Aspiring NFL player writes powerful letter after dad survives virus

Ellis McKennie III’s dream of becoming a professional football player didn’t come true this weekend, but his prayers had already been answered. His father, Ellis McKennie Sr., was discharged from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) after fighting the coronavirus for nearly a month.

The man McKennie describes as his superhero was wheeled out of the hospital to thunderous applause, then took his first steps after surviving COVID-19.

The former University of Maryland (UMD) offensive lineman penned a heartfelt letter on Friday, detailing the moment he’d been praying for as his father battled the pandemic-causing disease.

The senior McKennie had been put into a medically-induced coma. 

“It was pretty scary,” McKennie told CBS News, describing his father’s inability to breathe on his own. “The turnaround that he made was just incredible.”

McKennie, who is 6’4 and 310-pounds, wasn’t able to do a Pro Day for NFL Scouts to evaluate him on the field last month. His athletic combine was scheduled for March 15 but was canceled once the pandemic effectively shut down the world as we knew it. Days later, McKennie’s father tested positive for COVID-19.

In his letter on the Maryland Terrapins athletic website, McKennie wrote: “As a selfish 22-year-old, all I could see were my NFL dreams falling through the cracks. The last few weeks of what has been the best five years of my life were gone in the blink of an eye. No Pro Day. No graduation. No Senior Spring. That is all I could think about on March 15 . But by March 21, these self-centered concerns would be the least of my worries.”

The Terps’ 2019 team captain, who’s finishing his master’s degree in public policy, describes himself as an optimistic person, but says he started to worry when the hospital suggested a last ditch effort to save his father, the use of an Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO) machine.

“It was extremely, extremely scary,” McKennie recalled.

McKennie’s former UMD teammate and close friend, Jordan McNair, died in 2018 after spending weeks in the hospital after collapsing from heat exhaustion during a pre-season workout. McKennie said Jordan didn’t live very long after being placed on the ECMO machine.

“I distinctly remember him [Jordan] going on an ECMO machine and his parents explaining to me what it was, so when I heard them [the hospital] talking about that with my dad, it was the most terrifying, you know, Déjà vu moment I may have ever had,” McKennie said.

But the hospital didn’t have an ECMO machine and within days of it being brought up, McKennie’s father’s health improved. One of the big turning points, McKennie shared, was when the hospital turned his father on his stomach and decreased his dependence on the ventilator.

McKennie was hoping to reunite with his father soon and spend time with him as he continued on the road to recovery in Hanover, Pennsylvania, where the McKennie family home is located. McKennie hasn’t seen his dad since he was diagnosed. 

“I get to talk to him every day, now which is all I could really ask for,” McKennie said. “I’m honestly just relieved he’s getting better.”

Arthur Jones II is an Associate Producer for “CBS This Morning,” based in his hometown of Washington, D.C.