There are people who pass through your life, and then there are people who quietly change the direction of it.

For me, one of those people was Michael Wagaman — aka Wag, Wags, or sometimes, to me, “ScaliWag.”

I met Wag through mutual friends from Turlock before I was ever credentialed to be on an NFL field. I started running into him more while covering Raiders training camps and special events for other outlets. But I really got to know him while trying to live out a photography dream — covering my team from the sidelines.

Wag wasn’t just a respected sports writer. He was 100 percent real at all times, and if he knew you were real too, he made you feel like you belonged.

And if he really liked you, you knew it — not because he’d shower you with compliments, but because he’d give you the hardest time.

Talking trash, exchanging quick-witted jabs and keeping everyone laughing seemed to be his favorite pastime. He was even happier when you gave it right back. That followed him everywhere — sidelines, training camps, press boxes and media scrums. If you were around Wag long enough, you either got roasted or pulled into the joke. Usually both.

Throughout an incredible career, he covered some of the Bay Area’s most iconic teams — the Raiders, 49ers, Giants, A’s, Warriors and Sharks — as well as the Sacramento Kings. Fans knew him for the stories he wrote and the games he covered. Those of us fortunate enough to know him personally knew the man behind the byline: a loyal friend, trusted mentor and someone who genuinely wanted to see others succeed.

If you asked me what Wag would want you to know about him, it would probably be this: He was from Vallejo — and he made sure you knew it. He loved his son with everything he had. He loved his family. He was Con Funk Shun’s — also from Vallejo — biggest fan. He went to school with Earl, aka E-40 — yes, also from Vallejo — who was in the school band. He knew a guy from the rap group N-2-Deep - also from Vallejo. He had a “degree” in trash talking. And he genuinely enjoyed helping elevate people he believed in.

I was fortunate enough to be one of those people.

Wag wasn’t the first person to get me onto the Raiders field, but he was the person who made sure I stayed there.

When the organization was preparing to decline the media credential for The Black Hole, whom I was covering for at the time, Wag stepped in without hesitation.

“Don’t even worry. You’re going to come work with me.”

And just like that, I did.

I began shooting for him at Silver & Black Illustrated. He saw my passion, vouched for my work and made sure I remained on that Oakland sideline for the next several years, until the Raiders relocated to Las Vegas.

I often wonder if he ever realized how much that meant to me — or how much that one act shaped my career. Every game I photographed and every unforgettable moment I was privileged to capture happened, in part, because Wag believed I deserved to be there.

He helped create my photojournalism story simply by holding the door open for me.

Years later, when a photography position opened at the Turlock Journal, I mentioned it to him because he had worked there near the beginning of his own career for quite a few years. Without hesitation, he encouraged me to take it. He knew it would give me valuable experience, but more importantly, he knew I would love covering the local high school kids.

He was right. Again.

It feels fitting now that we both found ourselves working at the same newspaper where part of his journey had begun. Whenever a young reporter from the Journal ventured off to cover Bay Area sports, I would tell them the same thing:

Find Wag. Get to know him.

Because I knew what knowing him could mean.

In 2022, Wag faced something far bigger than anything that could happen on a sideline or in a press box.

He let those close to him know he was preparing for surgery to remove a brain tumor which he named “Amari Toomer.” He wanted to see his friends beforehand because he didn’t know what would come next. He worried he might not be the same afterward — that he might not be able to write, work or do the things that were such a huge part of who he was.

One surgery became two. Along the way came strokes and seizures, making an already difficult road even harder.

But Wag fought his way back.

Eventually, there he was again — back in the press boxes, back on the sidelines, covering sports and doing what he loved.

And he didn’t just return. He made it back to some of the biggest stages in sports, covering another Super Bowl and even the World Cup. After everything he had endured, seeing him back there was remarkable.

I was incredibly proud of him, but more than anything, I was happy for him. After everything he had been through and everything he feared he might lose, he got to return to the world he loved.

There was something especially meaningful about that for me. Years earlier, Wag had helped make sure I could stay on those sidelines. After everything he went through, I was simply grateful to see him return to them too.

His passing leaves a tremendous void, not only in sports journalism, but in the lives of the many people he mentored, encouraged, helped and called friends.

As I look back on my own journey, I realize his fingerprints are all over it. Every time I stood on a Raiders or 49ers sideline, I carried an opportunity he helped protect. Every photograph I captured along the way reminds me that sometimes one person believing in another can change the course of a life.

Wag did that for me.

Thank you for believing in me, “ScaliWag.”

Thank you for the laughs, the sarcasm and the stories — but most of all, thank you for the friendship.

The sidelines and press boxes won’t be the same without you, and neither will the people whose lives you touched.

Rest easy, my friend.

I hope wherever you are, you’re among fellow sports legends, talking sports, telling stories and giving someone a hard time.

I hope you’re still making everybody laugh.

And most of all, I hope you’re making damn sure everyone knows one very important thing:

Michael Wagaman was from Vallejo.