Life of Fitz | A Cancer Warrior's Conversations about Life

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his new friend and former Kansas State University quarterback from the 1980s, Donnie Campbell. Some listeners may remember Campbell playing at K-State from 1980-84, but what has now made him well known is the fact that in the 1990s he coached a player named Jason Sudeikis, who went on to become a comedian, a cast member...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his friend and former Kansas State University president Jon Wefald, who altered the downward spiral of the university while serving as its leader from 1986 to 2009. Wefald and his wife, Ruth Ann, now live on Bay Lake, which is about two hours north of Minneapolis. During Wefald's tenure in Manhattan, he lifted enrollment...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his friend SiriusXM host Ari Temkin. Fitz and Temkin met through Temkin's show Big 12 This Morning on the Big 12 channel (SXM 375) and they quickly hit it off. Temkin, a 2007 graduate of Kansas, has spent a majority of his career in Texas, hosting shows in Austin and San Antonio before moving to SiriusXM to co-host his s...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling former Kansas State receiver Curry Sexton, who now practices law in Kansas City. Sexton is a former walk-on from Abilene, Kansas, who developed into a special pass-catcher during his career. He currently sits at seventh on the school's all-time reception list and made many key plays during his career from 2011-14, but a...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his former employee, Matt Hall, who became a competitor in recent years. Fitz and Matt had a public falling out when GoPowercat left the Rivals.com Network to join 247Sports and Matt became part of the new Rivals team that competed against GPC. Their relationship soured and their feud became public, but in the spring of...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling Manhattan businessman Larry Weigel, a former Kansas State basketball player and assistant coach. Weigel played for Coach Tex Winter and was a member of the 1964 Final Four team starring Willie Murrell. He went on to serve as an assistant coach for Winter, then Cotton Fitzsimmons and Jack Hartman. Last week's guest, Lon K...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling former Kansas State basketball player and coach Lon Kruger, who retired from coaching this fall when he stepped down at the University of Oklahoma. Fitz was a senior at Kansas State in 1986 when Kruger was hired to replace the legendary Jack Hartman, and his official hiring was a story Fitz scooped as the sports editor o...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling former Kansas State assistant coach Mark Mangino, who went on to win a national title as offensive coordinator at Oklahoma and then became Kansas' head coach for nine seasons, leading the Jayhawks to a historic Orange Bowl season in 2007. Two years later, KU athletics director Lew Perkins fired Mangino and Kansas footbal...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling former receiver/quarterback Kody Cook in Hutchinson, Kansas. Cook is now the wide receivers coach at his alma mater Hutchinson Community College, and after playing a spring season this year due to COVID-19, the Blue Dragons captured the national title. Before going to Hutch and eventually Kansas State, Cook was the quart...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling former Kansas State defensive end Darren Howard in Tampa, Florida. Howard came to K-State from the Florida prep ranks in 1995, playing for Coach Bill Snyder during the 1996 through 1999 seasons. During that span of time, Howard asserted himself as one of the more disruptive defensive ends in college football, and then he...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling former Kansas State quarterback, baseball player and football coach Matt Miller. Miller was the quarterback for the 1995 Kansas State team and was named the second-team All-Big Eight quarterback after a record-setting senior season. Miller directed the program to its first 10-win season and into a Holiday Bowl berth that...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling former Kansas State placekicker Mark Porter. Porter redshirted in 1984 and then played for the Wildcats from 1985-88. Older fans may remember Porter as a player, but all fans now know him as the father of two walk-on receivers in the K-State program, sophomore Seth and incoming freshman Shane, who is better known for hav...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald turning over the hosting duties to his employee Ryan Gilbert. To set the stage for the start of the second season, and to reset the direction of the podcast that is now growing beyond the boundaries of the COVID-19 pandemic and Fitz's lockdown, Ryan asks Fitz about his health, his plans for the show, and his thoughts on the fall...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his friend Kevin Lockett, the most prolific receiver in Kansas State football history and the first of the Locketts to come to K-State. Kevin came to Manhattan in 1992 from Tulsa’s Booker T. Washington High School and he quickly became known for flying high to make an endless string of aerial receptions for the Wildcats....

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his friend Mark Simoneau, a former Kansas State and NFL linebacker. During his time at K-State from 1995-1999, Simoneau became a dominant force for the Wildcats during the late 1990s. He was named the Big 12’s defensive player of the year after the 1999 season and went into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2012. Afte...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his friend Brien Hanley, an offensive lineman on the historic 1997 and 1998 Kansas State football teams. Hanley was part of a junior college recruiting class for Coach Bill Snyder that forever changed K-State football, as well as college football by proving a program can recruit juco players and still be a national title...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his friend Michael Smith, the first breakout star of Bill Snyder's Kansas State program as a highly productive receiver. Smith completed his K-State career in 1991 as the second-leading receiver in Big Eight Conference history and after a brief stint in the NFL, Smith entered coaching. He spent 17 seasons at K-State work...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his friend Jamar Samuels, a former Kansas State basketball player for Coach Frank Martin. Over his four seasons, Samuels averaged 9.5 points and 5.4 rebounds a game, including a points average of 11 during his sophomore season. Samuels was always in motion, hustling, fighting, and too often fouling, but the fans loved hi...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his friend, fraternity brother and former Kansas State football player Al Jones. Jones walked onto the K-State football program under Stan Parrish and played two years as a tight end. Then when Bill Snyder arrived in December of 1988, he put Jones and his teammates through a trial by fire. Jones and those who survived th...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his dear friend Claire Coggins, a former Kansas State women's basketball player and assistant coach. Claire was the focal point of the Kansas State women’s team in the mid-2000s, twice earning second-team All-Big 12 recognition before playing the 2007 season with the WNBA’s Chicago Sky and then one season professionally...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his good friend Wyatt Thompson across town in Manhattan. Thompson is entering his 19th school year as Kansas State’s Voice of the Wildcats, the title carried by a long line of sports play-by-play announcers. Being called the Voice of the Wildcats comes with incredibly high expectations from a fan base who has enjoyed som...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his former student and Kansas State baseball player BJ Kissel, who now is an in-house reporter for the Kansas City Chiefs of the NFL. The former K-State athlete was one of about 15 students in a sports writing class offered in the spring of 2006 by K-State's AQ Miller School of Journalism, which was taught by Fitz. After...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling former Kansas State football player and coach Joe Bob Clements who now coaches the defensive line at Oklahoma State in Stillwater, Oklahoma. Clements was one of the players who was the heart and soul of the 1998 Kansas State Wildcats, who went unbeaten in the regular season. After completing his playing days, Clements la...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling former Kansas State basketball player Clent Stewart in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. Stewart came to Kansas State to play for Jim Wooldridge and ended his career with seasons under Bob Huggins and Frank Martin. That was like taking a college masterclass in basketball coaching and now Stewart is a high school coach in Oklahoma,...

This edition of the Life of Fitz podcast features host Tim Fitzgerald calling his good friend Bobby Burton in the Nashville suburb of Brentwood. Bobby and Fitz go back 25 years when Bobby, who was then working for the National Recruiting Advisor in Austin, Texas, served as Fitz's first national recruiting expert to help him cover Kansas State football recruiting. Burton eventually helped launch th...