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/ SPORTS / MONDAY, AUGUST 16, 2010 / THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN / KANSAN.COM
TELEVISION
Jimmy Johnson tackles another role:'Survivor: Nicaragua' contestant
MCCLATCHY-TRIBUNE
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — When Jimmy Johnson first appeared for the cold, rain and videotaped discomfort of the "Survivor" television set in Nicaragua, the other contestants didn't believe it was him.
"You're a look-alike," they said.
"Why would a guy like that be here?" they said.
That's the first, fascinating question, isn't it? Why did Jimmy do it? Why did he disappear to a remote part of the world for a month? Why start his own fire? Why build his own shelter? Why live on 100 calories a day, go nights without sleep, interact with strangers and have so few basic necessities that he used a palm frond to clean the grit off his teeth?
"They felt better afterward," he said.
He's rich. He's famous. He's successful. He's 67. He has a great wife
He has the dream home in the Keys. He can fish or drink or sit with friends all day if he wants. Why do this?
The answer offers the great thing about Jimmy.
"There was a philosophical part
Johnson
to doing it, he said. "I read this one quote. I can't say it verbatim, but it goes. 'Live your life from the start to the finish, but don't just live the length of it. Live the width of it, too.'
It's kind of like Wayne Huizenga is doing now with the QTL. — Quality Time Leaf.
"When I was a kid, I dreamed of actually living on the Amazon. Just in the wild. In nature. I dreamed of stuff like we did (on 'Survivor')."
Jimmy was home in Tavernier
as he talked, home with Rhonda and an aging Buttercup, home with all the things he never had in Nicaragua. No watch. No mirror. No phone.
"No comb, no hairspray," he said. Go ahead, insert a line on Jimmy's hair.
"The other reason I did it is I love the show," he said. "It's the one show I watch that I never TiVo because I'm always there watching it live."
He applied to do the reality TV show seven years ago. He was turned down. Three years ago, he tried again and was approved. But doctors found one completely blocked artery and another 70 percent blocked. He immediately had surgery. He lost 30 pounds. He got his cholesterol from 220 to under 100.
"In some ways, 'Survivor' might've saved my life" he said.
To prepare for this year's show, he
"We could hardly even get any drinking water to boil because of the parasites and such," he said. "You're thirsty, dehydrated."
swam. He died. "Let me see you start a fire with nothing." Rhonda would say, and he'd do it. But nothing could quite prepare him for the 39 days spent in the mud and rain and mountains of Nicaragua.
And that wasn't the worst part.
"The thing I had a tough time dealing with was no sleep," he said. "I mean, none at all for nights. When you're cold at night because you're soaking wet and it's raining and you have to stand by the fire to stay warm and you're saying, 'I hope the sun comes up soon' — that's the thing that stressed me as much as anything.
"I got so tired I didn't even slap the mosquitoes or flies off me. I've been through three-a-day practices as a coach or player. It's really hard. Strenuous. Taxing. But at least you
What did he want most upon returning to civilization?
get a good night's rest."
"The word got out and I had a cold, light beer waiting for me," he said.
"Survivor's" theme held. The 20 contestants were split into two teams. The twist this year was one team consisted of people under 30 while Jimmy's team didn't have anyone younger than 43. He was the second-oldest contestant ever on the show. And surely its most famous.
But then limmy has never been constrained by convention. As a coach, he always thought differently, talked differently and was viewed differently than others. He coached two of the three Dolphins playoff wins in the past 15 years, but dreamed so big that his reign gets branded a failure.
Jimmy keeps being Jimmy, too. In the past several months, he did penis
enlargement ads surely to enlarge his wallet and this "Survivor" show to enrich his life.
"As much as anything else, I wanted to get into nature and challenge myself," he said. "It gives me that much more respect of what our forefathers went through living out in the wild. It gives you a completely different perspective."
The show airs in September and all the bug-eating, people-eliminating details will have to wait until then. But upon leaving Nicaragua, he told the show's director, "Some of the most miserable nights of my life were spent here."
He's back in the real world now of flying to Los Angeles for a commercial and to New York for a Fox TV seminar. There are schedules to follow and a known role to play. But for 39 days this summer he did something to stretch the width of life. It's interesting. It's unusual. It's Jimmy.
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