Richard Thomas Estrada died of a massive heart attack December 28, 2025 at his Oakdale, California home. He was 62 and had been in seemingly good health before his heart failed.
Born in Long Beach, he grew up in Pleasant Hill, Sebastopol and Benicia. His adult years were mostly spent in Modesto and Oakdale.
Known to his friends as Rich and to his family as Rick, Estrada had been a newspaper reporter, magazine writer, public information officer and online influencer during his more than 40 years as a journalist.
He founded Black Hat Football 14 years ago as a new way to cover and promote high school football teams and players throughout the 209 area code.
While wearing his distinctive black cowboy hat on the sidelines, Estrada spent countless hours attending, writing and tweeting about football games throughout the region. Tens of thousands of athletes and sports fans followed him on X (formerly Twitter), Facebook, YouTube and his website.
His writing career began as a teenager with the Vallejo Times-Herald, where he became a sports writer. He worked for the Modesto Bee for three decades, covering sports, government, farming and agribusiness. And he was a columnist for The Canmaker international trade magazine for more than 20 years.
Estrada was honored with numerous state and national writing awards. In 2001, he was named the Agricultural Journalist of the Year by the North American Agricultural Journalists Association.
After community newspapers essentially collapsed, he joined the California Department of Transportation as a public information officer. He took on assorted special assignments during his decade with CalTrans, most recently involving the removal of homeless camps along freeways.
Because he wanted to travel and enjoy more time on his small Oakdale ranch, Estrada retired from CalTrans in November 2025. Unfortunately, he died a month later.
Rick is survived by his wife of 41 years, Joanne N. Sbranti-Estrada of Oakdale. He has two sons, Vincent J. Estrada of Napa (wife Abigail), and Nicholas H. Estrada of Hayward (wife Danika). His first grandchild, Niko Estrada, was born last year.
His sisters, Debbie Blay of Grants Pass, Ore., and Ruthie Estrada of Sebastopol, survive him. His parents were Robert Estrada and Ruth Ann Wilhelm Estrada Brown, both deceased.
He was a member of the Oakdale Golf and Country Club and the now-closed Sportsmen of Stanislaus Club in Modesto.
After graduating from Benicia High School, he earned an associate’s degree from Modesto Junior College and a bachelor’s degree in history from California State University Stanislaus.
Estrada was a voracious reader of history books, an enthusiastic vegetable gardener and a devoted animal lover. He bred and nurtured Boer goats for the last 25 years. He took his dogs for walks in the country nearly every day, and he recently helped three abandoned kittens grow into playful barn cats.
Rick coached many of his sons’ youth baseball and soccer teams during the 1990s. And he enjoyed playing on recreational softball and basketball teams.
Family, friends, neighbors and colleagues are invited to drop in during a wake in his memory from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 18 at the Estrada ranch in Oakdale. Contact a family member for the address.
Memorial contributions are preferred to the Modesto Salvation Army, P.O. Box 1663, Modesto, CA, 95353.
The Escalon (Calif.) Times
Jan. 7, 2026
