Editor's Note: The following is the second installment of Patrick Garbin's two-part "A 'Nobody' No More." GO HERE to read Part One, which was posted last Saturday.
By the end of Georgia’s 1986 football season, tight end Jim Hickey had been an exception to the rule—a walk-on who had hardly played high school football, yet one who would routinely see playing time for a major college football program. However, in year four of being a Bulldog, he nearly left the program.
Upon being moved that spring to offensive tackle, Hickey hardly saw the field, even during practices, and it was obvious he wouldn’t be an on-field contributor in his final season. Accordingly, he decided to quit the squad. That is, until he was approached by coach Dale Strahm, who spotted him during a team meal eating alone, alienating himself from his teammates. Strahm, the Bulldogs’ linebackers coach, held Hickey in high regard for the unconventional path he had taken to play football at Georgia, and believed it was necessary for him to see the field—at some position. Vince Dooley agreed and moved Hickey to the defensive line as the subsequent season loomed.
As the Bulldogs’ top reserve at defensive tackle in 1987, Hickey totaled 16 tackles and a fumble recovery. The seemingly modest numbers are actually rather admirable considering his unique collegiate football tenure as a four-year walk-on without a scholarship. Although a scholarship certainly was desired for financial reasons, Hickey was more so a letter-winner and an on-field contributor for two seasons—which was a lot more than what could be said for all the other walk-ons who were his teammates.
“It bothered me then, and it still bothers me today. Most guys who walked on didn’t play, so they didn’t earn a letter,” Hickey said. “It’s like they were never on the team. I mean, even trainers and managers got letters—and I get that—they play an important role for the team. But, obviously so do the walk-ons.”
While finishing up at UGA, Hickey worked at Northeast Sales Distribution in Athens, a wholesale beer and wine distributor founded and run by Frank Sinkwich, Georgia’s 1942 Heisman Trophy recipient. The young man who inconceivably played for the Bulldogs not only worked for but became really close to one of the greatest Bulldog players of all time.
Finally, with only one quarter of classes remaining, Hickey was granted a football scholarship from the University of Georgia just prior to graduating. Since then, he has remained rather involved with the Bulldogs’ football program. Hickey regularly attends lettermen functions, like golf tournaments and barbeques, had six season tickets to home games for a period of time, including a pair in Sanford Stadium’s SkySuites, and owned a condo at the Georgia Gameday Center.
Ironically, seated in the SkySuites while staying at his gameday condo with two former teammates, Hickey’s attendance at the October 22, 2005 Georgia-Arkansas game in Athens, the same day Tara Grinstead vanished, should’ve provided him with enough of an alibi to prove the former Bulldog player was not involved whatsoever in the disappearance. It essentially was enough of an alibi for the GBI, considering it did not interview Hickey until two weeks following the incident—and only then because the agency interviewed everyone who had been in recent contact with Grinstead.
Yet, because of a lapse in memory of an event from more than a decade before and a misstatement made while being interviewed, others could not let go of the association between Hickey, who had long been removed as a person of interest, and the missing school teacher from Ocilla, Georgia.
On the Up and Vanished podcast episode in late 2016, although Hickey thought the 2005 Arkansas game was at night, he seemed more so uncertain of when it was actually played: “I think that was a night game, if I remember correctly,” Hickey said to the podcast’s host, Payne Lindsey. “I could be wrong.”
Hickey was wrong. The game kicked off at 12:33 p.m.
“Suddenly, after they had heard the podcast, there were people who actually went online,” Hickey said. “They started posting insinuations like, ‘Why did he (Hickey) get the timing of the game wrong?’”
The subject was brought up by Lindsey in late January of 2017 during the 12th episode of the podcast. Those interviewed included a forensic investigator who had been hired by members of Grinstead’s family to investigate the case.
“The Georgia football game was actually during the day time. It started at twelve, probably over at four. Tara was at [a party in Ocilla] at eight o'clock when she sent the text to Hickey,” said the investigator referring to the message Grinstead sent the same day she disappeared. “If she sent the text to Hickey at eight o'clock or after eight o'clock at night, there's no way that he could've been at the ballgame and got it. … You (Hickey) were long gone from the Georgia game.”
In fairness, Lindsey stated although the forensic investigator made “an interesting point for sure,” it was a long stretch of time from the sent text and subsequent disappearance to when Hickey gave the inaccurate time of day of the Arkansas game.
“He told me on Facebook that he probably just had his times mixed up,” Lindsey said of Hickey. “He said they usually stayed up in the box (SkySuites) for a little while after the game, so it could’ve been night time when he got the message. He seemed sincere when he talked to me.”
Hickey was sincere, and had simply been mistaken concerning a long day-turned-night of tailgating/partying from more than a decade before.
“People want to know how I got the game’s time wrong. I’ll tell them how,” Hickey said. “Not unusual for me back then for a Georgia gameday, I drank all day with teammates up in the SkySuites—and then who knows where after that.”
Since the presumed murder of Grinstead, but not necessarily because of the tragic incident, Hickey has undergone what he describes as a “transformation.” Let’s just say, instead of him drinking all day on a Georgia gameday, you likely would find him more so enjoying perhaps the game itself, and definitely the fellowship of it all.
“I look at things in a completely different light today than I did 10-15 years ago,” said Hickey, now a devout Catholic. “I don’t want to belittle any of the things I did in the past, but I find my pleasure in different things now. The most important thing in my life now is the cross of Jesus Christ. That’s where I’m at.”
Since moving from the Atlanta area to Dallas, Hickey has worked in information technology at 7-Eleven’s corporate office. In addition, he is in the process of earning his Master’s in psychology from Divine Mercy University, a private Catholic institution. As far as any association he currently has with Tara Grinstead, and her murder case which has been solved for more than a year and a half, Hickey remains in demand—unfortunately.
“Yeah, right now, some woman with [a major cable network] wants to come out and interview me in reference to Tara,” Hickey said in a near-somber tone. “I think she wants to interview me because she’s probably having a hard time getting anything out of folks in Ocilla. You know, people from small southern towns can often be closed off—and for good reason. A story gets told—and only how a particular someone wants to tell it—and its message often doesn’t reflect very well on their community.”
Speaking of, Jim Hickey’s “story” is one of a twisting-and-turning account—from not even being good enough to play high school football, to improbably playing for the Georgia Bulldogs—but distinguished later more so as a UGA player associated with a murder victim—to finally finding other pleasures in life following a self-transformation. Still, his story’s message is a rather simple one: From a “nobody,” to a nobody no more.
“For all the kids, or really anyone for that matter, who don’t think they’re good enough, whether that’s in football or something else,” Hickey began, “if you want something in life, it’s certainly possible that you can achieve it. But first, you have to believe in yourself, and really want—really want badly—what you’re seeking.”
