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Editor’s Note: Most everyone in Washington Parish know former Daily News Sports Editor, Chris Kinkaid is a huge sports fan, but you may not know where he inherited his love of the game. The following is a feature honoring that love and the woman behind it.

By Andrew Lopez

Pelicans.com

If you glanced up at the scoreboard Sunday during the regular season finale for the New Orleans Pelicans, you may have noticed a small message that may not mean much to the average fan but meant the world to Chris Kinkaid.

“Happy Heavenly Birthday, Mary Kinkaid.”

For the last two seasons, Chris and his mother Mary Greenbaum Kinkaid have attended New Orleans Pelicans games as full season ticket holders who have sat in section 119 in the ADA section.

Mary battled valiantly for over four years with the effects of dementia but sadly passed away April 2.

Chris and Mary became partial season ticket holders during the 2019-20 season along with Chris’ father and Mary’s husband Ernie. After Ernie died in March 2020, Chris and Mary continued to go to Pelicans games before becoming full season ticket holders prior to the 2023-24 season.

As Mary’s struggles to walk continued, Chris would faithfully push his mother in a wheelchair around the Smoothie King Center. They made friends with ASM employees in their sections and many Pelicans employees throughout the building. Which made what was going to come next for Chris a tough decision.

The April 6 game against the Milwaukee Bucks was the first home game after Mary’s death and Chris had to make the call on whether he was going to attend.

But when he debated it, he thought about what his mother would say.

“She’d come down from heaven just to chew me out and then gone back up. I know her,” Chris told Pelicans.com. “She’s tough. She was a teacher for 50 years. You got to be tough to teach that long.”

Sports is what brought a mother and a son even closer together.

Mary was an original Saints season ticket holder in 1967 and held those seats until 1998. For two seasons, she gave those up and immediately decided to try and get them back. So once the 2001 season came around, they were back in the Superdome every game.

For Chris, those times with his family cheering on the home team meant the most to him.

“I wasn’t going to do anything to get myself into trouble to where she would take a game away from me,” Chris said, noting that missing one preseason game was all it took to make sure he never missed another game.

Ernie Kinkaid joined his family during those Saints games even though he was more into music than sports. That was the bond that helped grow the relationship between Chris and his mother.

When the Kinkaids took family vacations, sports were always involved. Whenever they would travel, they’d make sure to find some sporting event to go to before heading back home.

Sports was a part of their everyday life. Since 2006, it’s been a part of Chris’ life as he’s worked as a sportswriter. He currently writes for the Livingston Parish News.

When he walked into the Bucks game alone last Sunday, Chris had to mentally prepare himself for the questions. He didn’t want to break down because he knew what all the questions would be.

They actually started even before he made it into the arena. It started on the walk in.

“And before I could even get to the gates to walk toward the arena, somebody asked me, one of the security guards asked me, ‘Where’s your mom?’ And I told her what happened,” Chris said. “She gave me a hug and called over one of her co-workers and told her, and then she gave me a hug and offered condolences.”

Chris said this process repeated itself numerous times throughout the arena. His ticket rep, Mary Beth Carmen, knew but he wasn’t aware who else did. But he was shocked when other ticket reps stopped him just to have a word and express their condolences as well.

“Plenty of hugs were exchanged that day,” Chris said.

It wasn’t just arena or team employees either. Fans who the Kinkaids had known for seasons also were asking.

“The fact that so many people care just absolutely means the world to me,” Chris added. “It’s a good feeling to know that other people out there, it meant something. They wanted to see her.”

While Chris may have walked into the Smoothie King Center alone that day, he had a piece of his mother with him.

They had enjoyed so many games together watching the Pelicans. Mary’s favorite player was Zion Williamson and one of the final games she got to watch was Williamson’s triple-double in a win against the Los Angeles Clippers on March 11.

So when Chris took his seat, he brought a No. 1 jersey with him to drape over his mother’s empty seat.

There were some sad feelings as he would look over during the game or go to wrap his arm around the empty chair in an instinctual fashion, but Chris ultimately settled down and tried to enjoy the game. He got more questions as he exited the arena and more hugs once he told them what happened.

For the final game Sunday, Chris brought his uncle Tilden – Mary’s brother – to sit with him. It was important for him to have a member of his family there as his mother’s name is going up on the big board.

“It was something where we could share the excitement for both teams,” Chris said reflecting on the time he spent with his mother. “We knew we were going to have fun. The staffs are great. You know that nothing bad’s going to happen. And we had a lot of memorable moments.”

And with his mother looking down from above, Chris added one more moment to that list Sunday.