It's that guy: Mr. Orange and Blue

COURTESY PHOTO Mr. Orange and Blue, Fort Myers resident Richard Johnston, in "The Swamp." On any given fall Saturday during football season, hordes of Gator fans cram their way in to Ben Hill Griffin Stadium to root for the University of Florida players. And, for the last 25 seasons, Fort Myers resident Richard Johnston Jr. has led "The Swamp" cheers as Mr. Orange and Blue.

A University of Florida alum, he was a cheerleader for the Gator football team before graduating from law school, long before they were national champs. Every season whenever they have a home game, he faithfully makes the 3½-hour drive to Gainesville from Fort Myers, where he has been a bankruptcy and business lawyer for more nearly two decades.

"I have this odd hobby where seven times a year I get to turn the switch on 80,000 people," Mr. Johnston said. "I know they're not there to see me, but it's kind of like being this weird ringmaster."

His key role is to run around the field before the game, working the crowd into a frenzy with chants of "Orange and Blue!" He also makes some announcements honoring the university's benefactors or supporters before the game or at half-time.

EVAN WILLIAMS/ FLORIDA WEEKLY Mr. Orange and Blue at his day job. When he speaks into the microphone, there is a pause before Mr. Johnston can hear his own voice roll back down from the loudspeakers over the long slopes of people.

"You go 'boo' and there's this little delay," he said during an interview last week in his office at Fowler White Boggs, a 65-year-old law firm in Fort Myers. His window looks over First Street. "What people don't know is I have a time format. When I'm running around saying what I'm saying, I'm also watching the clock."

Mr. Johnston helps lead the pre-game rituals that include the band, cheerleaders and massive video screens that feature alligators rising out of the water. Having mastered the timing of his chants, he builds the cheers to a peak, so just when the team charges onto the field the roar is overwhelming. His job, as he put it, is to "connect up" to the fans — to channel their energy onto the field.

Still 'that guy'

Mr. Johnston, 51, plans to return this year for his 26th season beginning on Saturday.

He's a "senior at our church," according to a friend, and officially middle aged. But one suspects the "party boy" Mr. Johnston admitted he once was surfaces here and there. He graduated from Fort Myers High School in 1975 and was a walk-on for the University of Florida swim team the next year.

In 1978 and 1980, he was a cheerleader at Gator football games. After finishing law school, he worked at a law firm in Tallahassee before moving to Fort Myers. He has worked for Fowler White Boggs since March.

He is happily remarried to Tracie Carlson, lives in Fort Myers and said he's officially settled down — he even gardens now. But his boyish good looks are still more prominent than a few lurking signs of age, a couple of grey hairs or an extra pound or two around the middle. And when he's on the football field, the spirit of the kid who fondly remembers students "doctoring" their Cokes in 1980 while he slipped some good-natured profanity into a cheer, is there.

Surprisingly, he has not often been recognized for his role. He attributes some recent acknowledgement, including a spot on television, to the Crocs clogs he started wearing a few years ago. He wears orange on one foot, blue on the other.

"No one knew who I was," Mr. Johnston said. "I took all this hell from my friends because they looked goofy, but it's so recognizable from a desistance. It coincided with people going 'hey, Mr. Orange and Blue' or 'hey, you're that guy.'"

When the Gators won two recent national championships in 2007 and 2009, that obviously brought recognition as well. In 1980, the last year Mr. Johnston was a cheerleader, the football team was coming back from an 0-10 season.

"Back then the biggest difference is you hoped to win. Now there's an expectation," he said.

How he got the part

After school, in his mid-20s, Mr. Johnston was with a law firm in Tallahassee, when he was unexpectedly requested for the position in 1984. A friend there had mentioned his name to the athletic director, who was looking for an emcee for home games.

Sure that the old stalwarts he worked for (like LeRoy Collins, former governor of Florida) would deny him the chance to run around the field like a fanatic in front of thousands of people, he asked anyway. But instead — and he has told this story many times, imitating his old boss's Southern accent —"He goes 'Richard, I think it's a marvelous idea, and do mention the firm's name and telephone number when you're on the field.'"

Off the field, his career is still a priority. Recently he has seen firsthand, through his clients, how economic doldrums take a heavy toll. In early 2007, just after he returned from the Gator's championship win, the recession hit. His phones rang off the hook with calls of financial despair.

"No one has ever seen it like this," Mr. Johnston said, adding that some people "can't sleep. They can't eat. It's making them sick… The duration and depth of this problem is unreal. I don't want anyone to get mad at me for not speaking in an uplifting fashion, but it's bad out there."

Being at the games, even in front of that entire Gator nation, has always been a joy. Being on the field, he says, feels as exciting as his best days as a lawyer.

"I'm more nervous when I get in front of a judge for the first time," Mr. Johnston said. "It's like putting on an old pair of jeans when I go out on the field. When I'm in front of a judge, it's like there's something riding on this… You want to do your best for your clients, the firm, yourself.

"When the judge and the lawyers are on a topic that's difficult and there's no solid answer and you're on the edge of the law, that's interesting. That's when the job is really exciting, when it approaches the excitement of being out on the football field."

Some of the things he enjoys most about the games are the "border war" rivalries between teams (his wife, for instance, is a Florida State Seminole). But his favorite part is the camaraderie: pre-game rituals, parties and food. Mr. Johnston's father, who passed away in 1983, often came to his college parties and helped himself to the keg of beer. And his mother, who was Italian and passed away last year, would cook large batches of meatballs for pregame parties. "It's not just about the football," Mr. Johnston said.

After so many years, the hobby hasn't lost its appeal.

"It's a privilege," he said. "It's humbling. It's incredibly exciting."