Gridiron Heros

Every year, promising high school athletes are paralyzed by freak accidents. Chris Canales was paralyzed in the last game of 2001 with less than four minutes to go. A simple tackle turned a life of promise into a struggle for survival. At the Texas State 3A final, Cory Fulbright of Everman High was at the pinnacle of his football career. One moment, the crowd is cheering, the next, he was lying on the ground, unable to move, paralyzed from the neck down.

For these two men and their families, the struggles still continue. Physical and medical needs are overwhelming. Costs will run between $500,000 and $1M for the first year just for medical care. Then there is the need for ventilators, hydraulic lifts, home remodeling (doors, baths, ramps), transportation (vehicles, wheel chair lifts), and daily care.

If the family has insurance, they quickly hit the maximum for their benefits, both for the year and for the total policy. Further, the insurance companies often have clauses such as “the company will pay for such care and durable equipment as the company deems appropriate and allowable”, which allows the insurance company to disallow such items as power wheelchairs, or limit the payment to six months of the rental of a wheel chair. Medicare and Medicaid have significant limitations on what they will pay.

Finally, unless the family happens to live in a county that has a public hospital, there is no hospital that will accept the disabled athlete for treatment.

At first glance, one would think that the school district would bear some responsibility for the athletes. However, very few districts carry catastrophic insurance policies for the athletes (cost) and the school districts are generally considered to be exempt from lawsuits for such injuries.

One individual is trying to make a difference. Eddie Canales, father of Chris Canales, has been trying to bring the plight of these, and other disabled athletes in Texas to the attention of the public. Driving around in an old van with a battered poster of some 14 paralyzed high school football players, his organization “Gridiron Heroes” is trying to help change things.

He is trying to raise $100,000 per year for his non-profit foundation. The money is used for wheel chairs and specially equipped vans for the kids.

“When the horse Barbaro went down, the racehorse community raised millions of dollars. We need to get to the point in the football community where we value the human injured athletes as much or more as the racehorse community values a fine animal,” he said.

I salute Eddie Canales. He is trying to help those less fortunate than himself, to make a difference. If you would like to see what Eddie is trying to accomplish, you can visit the website of Gridiron Heroes at http://www.gridironheroes.org/