DALLAS - Remembered as someone full of joy and loud with laughter, former Dallas Cowboys running back Ron Springs has passed away.
We're never going to give up, said Adrian Springs, Ron's wife, in an exclusive interview with News 8 back in March of 2010. We hear about miracles every day.
Springs visited her husband daily, praying for his recovery.
The 54-year-old former Cowboys running back died at Medical City, which is where he had been since lapsing into a coma in October 2007. He flatlined while under anesthesia for a routine cyst removal on his arm.
Springs made national headlines after receiving a kidney from his longtime friend and former teammate Everson Walls. Together, they established the Gift for Life Foundation to raise awareness of kidney disease and living donor organ transplants.
Walls told News 8 that despite being in a coma for three years, Springs was very stable physically, showing no signs of deterioration. His death from an unexpected heart attack has taken his family and friends by surprise.
It was Walls who spread the word of his friend's death among Springs' former teammates.
Shortly after he told me that, I had to be alone and I did my share of crying as well, said Drew Pearson, a former Cowboys teammate.
Pearson said he'll always remember Springs as the great storyteller of the Cowboys' locker room.
Everybody told stories, but nobody told them like Ron, who had you rolling laughing, he recalled. And just breaking the intense atmosphere by telling jokes and keeping everyone loose.
Pearson said he regrets not seeing his friend one last time.
Springs family hopes his tragic situation will prompt other patients to check out their anesthesiologist as thoroughly as their surgeon. And, they said they want the world to remember Springs as a proud Dallas Cowboy who led a fulfilling life as an athlete, father and husband.
