Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, February 2, 1992 TAG: 9202020123
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C3 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE: GEORGE SHIRK THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
WARRIORS' ROOKIE GATLING MAKES MOST OF 2ND CHANCE
Chris Gatling says a lot of people wonder what that fashionable "X" is all about - the one that is stenciled onto the side of his head, a la Dennis Rodman.Gatling, a rookie forward for the Golden State Warriors, sometimes shrugs off the question quietly, but at other times he explains that it has nothing to do with fashion, nothing to do with politics and certainly nothing to do with basketball.
"That," says Gatling, "is where they put a big draining tube on the side of my head. That's where the blood drained out."
That, in other words is not the work of a barber, but rather it's a scar, under which is implanted a linoleum and steel-mesh plate. And it isn't the only scar, either.
Gatling has another one that goes from the front of his forehead all the way back to the rear base of his skull, representing yet another vivid reminder that he is a walking, breathing miracle.
In fact, Gatling figures he probably should be seven years dead. At the very least, he thinks, he should be in a wheelchair, paralyzed on the entire right side of his body.
That he is playing basketball - and has emerged as the Warriors' lightning bolt off the bench - is almost too much for Gatling himself to imagine.
Seven years ago, he lay paralyzed in a New York City hospital about to undergo a second brain operation as a result of an accident on a rain-slick Newark, N.J., street.
He was never going to play basketball again, according to his doctors and his parents; he was never going to get the athletic ride to Old Dominion that he dreamed of, and he most certainly wasn't going to be someday sharing the court with people bearing names like Mullin, Hardaway and Marciulionis.
"When I think about it now, it gives me the chills," Gatling said in an interview. "It was terrifying.
"Now that I look back on it, I value life every day."
If Gatling values his life - and he does - the Warriors and their fans do, too.
Having spent the first third of the season quietly learning a new position at small forward, Gatling since Christmas has bounded into the spotlight with bursts of sky walking, shot-blocking, lob-jams and rebounds.
"I'm going to have to try to find him some more minutes," said coach Don Nelson.
"He makes something positive happen, usually, every time he comes into the game, even for short minutes. He gets a rebound, scores a basket, blocks a shot, something like that. That's exciting."
Things are looking up for Gatling, in other words, which, given the events of seven years ago, is an utterly impossible thing to have happened.
"I was working for my father, Ray," Gatling remembered. "He owns a construction company, and it was a rainy night - really rainy. I went out to wipe the windshield. It was one of those maintenance vans with the big, high windows. I got on the bumper of the van and I slipped off - slipped backwards - and I hit my head on the cobblestone road.
"I was unconscious but came to, and went back to the site and was working, but I felt really sick, so the first thing I was thinking about, from previous concussions, is not to go to sleep, try to stay awake. But I was getting really tired, and really sick.
"The next thing I knew I was in the hospital and they were shaving my head and I saw my mother behind me, and she passed out - she fainted - and I saw her fall. But then I was counting backward from 99 and then I was out."
After the operation, Gatling lay in a coma for 2 1/2 weeks with his father, Ray, standing by the bed of the Gatlings' only child. The right half of Gatling's body was paralyzed. He was unable to talk.
"I just lay there, you know?" Gatling said. "That's when I caught pneumonia. They had to put me on an ice bed to try to cool me off.
"After that, I got pretty good, but it turned out they were giving me the wrong amount of medication. It was at the point where I could have died, so we went to a different neurosurgeon in New York at Columbia Presbyterian - the hospital where I was born."
Gatling had second brain operation and cleared the danger zone, at least in terms of death.
"Everything started going pretty well then. I was starting to walk and I was starting to talk, but my speech was still slurred and I was having a hard time talking."
He stayed there three months, and then went home, but only Gatling himself still dreamed about basketball. To everyone else, he said, basketball was the furthest thing from their minds.
"I could barely walk. They told me I'd never play again and that I might as well not even think about it, try to just get well. My father kept saying, `just get well.'
"I was so hurt that I wasn't going to play basketball again. That's the thing that I loved. That's the thing that was going to get me to college and everything. And to not be able to play, that was really difficult."
But Gatling defied the odds and played again. With his head in bandages, he began shooting hoops in his back yard. A year and a miracle later, he was back - having survived one lifetime and about to enter his second.
"It is a miracle, I believe that," Gatling said. "I've worked hard, and God has blessed me. He's given me a second chance, you know? And I want to make this second chance right. I don't want to do anything to jeopardize that.