Part 3: The Rise and Fall and Rise of Spider Gaines

The former University of Washington football player, after falling into substance abuse and an unsavory lifestyle when pro football didn't work out, turned things around.

Robert "Spider" Gaines has been drug- and alcohol-free for 19 years. Married for six of them, he resides in his childhood home in Richmond, California. He takes care of his autistic brother. 

He's a University of Washington graduate with a sociology degree. He's used his college education to create the RSG Foundation — that's Robert Spider Gaines — for youth and serve as a motivational speaker. Hey, he even navigated through the internet to attend a Zoom meeting for this story.

Gaines, 63, offers himself up as an upstanding citizen, a man of responsibility, completely in tune with a respectable world. It's a good fit for him.

The former Husky football standout and Olympic Games aspirant has distanced himself from the sometimes out-of-control existence of his youth and early adulthood that might have cost him considerable fortune and fame. 

He's pushed away hard from years of substance abuse and especially that seedy involvement as a flamboyant Canadian pimp, the latter a lifestyle that now hardly seems like it was ever true.

"I take them to the college," Gaines says of the students he mentors, "so they can see that anyone can turn their lives around — just like me."

This is the third and final installment of a throwback series about one of the UW's most explosive football players, a legendary figure who had his way with secondaries from Michigan and Alabama as likely the Huskies' greatest deep threat in program annals. He also might have been Washington's most prolific kick-blocker, swatting down five as a freshman.

The Huskies' Spiderman no longer flits with danger and lawlessness, preferring to be a grounded person. He has to be. He works with the schools and the city. 

After an aborted attempt at earning his degree and pushing back from his drug-use demons, Gaines graduated with the UW class of 2006. He was in school at a time when Brandon Roy and Nate Robinson turned the UW basketball team into a powerhouse, playing for Lorenzo Romar, one of his college contemporaries.

Former Husky football teammates Warren Moon, Antoine Richardson, Ronnie Rowland and Nesby Glasgow strongly encouraged him to finish school. They gave him money when he needed it. They were supportive at all times.

Another ex-Husky Rod Jones, who was part of the athletic department and is now deceased, got Spider interested in motivational speaking. He had him tell his experiences to current UW players. He hasn't stopped talking to impressionable audiences since.

"I knew I had a voice," he said.

Gaines gives off a positive vibe as he navigates a pandemic world in the East Bay. He still looks athletic. Above all, he's hopeful about the future as he puts plenty of space between him and the past.

His Kennedy High School recently inducted him into its hall of fame and he's impatiently waiting for the UW to do the same for his victorious 1978 Rose Bowl team.

He didn't say it, but how about just him? 

"It's been a great comeback," Spider said. 

Editor's Note: If you missed the first installment, you can read it here, and the second part is found here. 

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