Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
TAYLORSVILLE — If things had gone to plan this season, Taylor Hendricks wouldn't have been in Utah on Wednesday.
The Jazz forward would have been with his team as they went from Los Angeles to Detroit during a four-game road trip. But there were a bunch of kids in Taylorsville who are happy he wasn't.
"Everything happens for a reason," Hendricks said. "Because if I was healthy, I would be on the road right now, but I'm here impacting other people's lives."
Hendricks, who fractured his right fibula in early November and still has a walking boot, hosted a holiday party on Wednesday for some students at Arcadia Elementary in Taylorsville. He still can't fully walk, but he rolled around a classroom on a chair as kids ate pizza, designed stockings, and had a gingerbread house competition.
"I feel like I'm impacting them and giving them long, lasting memories," Hendricks said. "So I feel like that's what it's all about."
One child looked at a camera in the classroom and said, "I thought I should wear my best shirt (because) I might be on the news."
One excitedly waved Hendricks over so he could watch her put the finishing touches on her stocking. Another proudly displayed how much frosting he had got on his hands building a gingerbread house.
"Yooo! You've got to wash your hands, bro," Hendricks said with a laugh.
It helped that he brought the Jazz Bear with him — turns out, elementary-aged kids really like a life-sized teddy bear that blasts confetti. One student rushed up to the bear with a one-word request: "Hug?" Bear happily obliged.
At the end of the hour-long party, Hendricks played the role of Santa, giving out Jazz swag bags and a $200 Walmart gift card.
"We met as a school team and thought we could do it a couple different ways; but we really thought, if we're gonna do it, do it right and give it to kids and families that are in need," assistant principal Allison Peterson said. "All the kids that you saw here, this is going to be a big help for them and their families."
It wasn't random that Arcadia was chosen for the party. Last year, a teacher brought some students to a Salt Lake City Stars game where Hendricks was playing. As Peterson put it, one of the kids said "some things that needed to be redirected."
The teacher asked Hendricks' mother, Danielle, if the student could apologize and a friendship was formed.
"My mom knows a few students that came to the game one time, and she thought we should come here and do something nice," Hendricks said.
He certainly did just that.
