Gregg Doyel

gregg.doyel@indystar.com

INDIANAPOLIS – This Robert Mathis story starts in a north-side coffee shop. Mathis wasn’t there. Part of me figures he’s never been there, or to any coffee shop — ever. Mathis doesn’t strike me as a coffee drinker, but if he is, surely he takes his coffee black like the cowboys and soldiers and other hard-ass characters from the movies.

Because Robert Mathis is a hard-ass character from the movies.

Which is why this story begins in a coffee shop. I’m there with Colts punter Pat McAfee — the coffee shop was his idea, I say with a smile — and we’re discussing his stand-up comedy debut in Carmel. This was last summer. McAfee was letting me behind the scenes to chronicle it. So we met to discuss the show.

Pretty soon we’re discussing Robert Mathis, and here’s why: Robert Mathis fascinates me. He’s larger than life to me, has been since the day I got here in Oct. 2014 and saw him across the Colts locker room on West 56th Street, saw that serious, angular face below that bald head and watched him walk quietly toward his locker and in all seriousness saw other NFL players step aside. This was a movie, all right. And Mathis was Mufasa. You know, the Lion King.

As Mathis got closer, I saw how small he is. He’s listed at 6-2, and maybe he is … in cleats. OK, the guy’s not exactly “small” — he’s a pro football player, for crying out loud — but for the position he plays and the havoc he wreaks, he’s tiny.

And so we’re discussing Robert Mathis in a coffee shop when Pat McAfee offers a piece of advice.

“Don’t ever go after Rob (in a story),” McAfee tells me. “The locker room won’t tolerate it.”

Memo to self: Stay on Robert Mathis’ good side. And I did.

For six more weeks.

* * *

OK, so this isn’t an orthodox Robert Mathis story. Wanna read one of those? Colts insider Zak Keefer writes today about Mathis’ impact on the Colts, his accomplishments, his legacy. I’m hoping there’s room in the newspaper for all that, because Mathis’ impact, his accomplishments, his legacy are enormous.

As a quick aside, Mathis is a Pro Football Hall of Famer. Or he should be, even if his numbers, great as they are, are borderline: 122 sacks (tied for 18th all time), six Pro Bowls, one All-Pro selection in 2013 when he was AFC Defensive Player of the Year.

Borderline for the Hall, except for this one number, this one statistic that should push Robert Mathis over the hump:

Nobody in the past 25 years has had more strip-sacks than Mathis’ 46. It’s possible nobody in the past 50 years, or ever, has had more strip-sacks than Mathis, but that’s a statistic that wasn’t tracked until the early 1990s. So we work with what we know, and what we know is that on 46 occasions in his 13 seasons, Mathis has stripped the ball from the quarterback’s possession. One of the biggest plays in football, like an interception, only more violent, more visceral, more game-changing. And nobody in the last quarter-century has done it more times than Mathis?

Give a bust to a guy who was never, ever going to be a bust. No really, he had no chance at being a bust, because only a player with high expectations can be bust.

And Mathis had no expectations. That part of his story has been told a million times – I took my shot at it in September – but as a reminder: He wasn’t recruited by Division I-A schools out of high school. Wasn’t invited to the NFL Combine out of college. Wasn’t drafted until the fifth round. Wasn’t anyone that anybody knew anything about.

Now look at him. An all-time great who has had nothing given to him. Did it all himself. Did it all despite a strong wind in his face. Remarkable. Hall of Fame story there.

But I’ve put it off long enough. The part of this story where Mathis makes my stomach drop.

* * *

Reggie Wayne was, and probably still is, one of Robert Mathis’ closest friends. They were teammates from 2003-14. But then came that AFC title game, the Deflategate scandal and eventually Wayne was not re-signed.

Wayne signed that August … with the New England Patriots.

In IndyStar the next day, we ran a huge picture of Reggie Wayne walking away under the words: Patriot or Traitor? The story was mine.

And Robert Mathis hated it. Wouldn’t talk to me, and I mean that literally. Next time I needed to ask him a question, he nodded at me. That wasn’t a yes-no question, I said. He nodded some more. Is that all you’re going to do, nod at me? He nodded. Is this about Reggie?

Now he just stared at me.

And I got it. Respected it, actually. Loyalty is one of the most charming qualities we can have, and he was showing it. But here’s something Mathis didn’t do: Didn’t stop me from doing my job. Didn’t let teammates know he was mad at me. This was between two people, and Mathis left it there.

For the entire 2015 season.

Gotta say, I liked him more for it. I’d walk up to him with my eyebrows raised, and he’d start nodding. I’d turn and walk away thinking, “I’m not supposed to like that guy, but …”

So anyway, this season. The preseason, actually. Back at 56th Street, back in the locker room, back with Mathis. I walked up to him, and he wasn’t nodding.

“Tell you what,” he said, breaking into a big smile, “let’s have a fresh start.”

I will tell you, I was smiling. I will tell you, I walked away almost giddy. Does that sound weird? Don’t care. This felt like relief. This felt like forgiveness. This felt amazing, not on a professional level but a personal one. The stress of being on the wrong side of anyone is not good. In that moment it felt like a million pounds, pounds I wore only in that locker room, had lifted.

In the interest of objectivity, members of the media aren’t supposed to reveal fondness for a player. And until today, you’ve never seen any real fondness coming from me for Mathis. Until today, you’ve never read a Robert Mathis story that starts in a north-side coffee shop.

But today’s different, is it not? Today Robert Mathis announced his retirement. A special Indianapolis player is walking away. And so it is with fondness that I say: Happy trails, Rob. Hope to see that angular face and bald head some day at Canton, Ohio.

In bronze.

Find IndyStar columnist Gregg Doyel on Twitter:@GreggDoyelStar or atfacebook.com/gregg.doyel.

Before retirement, Robert Mathis turned to confidant Reggie Wayne

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