team trainers Mayra Ruiz and Tiffany Maston were attending to his son who laid motionless on the field.
“I can’t breath,” Perez told his dad. “I can’t move.”
“No, don’t say that,” Rico told him, reluctant to hear those words come out of his son’s mouth.
Rico turned his back to him and began to pray.
Perez, with tears flowing down his face, closed his eyes and began to do the same thing.
“As a coach, you see things like that happen but as a dad you don’t really think it’s ever going to happen to your son,” Rico said. “When it does, it’s like ‘Wow, this actually happened.'”
“It was scary,” Ardis said.
He was down for what he says was anywhere from three to five minutes but what felt like an eternity before he started to feel a sensation in his toes. The sensation then began to be felt through his body. At this point, the ambulance weas summoned to the field. Perez wanted to walk off of the field but Rico and the training staff would have none of that.
It was the eerie 30-minute delay that brings an awkward silence throughout the crowd. It’s what you hate to see as a spectator, player, or a coach. The moment humanizes the game to the point football becomes an afterthought and you just hope the player, regardless of who you’re rooting for, is OK.
“It was very strange,” said Serra head coach Scott Altenberg. “It was really surreal. You have all this energy flying because it’s the opening kickoff (of) the semifinal game. The stadium is just packed to the gills and all of a sudden this happens and all of the air is just deflated out.”
Perez was loaded into the ambulance and taken to a local hospital. His neck was broken. His C4 vertebrae was crushed and his C5 was partially crushed. Doctors told him his football playing career was over and wanted to perform surgery immediately. They wanted to instill rods into his neck which would have limited his movement.
Rico and his son refused to believe that. They held off on the surgery for a week and a half, determined to get a second or third opinion. Rico consulted Serra team doctor Keith Feder. He referred the Perez’s to Dr. Greg Yoshida, a neck surgeon and spine specialist.
Yoshida looked at Perez’s x-rays and informed them of a different procedure than the one originally prescribed that will allow him to continue his playing career.
“He told us he was going to replace the crushed bone with a new bone in there and Ardis would be able to play again if he does his rehab and everything feels right.” Rico recalls.
The surgery was performed in December. By February of 2011, Perez was out competing for the school’s track team.
In April, he re-joined the football team for 7-on-7 competitions.
Lately, when you think of neck surgery, you think of Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning and the ordeal that kept him off of the field for 611 days.
That certainly wasn’t the case with Perez. Yoshida’s procedure was performed by going through the front of Perez’s neck which decreased the possibility of any nerve damage, which is what happened to Manning.
Perez was diligent in his rehab and only had to wear a neck brace for a couple of months. Any subsequent pain, he just dealt with, refusing to take any painkillers.
“He worked hard,” Rico said. “He came back and did weight exercises on his neck to get it strong again. The doctors said his neck was so big and so strong that that’s one of the reasons he wasn’t paralyzed.”
Perez internally stored all of the doctors statements telling him he’d never be able to play again and used it as fuel to get back onto the field again. In his heart of hearts, he needed to play football again.
“It’s my life,” Perez said.
He had the support of his family and his Serra family. Cavalier seniors at the time, George Farmer, Jason Gibson, Woodson Greer and Marqise Lee were the many who went straight from their recruiting trips to the hospital to see their fallen teammate.
Gibson paid tribute to Perez by writing, “he’s not here playing tonight but we’re going to ball all out for him” on the back plate of his shoulder pads along with a picture of Perez.
The Cavaliers went on to win the CIF title the following week and advanced to their second consecutive state bowl game.
Perez returned to action to play three games last season. He spent the majority of the year getting acclimated to the yellow no-contact jersey he wanted no part of but a cautious Altenberg made mandatory.
“I didn’t like the yellow jersey,” Perez said. “My coach wanted to know where I was at, at all times. I didn’t like it though. I felt like I was standing out. I had a bright yellow jersey. I was looking like a big bee.”
The fact that he was able to step onto the field in the yellow jersey was a win in itself. The odds were stacked against him after being told that he'd never be able to play again.
“It was just heartbreaking,” Altenberg says of the injury. “It was just such a scary deal and for so long we really just thought that was it. We were thinking we were just so happy that he was able to walk. We never dreamed that he would be able to play football again. I mean, that was just never in the equation.”
He would have played much sooner in the season, but he was awaiting a request for an extra year of eligibility from the CIF, which the family says was denied.
Back for his first full season since the injury, Perez has continued his comeback by earning All-Mission League honors this season. He currently holds scholarship offers from Air Force and Idaho.
On Friday, he will lead a strong Serra (11-2) defense into the Western Division final against league rival Chaminade (12-1) at 8 p.m. on Prime Ticket.
“I want to play in the championship game and not watch it,” Perez said. “I want to earn my ring the right way instead of just watching my team do work while I’m not doing anything.”
On Friday, he’ll put his pads on, neck roll included, and play in a championship game for the first time, deprived of the opportunity to do so in 2010.
Before taking the field, he’ll spot his dad.
Rico will tell him “keep your head up” and they’ll shake hands.
And then he'll go out and play the sport he loves.
