During the final glorious games of last season, that question popped up and was debated at length by Buckeye fans on the Eleven Warriors website. And that conversation spawned the scarlet T-shirts – emblazoned with “Who is Fong?” across the chest – that are now worn by Fong’s family and friends, several of whom attended the OSU spring game in April and found themselves quizzed by other folks in the crowd:
“Who is Fong?”
That most folks know nothing about Chris Fong is understandable. Before he became a Buckeye defensive lineman, he went to Troy High School, where, in three years of freshman and junior varsity football, he had two seasons where he never got on the field at all and one – because of an injury to a guy in front of him on the depth chart – where he got to play sparingly.
Senior year he moved up to varsity but once again never got into a game – not even on Senior Night.
So why did he stick with football?
He said he enjoyed being part of a team and helping make the guys ahead of him better. And more importantly, he said sports became a place for him to escape from the far more serious matters that were weighing him down in his life.
“Plus my mom has a rule,” he said with a smile as he sat in the Buckeyes team meeting room at the Woody Hayes Athletic Center. “She always says ‘Don’t be a quitter!’”
Julie Barker, Chris’s mom, agreed: “That’s absolutely a rule for all three of my kids. If you start something, you better finish it.”
At Ohio State – where he has added some 65 pounds from high school and now weighs 265 – Chris finally gave in to two years of lobbying by a friend and agreed to play for the club football team in 2013, his junior year of school.
His first game was against the Wright State club team. After that he played a couple of more times, but couldn’t go on the road with the team because he was working a job while going to school.
Then just before last season, the OSU football program made an offer to the club team. The Bucks needed some practice-player linemen and were offering walk-on status to those who got through the tryout.
Chris said he remembered a kid from Piqua he’d met on campus a couple of years earlier. He had made the Bucks as a walk-on and urged him to try to do the same. At the time Chris wasn’t interested, but then came the offer from Urban Meyer’s coaching staff.
“I figured it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, something I’d never forget, so I figured Why not?’” he said. “I mean the worst they could do was say ‘No!’’’
And he’d heard that plenty of times before.
First, though, he called his mom back in Troy.
“He asked me, ‘Is it OK if I try out for the football team? Do you mind?’” Julie said quietly. “He was real low key about it – he keeps his emotion to himself – but he still asked my permission.
“And then two weeks later, he called and in the same voice he said he’d made the team.”
Although on the scout team, Chris was not part of the 105-man preseason roster and he didn’t dress for games or get to travel with the team. When the Bucks played in the Horseshoe, he’d watch from the stands and when they went on the road, he sat in front of the TV with his friends.
At the end of the season the roster expanded to 120 players and he was told he’d be on the sideline for the Michigan game, wearing his OSU jersey with his name on the back.
“Just running out of the tunnel with the team for the very first time was probably the most memorable part of that game,” he said. “To see everyone and run into that noise and everything, it was awesome.
“And as the game went on, I guess I was standing next to Urban for a while and I showed up on TV quite a bit. That’s probably how all that ‘Who is Fong?’ stuff got started.”
Chris was on the sidelines for the Alabama game, too, and then the national title game against Oregon.
“There was a real big-game atmosphere to those games and running out of the tunnel in the title game was even better than it was at the Michigan game,’ he said. “The best part was at the end, just seeing everybody so happy.”
Afterward he got a national championship ring, the only guy to receive such a bauble even though he had never played a down of high school varsity or college football.
Just recently he had an interview for a job as a pharmacy technician at the James Cancer Hospital at OSU and that prompted a question.
“Christopher asked me, ‘Should I wear my ring?’” Julie said with a laugh. “I told him ‘Absolutely.’”
Regardless of his lack of touchdowns or tackles, she figures he’s earned it for what he’s endured on his way to becoming a Buckeye.
Sports as an escape
Chris said when he was in the sixth grade his birth dad left the family.
There were three kids – Alex is five years younger than Chris and Julia is 10 years younger – and for a couple of years afterward the children did visit him every other weekend.
“Then freshman year, a week or two before Christmas, he sat my brother and me down and told us he didn’t love us,” Chris said quietly. “He told us he didn’t want to see us anymore … and he hasn’t. I know he’s remarried now and has some kids, but he’s out of my life totally.”
Julie said it was especially tough on Chris because he was old enough to understand what was happening and he remembers.
“As a kid, how do you respond when your dad tells you, “I don’t love your mom, I want someone else?’” she said. “Chris was standing there and overheard his dad saying, ‘I never wanted these kids in the first place.’”
Chris admitted junior high was “a rough time for me because of that whole ordeal.”
He said he found an escape through sports, not just with football, but in wrestling, where he was a district qualifier in high school, and in track, where he qualified for regionals in the discus.
“Sports took my mind off the things that were going on at home,” he said. “When I was doing sports, I didn’t think about anything else.”
By the time he was a junior, his mom had remarried – Brad Barker is “a good man” Chris said – and life seemed good again.
And then came another devastating blow.
Julie was diagnosed with cervical cancer.
“I was in shock at first,” Chris said. “I remember about a week later I broke down and cried at wrestling practice. Everything just hit me…it…aaah….I…yeah…”
The memory again welled up in him and he just shook his head and became silent.
“She means everything to me,” he finally said. “I don’t know what I’d do if I lost her.”
Since Julie was treated for her cancer at the James in Columbus and Brad was working extra hours to deal with the mounting medical bills while also trying to finish up a nursing degree, Chris had to step in and help wherever he could.
“Chris would take his brother and sister to their (soccer) practices when we weren’t around,” said Julie. “He helped with the grocery shopping, cleaned the house, did the laundry and made sure the other kids had uniforms to wear.”
Although now in remission five years, Julie hasn’t forgotten those uncertain times: “I don’t know how we would have made it without Christopher stepping up.”
Carrying on Fong tradition
After his freshman year of college, Chris got rid of his birth dad’s name and officially changed his last name to Fong, which is his mom’s maiden name. He had wanted to do it sooner, but she wouldn’t let him.
“I made him wait until he was 18,” she said. “I knew if he tried to do it sooner, there would be repercussions.”
The Fong name is respected in Troy. Julie played soccer at Wilmington College. Two of her brothers went to U.S. service academies, another brother, David, is the editor of the Troy Daily News, and her sister Jenny is the communications design manager at the Columbus Museum of Art.
“I knew if I was going to take that name, I had to try and be great, too,” Chris said with a smile.
Because of stellar treatment he felt his mom got at the James, Chris decided he wanted a course of study in college that would enable him to get a job helping people.
“I’m not a big fan of blood, so I couldn’t be a doctor or a surgeon,” he said with a shrug. “But I figured I could be a pharmacist. I watched how they explained the medications and everything to my mom. They were really friendly and helpful.”
He initially looked at Ohio Northern University, but then was accepted at Ohio State. Through the Troy Foundation, he received the renewable, $10,000 Elizabeth and Leon Brown and Frank and Sara Montross Scholarship.
To say he makes the most of his time at school is an understatement.
This summer for example, he is taking 13 hours of classes – including microbiology, calculus II, a history course and yoga – and he is working TWO jobs.
He’s a pharmacist technician at Walgreens and he also does clean up and maintenance work on the properties handled by his uncle’s real estate company.
And he’s also been doing all the football team’s offseason workouts, including two hours in the weight room every day and conditioning drills a couple of times a week.
He’s especially excited for football this season, in part because he got time on the field – 17 plays, one tackle – in the spring game. He hopes to make the 105-man roster at the start of this season, meaning he would be on the sidelines and have the chance to travel.
Still, his schedule again would be full with classes and that job he could land at the James.
Right now life has never been better. His younger brother and sister are both soccer standouts and he said his parents are happy.
“My (stepdad) definitely cares about our family,” Chris said. “He’s been great.”
With a grin, he shrugged and amended that, saying he is “almost” great.
“Unfortunately, he likes that team up north,” he said without actually saying Michigan. “He used to work there. I think he likes OSU now because of everything the James did for Mom and because of the chance I’m getting now.”
“But I don’t think I’ve ever seen him wear anything scarlet or gray…yet.”
That may change if Chris has anything to do with it. After all, he is a totem to backbone and persistence and he lives Mom’s mantra: He does not quit.
“Who Is Fong?”
As Julie softly explained:
“I just smile and tell everyone, ‘He’s my son.’”
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