Healer of Giants

With NFL team salaries soaring above $90 million, caring for star quarterbacks and gifted wide receivers means protecting a considerable financial investment. The New York Giants, whose worth Forbes estimates at $806 million, have entrusted that responsibility for more than 20 years to one remarkable man, Ronnie Barnes ’75.


By Marion Blackburn


The first graduate of ECU’s athletic training program and a native of Wilson, N.C., Barnes is vice president of medical services for the Giants, making him the go-to man for player conditioning, rehabilitation, injury recovery and overall health. He’s not a medical doctor; he has a staff of physicians, athletic trainers and specialists who work for him.

He is considered a lifesaver by some, including Giants assistant coach Pat Flaherty, who told the New York Times it was Barnes who prodded him to undergo tests that uncovered a cancerous tumor. “If he had waited until the end of the season he wouldn’t have made it,” Barnes says.

Barnes, 54, cares so deeply about the bodies of the Giants that he’s come to represent the team’s soul. That was evident last October when the Giants’ beloved owner, Wellington Mara, died at age 89. One of the architects of the NFL, Mara had owned the team for 75 years, since inheriting it from a brother when he was 14.

Mara had approached Barnes in March with a question. “He says, ‘I have a lump under my arms. What should I do, Dr. Barnes?’ Later, they found out that cancer had spread to a lymph node under his arm,” Barnes remembers. “I went with him to all of his appointments and radiation. He was in the hospital for 30 days and I probably spent 25 of those nights with him. For him to want me there was a wonderful opportunity, and a tribute.”

When Mara died last fall, his funeral was held at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York with about 2,200 people attending and the cardinal presiding. In the eulogy, Mara’s oldest son, John, singled out Barnes for special thanks. “My father’s face would light up when Ronnie walked into the room. Nobody took better care of him and there was no one that he trusted more.”


Breaking new ground

Once, athletic trainers needed to know only one thing—how to tape a sprained ankle. But that changed dramatically in the 1970s amid a movement to improve academic training in what was an increasingly important field. ECU had one of the nation’s first sports medicine programs and Barnes became its first graduate.

He had been the trainer for his high school, the Wilson Fike Cyclones, where he worked alongside coach Henry Trevathan and best-friend Carlester Crumpler ’74 to defy the odds and snare three state championships.

“From the beginning he was the Ronnie we know today,” says Trevathan, now retired and living in Fountain, N.C. “Very interested, very dedicated, very punctual. Whatever it takes to be a trainer, he had it all. He could have done anything. But he also had character, personable qualities, along with the passion. They were all there in the 10th grade.

“Coaches liked him, players liked him, parents liked him,” he says. “He was good at what he did. He studied, he would check out everything.”

“Whenever it came time to get something done, Ronnie was there,” says Rod Compton, who for many years served as the Pirates’ head athletic trainer and today is assistant professor of health education. “He had great people skills and that shone through. He very quickly rose to the top.”

“His demands for excellence appeared early,” Compton remembers. “I’d trust my life with his skills and his ability to handle injuries and emergencies. He is very talented and can pick up things very easily. People think if someone can tape an ankle they’re a good trainer. But there’s so much more to it than that. You have to be good with people, good under pressure.”

“You want to be the best you can be,” says Barnes, 54. “Creating new ideas, being at the forefront. Making life better has driven me. There’s no greater way to have someone think of you than for them to say, ‘Ronnie Barnes is an excellent athletic trainer.’ That for me is the reward of hard work.”

Barnes’ father, a Baptist minister, and mother, a homemaker, both deceased, set high standards for him. “There are good values in eastern North Carolina,” he says. “The caring about people, the sense that you are responsible for someone else and not just yourself. There is a lack of selfishness. These are the kind of Down-East values I learned. I had wonderful parents, who got it right. They had wonderful personal values and wanted me to do better than they’d done.”


From a master’s to the majors

Within five years of graduation, Barnes completed a master’s degree at Michigan State University and made the major leap to the National Football League. By 1980 he was the Giants’ head athletic trainer.

He has seen the team through three Super Bowls—two wins and a loss—while gaining respect from his peers in the Big Apple and beyond.

“It’s a big job, because football is a collision sport,” he says. “There are lots of injuries to the musculoskeletal system. Lots of illnesses.”

Like the players they serve, sports medicine professionals operate like a team, with physical therapists, orthopedic surgeons, internal medicine physicians and even counselors pulling together to keep players fit and strong.

“My job is to put the team together, organize them, give them the ‘Giants’ approach—the Ronnie Barnes approach—to how we are going to treat our athletes,” he says. “Athletes should not be treated any differently than regular patients, except that in sports, there is a real sense of urgency for answers. Because once a player gets injured, in about six days, there’s another game day.”

Mike Hanley, who as ECU’s assistant director of athletics for medical services is responsible for the football team’s health, considers Barnes a sounding board for difficult situations.

“Without question, I’ve called Ronnie for help,” Hanley says. “He’s gone out of his way to help. He has time for everyone. It’s like he’s known them all his life. He has a natural ability.”

“You can’t be in the position Ronnie Barnes is in and not stay on the cutting edge,” says Dr. Katie Walsh, ECU’s director of sports medicine and athletic training. “Players want the best and they will find the best. They will replace an athletic trainer in a nanosecond if they don’t.”

The Giants haven’t replaced theirs in more than 20 years. In fact, the team promoted Barnes and made him a key member of the management team in 2004.  “Being an officer of the company allows you to have a seat at the table when football business is being discussed,” Barnes says. “That allows me to etch out some territory for medical care. I’m not a physician, but I bring some of the same things, such as setting up a system that works, helping them have access to specialists, following up on their care. That responsibility falls on me. There are models where physicians are in charge of that.”



Pioneering new techniques

After a quarter-century with elite athletes, he has a unique insight into their problems and has contributed research on hydration, injury patterns among athletes, sudden death and orthopedic medical conditions. Barnes also has supported new approaches that aggressively emphasize conditioning, physical health and mental well-being. Athletic trainers are responsible for the prevention and rehabilitation, and are present on the field during games to evaluate injuries and decide who returns, and who sits out.

“We’ve really come a long way in injury prevention,” he says. “Preconditioning involves year-round conditioning and flexibility. You want to recognize muscle deficits before an athlete is injured.”

The National Athletic Trainers’ Association has twice selected Barnes the National Professional Trainer of the Year. He joined the National Athletic Trainers’ Association Hall of Fame in 1999 and NFL physicians voted him Athletic Trainer of the Year in 2002. He was named to the Athletic Hall of Fame at ECU, Michigan State University and Wilson Fike High School.

He also co-authored a textbook, Athletic Training and Sports Medicine.

Barnes has been a generous supporter of ECU over the years, creating the Ronnie Barnes Sports Medicine Scholarship for juniors and seniors in the athletic training major. In 2002, the university recognized his contributions with the Ronnie Barnes African-American Resource Center at Joyner Library. This collection holds biographies, journals and other materials documenting the African-American experience.

Barnes, who has never married, likes to travel and is planning a visit to the Far East. He has visited Africa, Asia, South America and Europe where, he says, the museums in Amsterdam were a special treat.

Once home, he was set to begin his next big project, helping the National Athletic Trainers’ Association’s first capital campaign for research and education. He is also working on a study of shoes as related to football injuries.

His year will kick into high gear when football season rolls around again. When it does, he will again be among the Giants, watching for the subtle signs that an athlete is in trouble, such as in the case of a young player experiencing hip pain. At Barnes’ request, he went for tests that found a tumor that required major bone surgery to remove.

“That’s my role,” Barnes says. “I hear the complaint, assess it, triage to the doctor and make sure there’s a sense of urgency about how it is managed. We don’t just say it’s a sprain, or it’s muscle soreness. We take the time to figure it out.”