‘Be genuine to every person you encounter’: Ethan Long motivated by lessons from kind-hearted friend

Originally posted on 247sports.com

May 5, 2023 - Written by Cole Bradley

Left to right: Ethan Long, Davis Heller and Willie Cano

Tears streamed down Ethan Long’s face as he sat outside of his Tempe home, alone amid a quiet early-October night. He had wept for much of the previous two-plus hours, fully engulfed by devastation as he tried to shoulder the unbearable weight that comes with such a loss. 

What seemed like an eternity had passed since he answered the worst phone call he had ever received. A call that lent a life-changing perspective. A call that changed the person he is today.

At first, Long refused to believe what he was told. He was frozen with shock, quivering as sorrow began to build. He tried to fight it, but his denial couldn’t suppress the grief that ultimately took hold of him.

Then the tears came. 

“I just kept asking, ‘Why?’” Long said. “I never understood why.”

Mere hours earlier, Long was with his Arizona State teammates during a fall practice at Phoenix Municipal Stadium, enjoying the game that he has loved and considered his life since he was a 3-year-old. 

He had stumbled through a difficult sophomore year in the months prior, a season he considered a failure by his lofty expectations. After an All-American freshman 2021 season that had put him firmly on the professional radar, Long rehabbed through left-wrist surgery and battled various illnesses during the fall following his disappointing selection as the final pick of the 2022 MLB Draft. 

Hammered with setback after setback, Long had never experienced adversity on the baseball diamond as he did last year. But all of those hardships felt so small in this overwhelming moment of despair. 

None of it compared to what he was feeling. None of it mattered.

His best friend was gone.

‘He was 100 percent one-of-one’

Anyone who ever met Davis Heller would say the same thing about their first-ever encounter with him. It wasn’t his undeniable talent on the baseball field that immediately stuck out, nor was it his unrivaled competitive spirit. It was something much bigger than that. Literally.

“‘Damn, this kid is really tall.’” Long said, recalling his first impression of Heller. “He was a giant. And that was before we even ever talked, but I remember playing against him all the time, running into him.”

Heller was already well over 6-foot when he met Long as a sophomore at Mesquite High School in Gilbert, Arizona, growing to a whopping 6-foot-8 by graduation. He was a year older than Long, who moved to Phoenix Mountain Pointe High School the following year.

But perhaps even larger than Heller’s towering stature was his heart. 

“He always wanted success from everybody,” Long said. “It’s definitely one of those guys that you want to have in your life, whether it's a teammate, or friend or whatever. It was just a blessing to call him pretty much my brother.”

Heller often supported the ones closest to him more than himself. His presence was always accompanied by a smile, his trademark wittiness, and sometimes an abundance of compliments.

He was the exact same way when it came to baseball.

Heller was the loudest one in the dugout, constantly cheering on his teammates. When someone else made a big play, Heller was the first to let them know about it. 

When Long hit three home runs in a preseason scrimmage as a freshman at Mesquite, Heller came barreling out of the dugout to congratulate him as quickly as the balls had carried over the fence.

“He was about four steps away from home plate every time and he’d be celebrating with me and telling me how good I’m going to be and telling me I’m going to be the first pick in the draft out of high school,” Long said, “saying all this stuff as soon as we were in the dugout. At that time, we weren’t as close as we got to be. That was kind of the beginning of our friendship.”

Heller was rated as the No. 3 overall high-school prospect in Arizona in the 2019 class by Perfect Game — an imposing right-handed pitcher who generated serious MLB Draft consideration entering his senior season. He had committed to Oklahoma as a sophomore and planned on fulfilling his pledge if his draft result was unfavorable.  

But just when Heller’s future seemed intact, everything came crashing down. 

Ahead of his senior season, Heller suffered from the yips, a rare performance anxiety issue that in baseball can cause a player to suddenly lose the ability to throw accurately. His scholarship was pulled, his draft stock plummeted and his pitching days were effectively done.

Over the course of the next year, Heller transitioned to first base at South Mountain Community College, adjusting to a consistent hitting routine, which he hadn’t done for much of his pitcher-focused high-school career. He batted .531 in 15 games during the pandemic-shortened season, earning an offer from Alabama the following summer for his performance in the San Diego League. 

As much as Heller endured to get to that point, his uplifting spirit never faltered.

“He went through it and you could never tell,” Long said. “He was always supportive and cheering for everybody. I mean, you would think he was a Hall of Fame baseball player the way he walked around and was always happy. You would never know that he went through it.”   

The game was Heller’s first love, but friends and family were his life.

“His passion was just such a great love for people,” Davis’ mother, Melanie Heller said. “He was a very loud person. He lived loud, both actually loud but also just lived loud in all of his actions and his love for people and his love for sports.”  

It seemed uncharacteristic that someone with immense talent could be so focused on everyone but himself.  But that’s just who Heller was.

“He was just for his guys,” said ASU senior infielder Willie Cano, who played with Heller at Mesquite. “He didn’t really care about his success. If he wasn’t doing well, he wasn’t the one on the bench pouting and stuff. He was right there on the wall cheering for the guy that was up.”

Despite playing in only 23 games in two seasons at Alabama, Heller found other ways to make a substantial impact. A season-ending hamstring tear during his first year in Tuscaloosa after a breakout fall camp led to minimal playing time the following season, but his setbacks never deterred him from being someone friends considered to be “the greatest teammate of all time.”

That title remained true no matter what environment Heller was in, something he carried with him when he joined the reigning Division II national champion North Greenville Crusaders last summer. He was unapologetically himself, and that never changed.  

“No disrespect to my past or present teammates, but he was 100 percent one-of-one,” Alabama senior infielder Jim Jarvis said.

‘It was the craziest thing I’ve ever seen’

Long was one of the best players in the country during his freshman season at ASU. For about a month, he might’ve been the best player in the Pac-12.   

Starting the season as Tracy Smith’s hard-throwing closer, he recorded four saves and didn’t allow a run in six appearances before being shut down with a shoulder injury in March. 

To that point, Long had only 13 collegiate at-bats to his name. Six days later, he hit his first home run against Oregon. Long slowly started to heat up at the plate in late March, recording a hit in all but three of the 14 games he played in over the next month. 

There was no stopping what followed.

Long hit 15 home runs in as many games from April 20 through May 15, batting .475 (29-for-61) with 37 runs batted in. He logged four multi-homer games during that stretch and posted an incredible1.311 slugging percentage. 

“It was the craziest thing I’ve ever seen,” former ASU center fielder Joe Lampe said. “I literally thought he was going to hit a home run every time he got to the plate. And I’ve never seen a stretch like that before, which is pretty impressive. He was hitting everything hard.”

His 16 home runs surpassed Barry Bonds for second-most by an ASU freshman, which helped him earn All-Pac-12 first-team and All-American honors. Long’s offensive explosion caught the attention of several of the school’s notable alumni, including former first-overall pick Spencer Torkelson.  

Heller was keeping tabs, too.

“It was every night after I hit a home run or I was 0-for-4, it didn’t matter, he would Facetime me and say how good I am and how many home runs I was going to hit the next day,” Long said. “He was always just positive.

“Every phone call he would end it saying, ‘Be great today.’ And knowing him, he’s a big goofball, but when he said be great today I would always chuckle, thinking like, ‘Dude we’re best friends, you don’t have to be motivational to me.’ But at the same time, he wants you to be great. It's serious.”

One of those calls came right before the biggest moment of Long’s career.

Driving to Phoenix Municipal Stadium ahead of the Sun Devils’ series opener against Oregon State, Long said he confidently told Heller he was going to hit a home run with “one of the best bat flips you’ve ever seen.” It was a bold prediction amid a torrid stretch at the plate.

Then it actually happened.

Standing in against Beavers’ left-handed pitcher Jake Mulholland later that evening, Long faced what many players would consider a dream at-bat.

It was the bottom of the ninth, the game was tied and two runners stood on base. Long quickly fell behind in the count 1-2.

On his next swing, Long swatted a walk-off three-run home run over the right-field fence. Pandemonium ensued as Long flipped his bat high in the air, staying true to his pregame promise before skipping his way down to first without his batting helmet as his astonished teammates flooded out of the dugout to mob him at home plate.

The moment went viral on social media before Long could even get to his phone, where a text from Heller was waiting to be seen…

You just ran the bases without a helmet. You literally called me before the game and said you’re going to see the best bat flip you’ve ever seen. I don’t think you can beat that.

It was a signature moment that defined one of the greatest single-season performances in ASU history. Everything seemed to be going Long’s way. 

Until it ultimately wasn’t.

‘This is life checking you right now’

As Long’s confidence grew, so did the expectations surrounding him.

Entering his second year as a draft-eligible sophomore, Long was considered a Top 250 overall prospect by multiple publications. He was a preseason All-American and All-Pac-12 pick, and one of just 55 players named to the Golden Spikes Award Watch List.

But even outside of the accolades, more was expected of Long inside his own clubhouse. His teammates were looking to him for guidance under a brand-new coaching regime led by then-first-year skipper Willie Bloomquist. 

It’s a role he admittedly wasn’t quite ready to fill. 

“I’ll take accountability and say I probably wasn’t mature enough at the time to take it,” Long said. “I was still lead by example — I’m doing this, you guys should be able to do it. And now it’s realizing I was a little immature.”

He still had to perform, which required him to adjust to opponents who were better prepared to deal with him at the plate. 

But the adjustment never occurred.

Long had just four hits in his first 25 at-bats of the season, and it took him 14 games to tally his first home run against San Francisco. Even as his batting average steadily climbed during that period, his power production took a noticeable dip.

Meanwhile, left-wrist discomfort became an issue in early March, an injury that sidelined him for much of the final month of the regular season before requiring surgery during the summer, limiting his contributions to occasional appearances on the mound.

For the first time in his baseball career, Long was dealing with adversity that he didn’t fully understand how to handle. He worked tirelessly to try and correct his trajectory, even if it meant spending most of his evenings at the Malone Hitting Complex at Phoenix Municipal Stadium.       

“He will be in the cages all night after a couple bad games,” Lampe said. “If he’s not feeling good in the box, there were multiple nights where I’m the last one to leave and he’s still in there hitting and would stay the night at the field. A lot of guys would see it too. He would be there after those games with his dad hitting in the cages off the machine.”

Even so, Long’s wrist injury became too difficult to play through as the year progressed. He appeared in the starting lineup just once over the Sun Devils’ final 18 games of the season, while logging four outings as a relief pitcher during that stretch.

His final stats — which included a .294 average, seven home runs and 28 RBIs — were certainly respectable, but not on par with his elevated standards.   

As ASU limped through its final month to a 26-32 finish in its first season under Bloomquist, a frustrated Long was often forced to watch from the confines of the dugout. It was during this time, with the help of his more-experienced peers, that he started to truly realize the importance of supporting others when he couldn’t be on the field.

“This is God checking you, this is (the) baseball Gods checking you, this is life checking you right now,” former ASU first baseman Conor Davis remembered saying to Long. “You’re on top of the world, this is your time to take a step back, look in the mirror and say there is still room to grow, there is still room to be a better person, to be a teammate and a leader.”

Long was still hopeful that his performance would yield a favorable result in the 2022 MLB Draft. He yearned to hear his name called early enough to bring him one step closer to achieving his big-league dreams. 

Except he never did hear his name, at least, not immediately after being selected with the 616th and final overall pick in the 20th round by the San Francisco Giants. He seemed to have already zeroed in on making a fully-healthy return for his junior season at ASU before the pick was even made, taking swings and refining his craft at a hitting facility in Phoenix.

But it still didn’t go unnoticed by Heller.

“I had the ringer on and I didn’t even get a call from the Giants telling me that they drafted me, nothing,” Long said. “I had no idea, and then I heard it on the TV and I was like, ‘What?’ So I run over to my phone, it rang, and it was Dave saying, ‘Congratulations, you worked your whole life for this, I’m so happy for you.’

“That was the first person who texted me.”

In the span of a year, Long went from being one of the nation’s top prospects to “Mr. Irrelevant.”

Even so, Heller’s support remained constant throughout the most arduous season of Long’s career. The texts and calls providing a pick-me-up when Long needed it most never wavered, something he always cherished about his good-hearted friend. 

But after everything Long went through — the struggles, the injury and the poor draft result — there was nothing that could fully prepare him for tragedy.

‘Too big of a heart’

It seemed like an ordinary morning in Tigerville, South Carolina, on Oct. 5, 2022. Students were roaming the campus of North Greenville, the school that Heller transferred to following his second season at Alabama.

But it was too quiet for Melanie Heller.  

She hadn’t heard from her son since the night before when he texted her amid his preparations for a Spanish test he had the next morning. He was stressed out over the exam and wanted to see if his mom would order groceries for him so he could carry on with his studies.

Heller had these kinds of exchanges with his parents daily, always keeping them updated on the latest happenings in his life. He never left them out of the loop on anything. 

So when Melanie didn’t receive a response to her text the following day, asking about his test, she was naturally concerned. She and Heller’s sister, Lindsey, called and texted him several times throughout the morning but heard nothing back.

Upon reaching North Greenville baseball coach Landon Powell, Melanie and Lindsey found out that Heller had missed his Spanish test at 9 a.m. 

Something was wrong.

Powell asked Noah Takac, who'd convinced Heller to transfer to North Greenville over the summer, to stop by his apartment and check on him. Takac was just down the street from Heller’s apartment, where he lived on his own. They developed a close friendship during the summer as teammates on the Macon Bacon of the Coastal Plain League.

“I told [Melanie], ‘I’m going to go by, he’s probably just sleeping,’” Takac said. “She was like, ‘Yeah he’s a heavy sleeper. If he was up all night he may have slept in.’ I got there and his car was there. I was like ‘OK, so at least we know he is here.’” 

When Takac arrived at Heller’s door, he knocked for several minutes, hoping to get his attention.

He was met with silence. 

Takac called the fire department after finding out that the apartment complex where Heller lived wouldn’t let him into the unit unless he contacted local authorities. At this point, Takac began to worry.

He waited outside of the apartment, hopeful that Heller had just slept through all the attempts made by friends and family to contact him.

The moment the fire department arrived, Takac was told to wait outside. The door was unlocked and two men entered, shouting as they went in to try and get a response.  

Peering through the partially-closed door, Takac’s heart sank. 

“I knew if he was asleep in his bedroom, they would’ve kept yelling to figure out where he was,” Takac said. “I saw through the crack of the door his stuff laying out by his couch. I saw his shoes next to the couch.”  

The 22-year-old Heller was found dead in his apartment that morning. He had passed at least two hours before Takac had even arrived. His family said the death was initially attributed to “natural causes,” but that was three months before additional testing revealed the full truth.

Heller had myocarditis: inflammation of the heart muscle that can reduce the heart’s ability to pump blood. That morning, Heller had an arrhythmia, which is a rapid or irregular heart rhythm that caused him to faint and go into cardiac arrest, likely in his sleep.     

“I think the hard part for us is the irony of the fact that he died of having too big of a heart,” Lindsey said.

Later that evening, Long learned of Heller’s death through his former Alabama teammate, Hunter Hoopes, a mutual friend that Long knew through Heller. He didn’t initially realize how such a devastating call would change his life forever. 

“Right when he said it, it didn’t really hit me,” Long said. “I was just like, ‘Oh, wow.’ I couldn’t really think of anything to say. He kept telling me he was really sorry, if I needed anything just call him. 

“I was outside of my house at the time and I was just sitting out there processing it all. I called my dad and he answered and as soon as I said the word that Dave passed away, that’s when it hit me. I started crying like crazy.”

‘Be genuine to every person you encounter’

The last thing Long wanted to do a day after learning he had lost his best friend was to play a scrimmage. It felt far too early in the grieving process to bottle the still-raw emotions that came in waves in the aftermath of such a terrible tragedy.      

“I didn’t want to come,” Long said. “I didn’t want to leave my room. I spent the whole day balling, crying, calling my parents. My dad told me, ‘Look, what do you remember about Dave? He was always cheering for you and he always wanted you to succeed in baseball. Best thing you could do is go out there and do it for him.’”

It was a meaningless game in the middle of the fall that nobody was around to witness, but for Long, the short scrimmage provided so much more. It served as a needed mental distraction from the dreary thoughts that dominated his mind.

He laced a pair of doubles that day before Bloomquist addressed the team, informing it that Long and Cano had lost one of their dearest friends.

Just hearing Heller’s name prompted tears to well up in Long’s eyes.

Long’s father, JP, was waiting for him after the intrasquad in a parking lot located just behind the home-plate area at Phoenix Municipal Stadium. Long couldn’t hold back his emotions any longer at that point.

“I just wanted to see someone,” Long said. “I ran over, jumped the fence, yelled at him and as soon as I gave him a hug he was like, ‘You alright?’ I lost it. I was out there for 30 minutes and I couldn’t stop crying.”

Much of the next several weeks following Heller’s passing were spent mourning, clinging to fond memories and subtle reminders of who he was. 

But Long always came back to what made Heller so special: his heart. 

“He would wake up and his main goal was how can I make the world a better place,” Long said. “It wasn’t like, ‘Oh, how am I going to get drafted.’ Seeing that, it really brought into realization that [baseball] is a game, stuff is going to happen but it’s not the end of the world. I’m still going to be able to wake up in the morning and be grateful for that.”

Those closest to Heller knew that while his aspirations were to play among the best in the world in the Major Leagues, being a truly genuine person was equally important to him. If he wanted to be remembered for one thing, it was the kindness he had toward others.    

“Honestly all his life he had these huge goals like all these guys do, like Ethan does, to play MLB and to make it and all that,” Melanie said. “But he made it, he made it because of who he was as a human being. If anything else comes of it, that’s all that truly matters. When all is said and done, all these guys, their careers are going to end, but who are you as a person and what have you contributed to love people.”

Long wasn’t alone in his grief. Countless players from across the country who knew Heller had to come to terms with the loss of someone who had such a great influence on their lives.

The process was particularly difficult for Takac, who still deals with the trauma of discovering Heller in his apartment that day. He may never fully move on from Heller’s loss. Perhaps nobody who knew him will, but they won’t let that stop them from trying to honor who he was.      

“He would be pissed at me if he knew that I was just sulking around feeling sorry for myself,” Takac said. “That’s something that kind of got me out of bed every morning thinking, ‘I’m going to live today like he would have if he were here.’ When somebody passes away like that, you realize the good qualities in them that you don’t have.

“He’s not here and he’s not coming back. The only thing I can do is wake up every day and do my best to live that day like he would have and be that person for somebody else.”

Heller’s impact was evident during a celebration-of-life service that his family held in honor of him at North Greenville last November. 

Alabama’s entire team bussed from Tuscaloosa to attend the service, joining North Greenville at Ray and Bea Dillard Field in Tigerville. Some of Heller’s former coaches and teammates from high school, summer ball and community college were also there, including Long and Cano.

“I mean he was everyone’s best friend, he impacted so many people,” Lindsey said. “We had a couple of his most recent teammates speak and his childhood best friends speak, but truthfully we could’ve had ten more people get up there and tell probably the same story that everyone had of just how great of a teammate he was and who he was.”

The Hellers started the Davis Heller Memorial Foundation in Heller’s honor shortly after his death, dedicated to financially supporting collegiate baseball players who display the same qualities that he did as an athlete and a person. 

Takac received the foundation’s first scholarship award at Heller’s service. His goal is to honor Heller’s legacy, remembering to “be genuine to every person you encounter,” as Heller would say.  

“I pass his apartment on the way to school every day, and I remember Oct. 5 at 10 a.m., walking up there and banging on the door,” Takac said. “There’s only one of us driving to school today, so it means, even more, to put in twice as much effort to make the people around you feel special or give something back that leaves the world a better place.”

In the aftermath of Heller’s service, Long began to move forward as well.

Through others, he had come to realize that who he is as a person far outweighs his accomplishments as a baseball player. Empowering his friends and teammates with unwavering support is now his primary focus.

“I’ve always viewed baseball as my life, played it since I was three years old,” Long said. “[Heller] passing away was like — he was the best teammate anybody could have. He didn’t get much playing time at Alabama but he loved every second. He would view other people’s success more than his. Seeing a guy that good go that early, I was like, ‘Alright baseball is just a game.’”

‘It’s nice to know that he’s watching’

Sitting behind the first-base-side dugout at Phoenix Municipal Stadium, Long grins as he gazes upon the pristine playing surface that he has roamed for much of the last three years.  

Several young fans approach him, anxiously asking for autographs from the star infielder. Without hesitating, Long obliges, grabbing a pen before signing a series of hats, balls and baseball cards.

It has been over a month since he had surgery to repair a partially torn ligament in his left wrist for the second time in the past year. The severity of his most recent procedure ended his season prematurely after he tore cartilage from the bone in his wrist on one swing during an at-bat against Oklahoma State on March 7.   

But even in his absence from Arizona State’s lineup, Long’s kindness and infectious personality is palpable. 

Being a leader among his teammates and supporting them has become his purpose. He remembers every day what Heller went through to do the same thing.

“First day after surgery I was bummed,” Long said following ASU’s series-finale win over Oregon State. “The first two or three days, I was in a very dark place, for sure. But then just thinking back, how tough of a hand he got dealt, and he would show up every day with a smile on his face, making everybody laugh. It got me back to saying, ‘I should follow that. I admired that when he did it, why shouldn’t I be doing it?’ Every day I’m here, no matter what is going on, doing tough in school or got stuff going on at home, I’m coming with a smile on my face.”

Long has watched the Sun Devils climb to second place in the Pac-12 standings since he last played nearly two months ago, reaching historic heights in their second year under Bloomquist. ASU has a legitimate shot at hosting an NCAA regional for the first time since 2011 as a result, entering this weekend facing perhaps its most important series since moving to Phoenix Municipal Stadium in 2015 against No. 7 Stanford, the first-place team. 

His inability to physically contribute to such a riveting postseason run is a harsh reality for him to process. He wants to be on the field. He wants to compete. 

But he isn’t letting such an unfavorable circumstance impact his attitude around his teammates. He shows up to the field the same every day: with a positive outlook and a willingness to motivate his peers.

"Obviously, it's not easy for him because he wants it just as bad if not more than anybody on this team," ASU sophomore first baseman Jacob Tobias said. "He does a good job of keeping spirits up even if we're down, he's always one of those guys in the dugout keeping good energy. 

"It's a big help."   

Long is representing more than just himself with his constant support. The lasting impression that Heller left on him has, in many ways, influenced the way he lives his life. He is grateful for the lessons Heller taught him, and how they have molded him into the person he is today.             

“It’s like the pebble in the lake with all these millions of ripples,” Melanie said of her son. “His impact and the ripple will continue but tenfold. I think if he was here on earth it would just be him, but now he’s got these tens and hundreds of teammates that he has made this impact on them that it will continue to move forward. There’s not any greater gift for us than to see his legacy live on.”

Davis Heller may be gone, but through others, his heart is still beating. 

It’s beating within those who are first off the bench to greet their teammates with a pat on the back and a smile. It’s beating within his family, who does their best to support Heller’s friends all over the country, just like he would. It’s beating on the backfields, the bullpens and the batting cages, where players are dedicating extra time to be a mentor for others. 

It’s beating through Long, who believes that somewhere, his best friend is still cheering him on. 

“I think he would be very proud,” Long said. “If I could talk to him today, I wouldn’t stop thanking him. I wouldn’t be the way that I am without him, especially in the position I’m at now. Knowing how much hard [stuff] he had to go through and all the injuries he battled and stuff like that, that’s kind of helped me. It’s the same thing now for me.

“It’s nice to know that he’s watching from above.”