On the 28th floor of the old Fiberglas Tower, the white knight who helped rescue the black sheep of the Toledo skyline feels on top of the city.
The long-abandoned skyscraper some thought should have come down two decades ago is at last set to begin its second life.
“We did what nobody thought was possible,” Nick Eyde said on a recent tour.
Only now he is not talking about the tower.
The project developer at Eyde Co. is reminiscing about the last time he faced fourth and forever.
Before the 37-year-old redeveloped the midcentury Toledo high rise from a symbol of a downtown on the mat to one punching back — the 400-foot glass building will reopen this fall as the mixed-used Tower on the Maumee — he spent six seasons playing American football in Europe.
And, fittingly, his claim to fame is a Hail Mary.
The biggest one in Italian history and the inspiration for the ending of a John Grisham novel.
“In a way, the situation then is very similar to the one here now,” Eyde said.
It was 2006, and he was flinging it as the quarterback for the Bolzano Giants, 4,400 miles from his home in Lansing, Mich., and triple that from the NFL.
Eyde had starred at Gustavus Adolphus College, a Division III school in Minnesota where he studied religious history, then set off to see the world playing pro football.
He spent two seasons in Austria, then four touring the Italian Football League, from Rome to Bolzano in the northern Alps. Playing in the outsized shadow of that other foot sport, the quality of play was not great.
Teams fielded a max of five foreign players while most of the Italians played for fun after their day jobs. The locals quite literally were Playing for Pizza — the title of Grisham’s 2007 book about a former Browns quarterback who revives his career in Italy — paid in food after games.
But Eyde’s improv style suited him well. Think Doug Flutie. The 6-foot American always seemed to find a way. In 2006, Bolzano was improbably tied in the dying seconds with the Bergamo Lions, the eight-time reigning champions and winners of 73 straight games. With no time left, Eyde hurled a 35-yard Ave Maria to the end zone and into history.
“We had grown men on the team crying,” Eyde said.
The Giants’ 20-14 win also proved poetic grist for Grisham, whose book ends with the protagonist launching a Hail Mary to beat undefeated Bergamo.
After the season, Eyde returned home to Lansing to work for his family’s development company and soon became the point man on their big money pit in Toledo. The Eyde Co. bought the Fiberglas Tower in 1998 — two years after Owens Corning left the building — and its only tenants since were asbestos and water-damaged rot. The region’s top economic development official warned in 2003, “Every option has been exhausted.”
But after several well-chronicled false starts, Eyde helped shift momentum, secured tax credits, and shepherded the redevelopment home. Residents will soon move into the 106 upscale apartments planned for the top 11 floors.
Eyde figured his first Hail Mary would be his last. Then he came to Toledo. How long is this pass?
“More than my arm can throw,” he said.
Contact David Briggs at: dbriggs@theblade.com, 419-724-6084 or on Twitter @DBriggsBlade.
First Published May 12, 2017, 4:12 a.m.
