Follow-up on Anthony Murdock

Anthony Murdock was the running back that injured his knee against Hilltop a couple of weeks ago. The preliminary diagnosis was that he broke his leg (right tibia) and that he tore his ACL.

I have spoken to the players and I told them the severity of the injury. I told the players about the injury and some have taken the news very hard. I asked them to keep Anthony in their thoughts and prayers.

Well today was his surgery and the doctors found it was worse than they thought. Not only was the ACL torn, but the MCL was also torn. A segment from the top of the tibia broke off the bone that was the size of a large coin. The doctors had a hard time resetting the bone and a gap was left between the fragment and the tibia.

The doctor told Anthony's father, Rob Murdoch, recovery is going to take a long time. In all my years involved in sports, both as a player and as a coach, I have never seen an injury like this.

Thanks to Nick Lococo, our team photographer, I found a neat photo of Anthony scoring a touchdown against Hilltop before he got injured. I took a copy of it to Kinkos and had made into a poster with a border all around the edge. Today, I had all the players sign the poster and I returned it to Kinkos to have the poster laminated. The players all took pride in signing the poster for Anthony.

Rob called me and I asked if we as a team could stop by to visit Anthony and present the poster in the hopes it would lift his spirits. He said yes and that it was a great idea. I am planning to go the Murdock home this coming Saturday (10/10/09) and I might need help with transportation.

The Murdocks live on Crawford St. in Allied Gardens and I am thinking of meeting at PHHS at 10:30 am. We will stop by for a brief visit and then return back to PHHS. If you are able to help out with transportation, please call me on my cell or e-mail me at ldailey@pd.sandiego.gov.

I don't have a head count at this time. But as soon as I find out, I will let you all know. Thanks and please keep Anthony and his family in your prayers.