"Is he conscious?" the dispatcher asked.
"Yes," [Assistant coach Steve] Deacon replied.
"Is he breathing?"
"Yes, he's breathing -- yeah, he's going, kind of going in and out on us though," Deacon said.
"Is he completely awake?"
"Uh, he keeps going … yeah, he's awake -- we're trying to get him to open his eyes right now. He's got a rapid pulse," Deacon said.
This from C-J:
A copy of the 911 call that a Pleasure Ridge Park High School coach made after the collapse of football player Max Gilpin during an Aug. 20 practice reveals that the 15-year-old had a "rapid pulse" and was drifting "in and out" of consciousness....
2 comments:
What a horrible situation for the family of the young man, his teammates, and the coaching staff. As a coach you never ever want any of your players to get hurt no matter what kind of situation it might be due to the fact that majority of the coaches view their players as their kids. For a player to pass away at a practice is just devastating. That coach will question himself everyday for the rest of his life of what he could of done different to make sure this situation never occurred.
On the other hand as a coach you need to make sure that when practicing in very hot weather that you are giving water breaks as often as possible so that this does not happen. I know that several teams practice during the early mornings as well as at night so they do not have to deal with the heat and risk getting someone hurt. The coach should have been prepared for this type of situation and from the 9-1-1 call it seemed as if he took the situation very lightly instead of being over concerned about the player. If he’s over concerned and nothing happens to the child then that’s okay, but to kind of overlook it that’s not okay.
The one thing I would tell all coaches is to make sure that when you become a coach that you are prepared to take care of each individual and if you don’t then it’s on you and no one else. If you want to be a coach you better come prepared each day to protect each child on your team as their parents would protect them.
Thanks James.
Very difficult situation, but as you suggest - the coach must err on the side of caution.
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