Coach Sense by George Selleck

Author:George Selleck [Selleck, George]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Coaches Choice
Published: 2011-10-12T16:00:00+00:00

NOTES

NOTES

NO PAIN, MORE GAIN: ESSENTIALS OF EXERCISE SCIENCE

Kids Can Be Stupid—That’s Why Coaches Have to Be Smart!

It was midway through my 10th grade year and my basketball team was playing to a packed house. As I drove down the lane for a lay-up, I was tripped hard from behind. The wall mats were quite small in those days and the gym walls were quite close. I stumbled forward, hitting the wall squarely with my right knee. I knew immediately it was bad, and it was. My leg was broken at the connection of the knee and the tibia. Three doctors told me that my playing days were over, but with the arrogance and optimism of youth I decided to ignore their injunctions.

After many months on crutches, I began to get ready for the next season. When fall rolled around, I had made varsity at Compton high school. As I was warming up prior to the start of our first game, my right leg locked and I could not make it bend. I went to see several doctors who once again said to forget it—nothing could be done.

As a last resort, I traveled to the San Francisco area to be examined by my godfather, who had been head of orthopedic physicians for the U.S. Army in World War II. He told me that I had a bone spur on the injured kneecap and that I should return over Christmas vacation to have it removed.

As I lay in bed that Christmas, following what was supposed to have been routine surgery, a parade of doctors kept coming into my room to look at my knee. Curious, I asked my godfather what was going on. He informed me that when he had opened up my knee, the knee cap had been completely shattered and so he had removed it. In those days, losing a kneecap (patella) meant having a stiff knee for life. However, my godfather had performed a very delicate and experimental surgery (never before done in this country) that involved removing the kneecap while still allowing for mobility in the leg.

Instead of treating this near-miracle with the awe and reverence it deserved, I no sooner got to my grandmother’s apartment to recuperate when I convinced her to let me walk, in my corset-like cast, to the park across the street to watch the kids shoot hoops. I soon was out there with them, and almost immediately back in the hospital after rupturing some blood vessels in my neatly stitched knee. Amazingly, I had done no permanent harm, but it just goes to show you how stupid kids can be when it comes to risking long-term harm for a moment of pleasure.

A couple of months later, I was back in the starting lineup as we won the Southern California CIF championship, and we went on to win it again the following year when I was chosen CIF Player of Year.

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