Sean Meagher

By Andrew Greif, The Oregonian/OregonLive

EUGENE — On a recent afternoon, Holly Herbert walked into her kitchen holding a framed photo that could have come out of an Oregon athletics museum.

It was taken at Christmastime in 1998. Nine-month-old Justin Herbert, the second of Holly and Mark’s three sons, wears overalls in the lap of a smiling Len Casanova, then 93. It was signed in gold pen: “To Justin, from Cas.”

“Who’d have known, taking this photo?” Holly said.

The significance is startling: An infant who’s since become the face of Oregon Ducks football as its homegrown, star quarterback, held by the iconic coach who brought the program into the modern era with success that took decades to replicate.

To those who knew Rich Schwab, it’s telling.

“Schwabby,” who played receiver at Oregon from 1960-63, was a natural connector. And nothing was intertwined tighter than his twin loves: family and Oregon football. It was Schwab who introduced his grandchildren to UO football. Now, it feels almost “predestined,” one friend said, that his grandson is not just playing for the Ducks, but thriving.

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Courtesy Herbert family

Justin Herbert and Len Casanova in 1998

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Expectations for Herbert have gone wild entering UO’s 2018 season opener Saturday at Autzen Stadium against Bowling Green. Could he win the Heisman Trophy? Could he become a No. 1 NFL draft pick? After football, could he go to medical school, with his 4.0 GPA? It’s all conceivable. This should be the most anticipated season in the family’s long history with the game. It still could be the most exciting.

And yet, Schwab’s unexpected death in January, at 75, has left those closest to him reconciling what it will mean to go through fall without the man known as Papa Rich — the family “rock,” his daughter said.

“I just remember all the people who would come to me and tell me how great of a man he was, and I knew it,” Justin Herbert said. “Everything he taught me, I try to live by every day to make sure I honor him.”

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"LIVED AND BREATHED" FOOTBALL

“F88” always worked.

The play began with Schwab, who wore 88 at Oregon, running an assigned route. Depending on the defense, it was up to him to change it.

“No matter where he ended up,” said Dave Tobey, a friend and former all-conference UO center, with a laugh, “Bob Berry would get him the ball.”

Schwab and the Ducks played in the Sun Bowl in 1963, the last UO team to reach the postseason for 26 years. But his legacy was never his statistics.

It was his magnetism.

If you played for Oregon in the last 60 years, you likely met Schwab at an alumni event he helped organize: golf outings in central Oregon, lunches in Eugene on Mondays and the team’s annual preseason barbecue. Schwab bought the meat, recruited volunteers, manned a grill and worked the room.

“If Rich called you, you would drop what you were doing,” Tobey said. “If you had other plans, you’d cancel them.”

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Courtesy Herbert family

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When Dave Wilcox met Schwab in 1961, they shared only their place on the depth chart — second-team receiver. Wilcox was from Vale, on Oregon’s rugged eastern edge, and Schwab from San Diego. Soon they were celebrating holidays together, joining other teammates whose families lived far from Eugene. Wilcox became an NFL Hall of Famer. Schwab coached at Churchill and Marist high schools, winning a state championship at the latter in 1973, before ending his career in private business and human resources. The former Ducks were in each other’s weddings. They started families; Schwab married Kelli and had three children. Grandchildren arrived. (Wilcox was so close with Schwab, he can still rattle off the address of a house Schwab lived in during college.)

The gatherings continued.

“Our son Justin was born in the early evening the same day that Marist High School was playing in a playoff game,” Wilcox said. “I kept telling the doctor, ‘Justin needs to hurry up and get here because I’ve got to get to Schwabby’s game.’”

When Holly Herbert said her father “lived and breathed Oregon football,” it’s only a slight exaggeration. He attended Oregon’s 2009 Rose Bowl appearance shortly after undergoing surgery to replace a valve in his heart.

The passion was passed down to his grandchildren.

“From birth,” she said.

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"PROUD GRANDPA"

For the Herbert brothers, Mitchell, Justin and Patrick, their introductions to UO football began in Section 12 of Autzen Stadium, Rows 32 and 33, where the Schwabs had four season tickets.

But unlike so many Ducks fans, the Herbert boys’ connection to UO continued long after leaving the stadium.

Mitchell tagged along with his grandfather to the season-ending team banquet. Running back Maurice Morris stopped by the Schwab house to say hello. Wilcox's sons, Josh and Justin, became Ducks and de facto family. Casanova was a father figure to Schwab and was almost a third grandfather, alongside Roger Herbert, a former Oregon State sprinter and longtime track coach at Sheldon High School. UO's roster was practically an extension of the Schwab family tree.

In 1998, an acquaintance asked Schwab to look after a freshman quarterback from Los Angeles named Adam Kennybrew. The perfect strangers became a perfect match. When the Ducks asked for a position switch to fullback, Kennybrew didn’t talk to his family about whether to transfer or stay. He discussed it with Schwab.

“He provided me with advice no one else provided for me,” Kennybrew said. “I always knew if I had a moment of being lost or things not being OK, I can always go to Rich and it’ll be like pressing a reset button.”

For all that fandom, it hardly mattered to Schwab if the grandsons went to Oregon. He was most proud that they be well-rounded, Dave Wilcox said. Mitchell, who played receiver at Montana State, and Justin are both academic All-Americans. Patrick is a four-star recruit and Sheldon senior who has committed to Oregon. Coaches and friends rave about their dependability, humor and compassion — the same traits used to describe Schwab.

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Courtesy Herbert family

Justin Herbert with his grandfathers, Rich Schwab (left) and Roger Herbert.

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The last few summers Schwab would call Wilcox about watching an Oregon practice together, just as he watched nearly every sporting event involving his grandchildren since youth leagues. Schwab didn’t want to distract Justin, but he was too excited about the team, and proud of his grandson, to stay away.

Schwab would try to hide at practice, “but I could always see him,” Justin said. “I’d always know he’d be there. He’d be sitting, talking. Was just a really personable guy. Just loved to be around. That’s something that I’ll miss the most.”

“Rich wouldn’t have cared where he played,” said Doug Post, a teammate whose introduction to Schwab at McArthur Court in 1960 began a lifelong friendship. “But the fact he played quarterback, that obviously is special.”

Indeed, after a photographer published a photo of Heisman winner Marcus Mariota watching Herbert during a 2017 spring practice, Schwab was so thrilled he blew up multiple copies.

Herbert paid visits with his own. On Thursday nights he stopped by his grandparents’ house to use their hot tub and check in. Schwab gave him his space, understanding the moments as reprieves for a teen living in the public eye, and anyway, he got his football talk in eventually. On fall Sundays, when Holly dropped by to get her father’s take, she found herself often competing for his attention.

The phone was constantly ringing, his friends calling to hear Schwab’s thoughts, too.

“He was a very proud grandpa,” Holly said. “I think to him he was probably like, ‘Finally. Other people see what I’ve known Justin to be.’”

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A VOID

Even those who’d known Schwab longest still talk about him as if they’re trying to crack a code. How had he done it? How, as his family and commitments grew, did he seemingly have endless time for a seemingly endless amount of people?

His celebration of life packed Autzen’s massive club level. And everyone had a story about how he’d touched their life.

“I was thinking at the memorial, seeing all those people, I would bet that the majority there thought that they were one of Rich’s best friends,” Tobey said. “Because everybody who knew Rich thought of him as a best friend.”

One last time, he’d brought everyone together. Which raised a question that many have spent months answering: How do you fill the void of such a central figure when they’re gone?

As Oregon’s coach from 1995 until 2009, Mike Bellotti knew Schwab as a “grandfatherly” figure available to help in any way. Before UO’s annual preseason barbecue began earlier this month, former punter Josh Bidwell, after asking Herbert’s permission, said a blessing on Schwab’s behalf.

“Him not being there was noticeable,” Bellotti said. “He was genuinely one of the nicest people I’ve ever met and it’s hard when those guys pass. You kind of go, wow. I don’t know if there are people who can fill that void.”

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Oregonian archives

Rich Schwab in 1963, his senior season at Oregon.

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For Wilcox, attending Ducks practices without Schwab has been an adjustment.

“It’s going to be a little different, but I know Schwabby is up there somewhere paying attention,” he said. “Cas, I’m sure, is up there talking with him.”

Holly thinks about her father every day. When she found a letter tucked away in his office from a former Churchill player, who’d written Schwab 16 years ago to share that his firm-but-fair style as a coach and teacher had kept him from dropping out of school.

In the days after Schwab’s death, from complications following a stroke, she and her husband sat down with their sons to talk. How did they want to remember him?

“And Justin was like, ‘I’m going to honor him by being a better teammate and better person,’” Holly recalled. “I was just like, wow. Because he’s a man of few words.”

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Chris Pietsch/Register-Guard

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HONORING "SCHWABBY"

Ten days before kickoff, Herbert was still unsure how his own tribute will take shape. Given his private personality, it likely will not be a public display.

“I was fortunate enough to have the 20 years I had with him,” Justin said. “I’d like to say that I made him really proud.”

Schwab will be honored in other ways, too. Kidsports and Marist High School each are creating memorial scholarship funds in his name, and at Marist's football field, a sign listing the school's football titles was recently erected in his honor.

The hot tub is now at the Herbert household, awaiting installation. Businessmen selling financial services and insurance, searching for an in with the family before Justin’s eventual NFL career, call the house yearningly. ESPN asked to drop by for an on-camera interview.

Holly is still amazed Justin her son has become such a public figure.

“On one hand, it’s crazy,” Kennybrew said. “But on the other it’s like, of course it would happen this way. Of course it would be his grandkids to carry on his legacy at such a high level.

"Rich is so deserving of it — which makes them even more deserving of it.”

So much is changing, but some things stay the same. In the offseason the Herberts renewed Schwab’s four season tickets, and when Justin takes the field Saturday, his family plans to sit together and watch from Section 12, Rows 32 and 33. The same spot where Papa Rich introduced them to UO football so long ago.

His family and his team, together.

There could be no better tribute.

-- Andrew Greif

agreif@oregonian.com

@andrewgreif