He rests his head against the headrest and says, “I’m barely holding on, Coach Wood. The pain is starting to take over, and every day, I wake up more and more stiff. I still have headaches on occasion that are absolutely debilitating. There are days when I feel like I can’t put on my gear one more goddamn time.” He looks over at me. “I can’t do this for another year. This is . . . this is it for me.” I swallow, knowing this will be a huge loss to the team. Lawes has been our backbone, our foundation, some might say the start of something great. With him in front of the goal, we’ve had more
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