I've posted the details on this story a few times here, but it's been a while and the memories are a little fuzzy, but...
Right before I was heading into my senior year (Fall 2006) I had my third shoulder surgery. I was in surgery and gave my cell phone to my little sister. I had gotten Fran's personal cell phone number as it had been passed through the stands at a game the previous season. People were getting his number so they could call and text him to quit as 2005 had been a bad year.
My sister decides to start going through my phone while I was in surgery. She found the number for "Coach Fran" and called it, thinking it was a joke. He answered and she immediately hung up. It was a 405 number at the time and he no doubt thought it was something to do with OU/OSU football or a recruit because he called back like 3 or 4 times in a row. My mom finally answered it realizing what my sister had done and explained to him that we were very sorry to bother him, her son was an Aggie and would be entering his senior year and was in surgery and his little sister was calling people on his phone.
Coach starts up a conversation with her about OU/OSU (mom and dad are OSU grads) and how much they both hate OU and he keeps her on the phone for about 5 minutes. Fran tells her that if we need ANY help to give him a call when we get into College Station the next week to move me in and that if I needed anything as I healed to let him know.
A week to 10 days later I got a phone call from Dennis Franchione asking how my recovery was going. He offered to get me some football players (who needed disciplinary action) to help me move in. I told him "no thanks, but I appreciate the offer and the gesture."
About two months later I get a call from Fran asking how recovery was going and if could help get me in with the more desirable rehab folks in the area. He even offered to let me come up to the facilities to let their staff make sure I was getting taken care of so the surgery and recovery would be successful. I already had a good one so I told him I thought I'd be ok.
I didn't love him as a coach, but as a person he way over delivered. He really did love Texas A&M and embodied what I thought being an Aggie meant, especially when no one was looking or knew what was happening.
