Kentucky basketball coach on Ben Jordan: ‘Still a part of our family’
A certain sense of irony hung in the air when Kentucky basketball staged one of its youth camps at West Carter High School on Monday.
The setting was the alma mater of the late Ben Jordan, the UK baseball pitcher who did double duty in 2019-20 by agreeing to join the basketball team and push Nick Richards as a practice player.
John Calipari saluted Jordan’s contribution. “He gave Nick everything he could handle,” the UK coach told the campers and their parents. Jordan, who stood 6-foot-9, was “still part of our family,” Calipari added.
The Kentucky program presented West Carter High school with a photograph of Jordan that measured poster-size and then some. It depicted him wearing a basketball jersey and flipping a ball upward with his right hand while wearing a baseball glove on his left hand and a UK baseball jersey on his left side.
West Carter Coach Jeremy Webb said the picture would be on display either in the gym or the team locker room.
Jordan’s father expressed appreciation for UK basketball helping in the ongoing healing process for the family and the town of Olive Hill.
“We’re trying to recover as a family,” Kevin Jordan said. “We’ve lost a big piece of the puzzle that made our family go. Very thankful for the university and Coach Cal coming to West Carter. It means a lot to our family and I’m sure the community.”
The irony came from hearing people talk about how Jordan took solace in setting sports aside on occasion. An athletic hero since childhood, they said he felt pressure to play heroically and be Ben Jordan.
Incidentally, Jordan scored 1,425 points for West Carter. That’s about a point per person living in Olive Hill, which had a population of 1,599 according to the 2010 census.
Chris Perry, a volunteer with the West Carter High boys’ basketball team for more than 30 years, said he regularly ate postgame meals with Jordan.
“I got to know the real Ben,” said Perry, who added that there was one rule in place as the pair ate: “Don’t talk sports.”
That proved difficult, if impossible in Olive Hill where Jordan’s exploits enthralled people. His presence was noticed. So the two might go to a restaurant in Ashland (about 36 miles away) or Huntington, W.Va. (43 miles).
“We went all the way to Lexington after a game,” said Perry, who works as manager of the Carter Caves State Park.
Baseball was supposed to be Jordan’s ticket to athletic fame. He came to UK as the No. 3 baseball prospect in the state. Perry noticed tears in Jordan’s teenage eyes when he spoke of an elbow injury in high school meaning Tommy John surgery.
“Perry, it’s over,” the confidant recalled Jordan telling him.
Perry tried to reassure Jordan that the injury could be overcome.
Jordan’s father acknowledged that his son found ways to escape the ever-presence of sports.
“Anybody who knew Ben, sports was the issue they wanted to talk about with Ben,” Kevin Jordan said. “They really didn’t know Ben. He liked to spend his days wading in the creeks (and) fishing. And he was really somewhat shy.
“And I think he had a lot of pressure throughout his life. But, he was very blessed, too. It’s just an inexplicable tragedy. We’re devastated as a family.”
Of course, Kentucky saluted Jordan posthumously. He died unexpectedly on Jan. 11. Kevin Jordan and Perry declined to discuss specifics of the death.
Jordan would have turned 23 on June 2.
“It’s something that I don’t think you ever recover from,” Kevin Jordan said of his son’s death.
Perry said Jordan contacted him in the first week of January and wanted to get together. Perry said he is haunted by saying his workload prevented a reunion.
“I lost my older brother last year to COVID,” Perry said. “When (Jordan) passed away, it was like losing my brother all over again.”
Kevin Jordan and his wife, Stephanie, have three daughters: Abigail, Kara Beth and Jenna. Two will attend UK in the 2021-22 school year.
The daughters help their parents persevere.
“Just a tragedy,” Kevin Jordan said. “We spend day by day just to get through it for my girls. That’s the only thing that keeps us going. We have an obligation to our children to, you know, provide a happy home. So we do the best we can.”
Kevin Jordan is a dentist in Olive Hill. Stephanie works in the office. Neither has returned to work since their son’s death. He expressed gratitude for his patients’ understanding.
“We’re just trying to recover,” said Kevin Jordan, who posed for pictures with the UK coaches and players. “And there is no recovery. But we try to get to where we can cope and function in society.”
This story was originally published June 8, 2021 at 7:26 AM.
