Sports

LeGrand: Rutgers keynote offer was rescinded

From Saturday until Monday, former Rutgers football player Eric LeGrand believed he would be Rutgers’ commencement speaker.

Now he officially is not, and he’s “very upset” about it.

According to multiple outlets, the man who has persevered through his paralyzing injury on the field was called Saturday by Gregory Jackson, chief of staff for Rutgers President Robert Barchi, asking that he speak at his alma mater’s May 18 commencement after Condoleezza Rice withdrew as speaker amid backlash. Monday, reports say, LeGrand’s phone rang again, this time with athletic director Julie Hermann on the line.

“[T]hey decided to go other ways for political reasons,” LeGrand tweeted.

LeGrand was not given a reason, and Monday the school announced Gov. Thomas Kean would be the keynote speaker.

“I’m very upset about it,” he said. “I was all excited all weekend thinking about what I was going to say. It’s rough.”

For one weekend, LeGrand envisioned proselytzing to legions of Scarlet Knights, of sharing his remarkable story.

“Starting in 2005, being recruited by Rutgers and what it meant to me to play here and go to school here,” LeGrand said. “And then the way everybody supported me. … I was just going to give inspirational words about how they should attack life. All the things I’ve learned so far. All the [graduates], they’re my age so I was going to try to [say] words they could remember, words that would inspire them to do great things in life.”

For reasons Rutgers has not yet stated to either the public or LeGrand, those words won’t be spoken this year.