Navy senior offensive tackle Kip Frankland is living proof that it is possible to be the funniest guy in the room, while also being one of the toughest, nastiest ones in the group.

In Frankland's world, there is usually room for breaking ice or tension with a good joke or some other goofy moment among friends or teammates or even coaches. There is always room for empathy, engaging others and dropping self-deprecating quips.

There is zero space for cutting corners when it comes to the classroom, the practice and playing fields, caring for anyone in the Brigade or doing whatever it takes to contribute to the ultimate endgame that is winning.

"Kip is a fun-loving, goofy, really nice kid. But when it comes time to man up, go play and get it done, he's not like that at all," says Navy offensive line coach Danny O'Rourke. "He's got a whole lot of grit. He doesn't come in to work pouting one day, happy the next. There's no back and forth. He absolutely loves football and his teammates, and he's super-tough and competitive. We love having him around every day." 

Arguably more than any other player on the Navy roster, Frankland made the most of a miserable personal situation throughout the uphill battle of 2022. Despite debilitating injuries to both shoulders and both knees —which he later addressed with multiple, offseason surgeries — Frankland refused to sit and get his body right while the Mids were trying to turn the corner on the field.

Frankland might have produced Navy's most impressive personal statistic last year. While injuries were ravaging the Mids' offensive line, forcing them to start five different tackles and guards and three different centers, Frankland was the lone mainstay. He was the team's only offensive lineman to start all 12 games, as Frankland took more snaps than any other Navy player. Frankland maintained a strong late-season performance level, despite the physical toll the season had taken on him.

"We are preparing to be our nation's fighters. We have to have some resilience about us. We're going to be put in rough spots," Frankland says. "I was really banged up, but you gotta be able to rub some dirt on it and gut it out, keep trying to get better. I felt like a million dollars going into the Army game."

"We were out of the bowl game picture pretty early last year. We had great leaders who kept us together and fighting," adds Frankland, referring to then-senior co-captains Diego Fagot, Mychal Cooper, Kevin Brennan and Chance Warren. "We had to look into our hearts and ask ourselves how badly do we want to play this game?"

It's no wonder Frankland, listed at 6-feet-1, 306 pounds, was voted a tri-captain last spring by his teammates for this season. None of the Mids were the least bit shocked when Frankland eventually earned the honor of captain of the captains by the voting captains of Navy's other 34 varsity teams.

Ever since he was a youngster in Germantown, Tenn., part of greater Memphis, Frankland has had a way of connecting with people.

Frankland grew up used to being one of the larger folks, if not the biggest, in sports and social settings. He carried a healthy and justified confidence, while embracing football and ice hockey passionately. He attracted friends easily with his light-hearted, humorous and sincere, giving ways.

From his parents, Kerry and Golda Frankland, to a former high school teacher, Tim Boyer, to an ex-youth football coach, Brock Kreitz, Kip was clearly known as the people's kind of guy. He took his business as seriously as his ability to ingratiate himself. The kid was having fun and he enjoyed showing it and had no problem making himself the butt of the joke.

That joyous side of Frankland was broadcast to the college football world last year, during ESPN's College GameDay coverage at the Army-Navy game in East Rutherford, N.J.

In the clip, there is Frankland, shirtless, bow-tied, on stage at a talent show, set up for the football team at the conclusion of its '21 fall camp in Akerson Theater in Ricketts Hall.

Frankland struggles to tell a couple of corny jokes, then proceeds to crack up laughing after barely getting each of the punch lines out. The Navy football roster in attendance roars its approval, as Frankland gleefully makes his exit.

"Kip has always been outgoing and gregarious, going back to a very young age. After he'd just started talking, he loved to hang around adults and be part of the conversation," Kerry Frankland says.

"He has always wanted to engage other people. He likes life. He enjoys a good laugh and making other people laugh. And he's clearly not afraid to poke fun at himself," he adds.  "When Kip was in elementary school or middle school and he noticed a kid that was struggling, Kip would lighten the mood, make the other kid laugh, make him feel more comfortable and confident. He still does the same thing at times with his teammates."

Tim Boyer had similar takes on Frankland from his days at Houston High School — he was a two-time football captain — where Frankland and Houston excelled in the DECA program, an international association of high school and college students and teachers of marketing, management and entrepreneurship in business, finance, hospitality and marketing sales and service.

The program helps students beef up their business and interpersonal communications skills.

"Kip always got good grades in our competitions. He liked to present in-class reading and do powerpoint presentations," Boyer recalls. "He can talk to anybody. He liked getting up and talking to a group of people, and really worked to get better at it. Kip is a cool, funny dude. He is secure enough to think if I can get you to laugh with me or at me, I'm doing something good."

Kreitz described the Pop Warner version of Frankland as "the happiest human being I've ever been around."

Kreitz has an indelible image of Frankland stuck in his mind. He is the biggest kid and best athlete on the flag football team and one of the top talents in his youth league.

Frankland is rumbling down the field while carrying the ball — which he was not allowed to do with pads on, due to his exceeding the league weight limit. He is using shifty moves and great footwork to evade "tacklers." And he is beaming and laughing loudly as his pursuers try futilely to stop him.

"Who the hell smiles while he's running the ball? Kip was very aware he was bigger and better than everyone else, but he worked very hard at [being good]," says Krietz, who recalls another touching side of Frankland.

"When you coach little league football, you have a bunch of kids who've never played. Kip was always as helpful as the coaches with them," he adds. "It doesn't surprise me that he's been a captain as much as he has. He's a leader. When he comes into a room, he brings such great energy and great attitude. You like being around him. He brightens your day."

Frankland grew up as an Ole Miss football fan. The family had season tickets. Kip dreamed about playing in the SEC one day. He and his father later started to become Navy fans, based on the option offense the Mids ran so well when they would appear on television.

"We thought it was a really cool-looking offense. There was so much more to it than the quarterback or fullback dive," recalls Frankland, who fondly recalls the huge success of the Keenan Reynolds years (2012-15).

As the recruiting process played out, Air Force came after Frankland first. Virginia also invited Frankland to a visit in the spring of his junior year. The Franklands decided to see about a visit to Annapolis while checking out Charlottesville. Navy was already interested.

"We drove home and Kip didn't say much about either school. We didn't want to say how much we loved Navy. It was his decision," recalls Golda Frankland. "We had a sense that he wasn't crazy about the Virginia experience."

"I think once Kip got to understand what Navy was about, he knew what he wanted," Kerry Frankland says. "A few days after he said he liked the Navy visit, he just told us, 'Yeah, I'm going to commit to Navy.'"

Frankland admits he didn't do all of the homework he could have. Plebe summer was various blends of exhaustion, agony, predictable second-guesses about what he'd gotten himself into.

"I made the mistake of not knowing or really looking into what i was getting into. That was hilarious. I was shell-shocked," Frankland says, summing up the impact of plebe summer. "Then when we came straight to [fall football] camp, we had these five established dudes on the offensive line. They knew our names, they loved on us, they wouldn't pass up an opportunity to make fun of you, but they were the greatest leaders I've been around."

That line, led by seniors center Ford Higgins and guard David Forney, formed part of the backbone of an offense that would catapult the Mids, led by quarterback Malcolm Perry, to an 11-2 season. Frankland and most of the other plebes formed scout teams and saw no varsity action that year, but took in what it took to be great. The young guys were excited about the future.

Then everything changed for the worse. As the Covid-19 was becoming a pandemic in February, threatening professional and amateur athletics across the country, Navy was dealt a terrible blow. Forney was found unresponsive in his Bancroft Hall room on February 21, 2020 and pronounced dead, later ruled to be due to cardiac arrest.

"I remember it like it was yesterday. It was awful," Frankland says. "The entire hallway on the fifth floor was lined with people sitting on the wall. So many people loved him. The team met in the chapel. We stayed up all night."

Soon, as Covid raged, spring sports shut down. Following spring break, students were sent home to attend school online and isolate. Players were home until the summer.

For his first month home, Frankland bellied up to his favorite BBQ and steak joints without much hesitation.

"I was not a very good boy. The gyms were closed. I love to eat a little too much. I was living pretty loose for a few weeks, picked up about 15 pounds," he says. "It was great to come back here and focus on football again. Good to get our bearings back at the academy. But what a tough year."

The pain of 2020 and 2021 — the long lockdowns on the Yard, the socially distanced "practices," the isolation in Bancroft rooms, the loss of more than half of the original senior class has turned into hope for 2022.

Senior left tackle Jamie Romo feels the same vibe and points to leaders like his best friend who he hopes will help to recapture Navy's winning ways.


"Kip has stepped up and kept everybody on track and an even keel," Romo says. "He's grown into a phenomenal leader."