Player safety takes priority as summer continues to sizzle
COLLEGE STATION — The first Sunday of this month was blazing hot for most Texans and a good day to seek shelter in the cool indoors. For Texas A&M receiver Jhamon Ausbon and his teammates, Aug. 4 simply marked what he unlovingly dubbed “Day Four” of training camp.
“Hottest day I’ve ever experienced in my life,” Ausbon said. “I promise you.”
And Ausbon grew up in Houston, not exactly an oasis in August. The hot days at A&M and across Southeast Texas have come in waves this month, when high school and college football programs prepare (and thirst) for fall.
Meantime, the world around them has never been more airconditioned, creating a sharper contrast for a generation acclimated to 72 degrees year-round suddenly mixing it up for a couple of hours with the thermometer regularly hitting 100.
“We have a lot of things in place to make sure they cool down and do the things we’ve got to do,” A&M coach Jimbo Fisher said of players going from blessed AC to Texas’s version of Hades. “And we try to condition in the summer as much as we possibly can in the heat.”
That acclimation wasn’t necessary several decades ago, when air-conditioning in homes and cars was a luxury and not the norm. Billy Pickard, who died in 2015, spent about six decades in and around Kyle Field, first as a trainer under coach Paul “Bear” Bryant in the 1950s and then as a director of athletics facilities on campus.
He once explained that early in his A&M tenure, players had little trouble handling the heat in practice based on two factors: no acclimation necessary and player size.
“You never slept in an airconditioned house,” Pickard said of the not-so-good old days. “And Marvin Tate and Sid Theriot — those guys were our guards and our ‘big guys’ — they weighed 180 or 190 pounds.”
The late Pickard’s point on that front was illustrated again last year, when then-A&M offensive
lineman Koda Martin, all 310 pounds of him, suffered a heat stroke during spring drills. Martin and his father, former Manvel coach Kirk Martin, credited the swift reaction of A&M’s staff for saving the massive player’s life.
A&M, like similar programs, has a load of safeguards in place, both to try to prevent heat-related issues and to jump on them should they bubble up during drills.
“Coach Fisher and his whole staff, they do a great job of taking care of us,” A&M safety Keldrick Carper said. “They make sure we hydrate properly and get a lot of time for treatment and rest. (But practice) is a grind, and we’re going to have to play games in weather like this.”
The Aggies and their fans are fortunate on that front, at least early on. Television typically dictates kickoff times, and A&M opens this season with a night game (against Texas State on Aug. 29 at Kyle Field) and an evening kick on Sept. 14 against Lamar for the next home game.
Carper added that he and his teammates made sure to work out plenty in the heat in June and July to lessen the jolt of August. Speaking of jolts, Pickard once recalled that fresh water might as well have been sewer water to oldschool coaches trying to toughen their team for the season.
“Nobody gave the players water. That was unheard of,” Pickard said. “When Gene Stallings got here (to A&M) in the mid-1960s, only then were coaches beginning to look at giving people water.”
Now, and much more wisely, drinking water throughout the day not only is an act but a way of mind, Ausbon said.
“The whole day we’re in the mindset of going out there knowing it’s hot and hydrating over 12 hours,” he explained.
Fisher, 53, grew up in West Virginia at a time when there was little to do indoors to keep kids’ attention. He graduated from high school in 1983, just as video games were beginning to take hold.
“When we were kids, we were outside all of the time,” Fisher said of being accustomed to summer heat prior to any harsh football training. “There wasn’t anything to do inside, except mom would put you to work, or dad would put you to work. So you were trying to get away from the house to go play.”
Plus, it could be downright uncomfortable in the summer in homes with no air-conditioning, prompting dwellers to seek a breeze and perhaps a shade tree. Today, the 1.6 billion air conditioners across the world will increase to 5.6 billion by 2050, according to the International Energy Agency.
Put another way, 10 air conditioners will be installed worldwide every second for the next three decades. Don’t tell that to Ausbon, who sounded a bit like Bear Bryant when speaking of not only surviving but thriving in the Southeast Texas heat with another season thankfully at hand.
“It’s the last man standing,” Ausbon said with a slight grin. “Only the strongest survive.”