50 People To Know: How Jimmy Nolan Honors The Memory Of His Brother, Mike
YONKERS, N.Y. (WCBS 880) – Jimmy Nolan is on a mission to get guns off the streets of Yonkers.
He does this in memory of his brother, Mike Nolan.
"He would go down to some of the worst neighborhoods and just automatically become friends with everybody. He was a 6' 8" lefty that would come out of nowhere and thump the ball," Jimmy tells WCBS 880's Sean Adams.
From the hardwood to the pitcher's mound, Mike had talent. He was an Oakland A's prospect.
"Speed, he had a great changeup, curve, slider, and his pickoff move – he said that many times they never saw it coming," Jimmy says.
While he was home nursing an injury in September 2015, he lost his life.
"There was a drag race, which – my brother, it was proven that he wasn't racing in – and then there was an altercation, which my brother did not throw any punches, nothing. It was somebody else's fight," says Jimmy.
Looking to even the score, four young men from the Bronx drove to the Burger King on Central Park Avenue. One of them had a gun. He opened fire, striking Mike in the head.
"He just happened to be there in the wrong place at the wrong time," Jimmy says.
After several months, Yonkers detectives tracked down the suspects. The four men copped plea deals.
In court, the shooter showed no remorse.
"I guess that I could have went bad, and I could have done a lot of bad, or a lot of damage… Revenge," says Jimmy. "But, I decided to do revenge in a good way."
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Jimmy and his family host charity sporting events, fund scholarships for Yonkers students, and that's not all.
"I go with Yonkers Police for their legal gun buy-back program. We go to community meetings, I go wherever I have to. Sometimes I go alone," Jimmy says.
Last year, they collected 52 guns.
"If I get one gun off the street and I can help save somebody the pain that my brother went through or we did, it's worth it," says Jimmy.
Jimmy wants to turn those guns into a memorial.
"It's a statue of him pitching. The guns would be melted down into a mound. So he'll be dominating the mound still," he says.
