“Everything on the line” was probably the most commonly used phrase describing the Week 17 game between the bitter rivals Green Bay Packers and Chicago Bears. The winner goes to the playoffs, the loser goes home.
It’s a rivalry that tears friendships and families apart, at least for that day or night. While Aaron Rodgers and Jay Cutler surely saw “everything on the line” that day, Kyle Moser, D.J. Hungerford and Nick Crandall didn’t.
They’ve seen “everything on the line”.
Kyle Moser lived it.
Moser, Hungerford and Crandall have known each other since January 15, 2011, the day Crandall picked up Moser and Hungerford for Marine Boot Camp. They haven’t seen each other in about a year, but a rivalry as strong as the Bears and Packers brought the three back together thanks to Operation Warrior Wishes.
I met Kyle, D.J. and Nick on Sunday, December 29th at Chicago Cut Steakhouse in Chicago, IL. Kyle is a 22-year-old from Oswego, IL, but currently at Walter Reed in Maryland. Nick came in from Michigan and D.J. from California.
The only thing I knew of Kyle’s story was that he’s a double-amputee caused by an explosion in Afghanistan. He’s sporting a Bears jersey, while D.J. is across the table in a Green Bay jersey wearing a slightly more confident smile.
The three interact like they’ve done this each of the last 16 weeks prior to Sunday kick-off. Kyle and D.J. were “automatic buddies”, Kyle says, from the day they met in boot camp. Nick was their squad leader, a mentor of sorts whose job was to “take what you learn from a book and teach you in the real world.”
The three were deployed together on August 31, 2011. It was Kyle and D.J.’s first deployment, Nick’s second. Immediately thrust into battle was then-19-year-old Kyle. A machine gunner, rifleman and radio operator, Kyle suffered a minor concussion and a few bone fractures when a tank he was in hit an IED.
His first mission back following the injuries was on November 21st, 2011.
On a mission searching for information regarding Taliban leaders, Kyle felt an unsure, uneasy feeling.
“I had a fishy feeling while sweeping the area,” he said. “I turned around in an attempt to walk around the area.”
Kyle relayed his uneasy feeling to his squad. Just a few steps later into the swampy area, that fishy feeling became a reality.
“I got blown up,” he said.
“Everything was black and I literally remember flying through the air before I landed. I fractured my pelvis. My legs and hands had no feeling. I couldn’t feel anything.”
The 20-30 seconds Kyle waited for help felt more like 20 minutes. He tried to put a tourniquet on himself to help stop the bleeding, but he was unable to grasp anything.
He was shaking when Casey Hansen was the first to reach him after clearing the area. Hansen kept assuring Kyle that he would be fine, “because you can’t really say anything else,” Kyle says. As Kyle was rapidly losing blood and eyesight, Hansen reassured Kyle he would be fine.
Kyle knew what was going on. Kyle looked down and saw that his legs were gone. He saw the blood and bone. He saw his damaged hand.
“I thought I was gonna die.”
With his life hanging in the balance, Kyle wasn’t thinking about himself. He wasn’t thinking about his missing legs. He was thinking about Casey. He was thinking about his family. He was thinking about his wife.
“It seemed like I wanted to die, but I didn’t, “ Kyle explained. “I just wanted him (Casey) comfortable. I didn’t want him to feel like it was his fault. I told him to tell my wife, my dad and my mom that I love them and I’m sorry.”
One more time Kyle looked at Casey.
“Look, I’m going to die. It’s okay.”
Nick watched the explosion from about 100 meters away. While his immediate worry was Kyle, he was also responsible for the lives of the rest of the squad and their security. After clearing the area and establishing safety, Nick made his way over to Kyle.
“I’ve seen explosions before but nothing to that intensity,” Nick said. “The lieutenant’s face froze.”
They were able to stop Kyle’s bleeding, and his eyesight became less foggy. Kyle weighed about 160 pounds to start the day, but guesses he was down to 110 after the blood loss. It took six men to carry Kyle to a safe area to avoid the risk of the tourniquets loosening.
It took 26 minutes from the time of the explosion to the time Kyle was on an aircraft, but Kyle swears it was more like a century. In the meantime, Nick says Kyle’s face was as white as the white tablecloth we ate breakfast on that day. Yet, Kyle remained calm, singing “I’m Blue” and “Pocket Full of Sunshine”.
Nick wasn’t allowed on the aircraft, but left Kyle with one message: “I love you, bro.”
“That came from the guy I’m used to screaming at me,” Kyle said of his squad leader. “I can’t even explain what that meant.”
On the aircraft, Kyle repeatedly asked the medic, “am I gonna live?” Kyle never got a direct response; instead the medic acted like he couldn’t understand what Kyle was saying and avoided the question. I asked Nick if he felt deep down that Kyle would really come out of this alive.
“Oh, he wasn’t gonna die on our watch,” he said. “It never once crossed my mind.”
Then there was D.J. He was in the middle of patrolling rotations. With only two hours of sleep after his 24-hour rotation, he got the call.
“Moser is a double-amp.”
D.J. and the rest of the crew jumped in trucks to go and take Kyle’s squad’s place.
When he heard it was Kyle?
“Pissed.”
Kyle’s wife Alex received a phone call from a strange number around 9 A.M. the next day. It was Kyle’s staff sergeant.
“I just remember breaking down thinking ‘this can’t be right’. I was in denial; I was crying so hard.”
The hardest part, Alex says, was waiting an entire week before she could see Kyle.
Kyle told me about the explosion, not feeling his limbs, looking down and seeing that his legs were gone with almost a half-smile. But as Alex explained her side of the story, Kyle buried his face in his hand, consistently wiping a trickling tear from his eye.
“Just going over it all again,” Kyle says when asked about his emotions. “It means a lot that they’re all here. A lot of guys that I was with out there I haven’t talked to since. It just means a lot to be with these guys again.
“It feels like time never passed.”
Kyle is limited to a wheelchair now. His prosthetics are too painful because of his small frame. There’s no muscle or fat there for support. He is rehabbing at Walter Reed and hopes to be released this year. He gets stares because of his wheelchair, because of his missing ring finger, because of his missing legs.
“People are curious. They stare. They’re just doing what they know,” he says. “It’s difficult, but I’m all good. I’m content. Life moves on.”
There truly was “everything on the line” for Kyle Moser. It was more than a fourth-down conversion. It wasn’t win or go home. It was survival. He didn’t give up and continues not to.
Operation Warrior Wishes provided him an unforgettable afternoon with two people who helped save his life. He was on the field when Chicago Bear Landon Cohen ran over to give him a handshake and a hug on the sidelines. He saw Devin Hester, his favorite player. And yes, he saw that 4th-and-8 from Rodgers to Randall Cobb—a play that D.J. won’t likely forget either.
On a night that turned friends into rivals, Kyle Moser was with Nick Crandall and D.J. Hungerford watching his favorite team and its arch-rival having his wish and reunion come true—a selfless act for a selfless warrior whose service and story are enough to drive us to reach for our wish, too.
“I wish I could’ve been there longer and have as many deployments as I could,” Kyle said. “I knew what I was getting into. I don’t regret a thing.”
