Pat Tillman's name still reverberates around NFL circles 20 years after his death.
Look no further than last year's Super Bowl. The former Cardinals safety was honored before the game, with four Pat Tillman Foundation Tillman scholars serving as honorary coin toss captains before the big game.
It was yet another recognition for the hard-hitting safety, whose life and career has become the topic of numerous books and documentaries.
For a younger generation of fan, though, Tillman is an enigma. His legacy — from his playing career to the mysterious circumstances of his death and the military ensuing cover-up — has spawned a series of queries.
Some have been concrete. Others are more abstract.
Nevertheless, Tillman is one of the more interesting figures in league history.
Ahead of the 20th anniversary of his death, it's worth revisiting the life and death of the former Arizona standout.
What happened to Pat Tillman?
Tillman was a burgeoning talent in the NFL, a former seventh-round selection who wowed fans with his penchant for spine-tingling hits and big plays. He played in the league from 1998-2001.
He starred for the Cardinals, enjoying four years with the franchise. In that time, he established himself as one of the league's better defensive backs. Tillman even netted All-Pro votes in 2000 after racking up 155 tackles (118 solo), two forced fumbles and an interception.
For his efforts, Tillman — described by many as a voracious reader with an unquenchable appetite for knowledge — was offered a multi-year extension by Arizona. However, he declined the deal and enlisted in the U.S. Army, instead, citing his desire to defend the country after the September 11 attacks. He joined the military alongside his brother on May 31, 2002 and was deployed to Iraq in March 2003. He subsequently returned to the U.S., completing ranger school before being deployed once again in April 2004, this time to Afghanistan.
Tillman was killed in action on April 22, 2004.
Pat Tillman cause of death
Initially, the army reported that Tillman had been killed by "enemy combatants" during an ambush. The narrative was as such: Tillman died defending his fellow soldiers, brought down by enemy fire after charging up a hill in the mountainous region of the Khost Province.
Tillman had, as described in "The Tillman Story," a 2010 documentary about the former NFL player, charged up a knoll in an attempt to protect his fellow compatriots. He was not, however, killed by enemy soldiers, the documentary suggests. Rather, he had been shot three times in the head by members of his own battalion.
Tillman's death by friendly fire was something of a nightmare for the U.S. Army, which had already suffered a major blow earlier in the week when "60 Minutes" detailed the grisly torture going on at U.S.-run detention center Abu Ghraib. So in an effort to drum up domestic support, Army officials reportedly fabricated the circumstances of Tillman's killing.
"Within hours, certainly, and probably less, the Ranger regiment — officers, high-ranking officers back in the States — were conspiring to cover this up," Jon Krakauer, the author of Where Men Win Glory: The Odyssey of Pat Tillman, wrote.
Tillman — who criticized the U.S. military apparatus in his personal journal and regularly questioned the legality of the invasion and occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan — was made into a military hero, a patriotic figure who died defending his country. He was immediately recommended for the Silver Star medal, his uniform and body armor were burned and numerous pieces of evidence from the scene of his death disappeared.
It was, as Tillman's mother, Mary, said a "steak dinner" for the much-maligned U.S. military, per the Telegraph.
We’ve got Abu Ghraib, all this other stuff [the garbage], but this soldier [the steak] who is very high profile has been killed; we can use this to our advantage. Unfortunately, he was killed by friendly fire. That means we’re going to have to spin it.
His family was informed that Tillman had, indeed, been killed by an opposition battalion. It wasn't until later that they would discover additional evidence surrounding his death.
MORE: History of Super Bowls in Arizona, from David Tyree's 'Helmet Catch' to Malcolm Butler's INT
Why did Pat Tillman get a Purple Heart?
Tillman was posthumously awarded a Purple Heart medal for his service in 2004. Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal detailed Tillman's death as the following:
...in the line of devastating enemy fire."
However, he communicated to military officials that that wasn't actually the case.
“I felt it was essential you receive this information as soon as we detected it,” McChrystal wrote in a memo to the Army's chain of command (via The Intercept's Ryan Devereaux), “in order to preclude any unknowing statements by our country’s leaders which might cause public embarrassment if the circumstances of Corporal Tillman’s death become public.”
Pat Tillman position
At a time when hulking figures like John Lynch, Rodney Harrison and Darren Woodson were lurking in the secondary, Tillman was cut from a different cloth. The strong safety was one of the position's least intimidating players when it came to height and size, standing in at just 5-foot-11, 204 pounds.
He was, however, a nuisance out in the open, capable of driving oncoming ball-carriers down to the turf with relative ease.
How much money did Pat Tillman give up to leave NFL?
Tillman ended his career prematurely, trading football for military fatigues in 2002. It wasn't because he didn't have options in the NFL, though. Not only did Tillman reject a five-year, $9 million deal with the Rams to remain loyal to the Cardinals.
Some time later, he would decline a three-year, $3.6 million extension, deciding to join the U.S. wartime effort, instead.
Pat Tillman NFL stats
| Year | Tackles | INTs | FF | FR |
| 1998 | 73 (46 solo) | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 1999 | 52 (40 solo) | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| 2000 | 155 (118 solo) | 1 | 2 | 2 |
| 2001 | 94 (72 solo) | 0 | 0 | 1 |
