Back in the mid 1980's, we lost a player. Had never been sick but one day at practice he felt dizzy. They thought maybe heat exhaustion so they first tried to cool him down. He went into cardiac arrest. They did CPR and rushed him to the hospital. He would revive and then go back into cardiac arrest. They eventually lost him. Had a heart defect that went undetected his entire life up till then.
Always better to be safe.
I had just started the 8th grade in the fall of 1971. A W/R for the Detroit Lions - Chuck Hughes went out for a pass and on the way back to the huddle, dropped dead on the field. ( I among millions saw the game on TV as there were only 3 network channels then and on Sundays, in the fall, Pro Football was king. They didn't pronounce him dead until well after the game ended) He had a massive coronary. Thing is, he had been given a clean bill of health from the very hospital they took his dead body to just a few weeks earlier when he went there complaining of chest pain. His family had a long history of heart disease and he thought he might have inherited the problem.
Turns out he was right. He was just 27-28 yrs old.
