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Bailey Touched Them All
by Bob Keisser, Long Beach Press-Telegram
November 17, 2007
Long Beach State has had many great coaches and great athletes in more
than a half-century of athletics, from Ed Ratleff to Troy Tulowitzki,
Leon Burns to Misty May, Jerry Tarkanian to George Allen. But it is safe
to say that no one touched the lives of more athletes and coaches, literally
and figuratively, than former trainer Dan Bailey.
That's why the entire campus and extended sports community was in shock
and tears Friday upon learning that Bailey died Friday morning of a heart
attack at Los Alamitos Medical Center. Bailey, 60, had just retired this
summer after 36 years at Long Beach State.
Bailey underwent knee replacement surgery on Nov. 5 at Long Beach Memorial
Hospital. He returned home but over last weekend but began to feel ill
and was rushed to Los Alamitos Medical Center on Nov. 10. Other tests
couldn't determine the source of the bleeding, an ulcer in the lower stomach,
until Thursday. He suffered a heart attack Thursday before surgery, then
a second heart attack Friday morning, and died at 2:30 a.m.
There was immediate disbelief that someone so young and vibrant had been
taken away, and then crushing sadness at how unfair it was to happen to
someone in the first few months of a retirement that would allow him to
spend more time with his wife Kay, his children, Joe, Ryan and Dana, and
his grandchildren.
"I'm sick," said Seth Greenberg, the former 49ers mens basketball
coach who is now the head coach at Virginia Tech. "Bales defines
everything that is good about college athletics. He cared about the kids,
cared about the coaches, cared about the university.
"He educated Joe (Harrington, Greenberg's predecessor) and me about
how to succeed at Long Beach State. He enabled me to survive my first
year. He was a voice of reason.
"He was more concerned about me than anything else that first year.
He wanted to help. That's so very, very rare. It's not in his job description."
"We became very close friends when I arrived at Long Beach and stayed
close friends forever," said Ratleff, the 49ers basketball icon.
"He was more than a trainer when I was student and more than a friend
when I left school. He was just the best.
"This is so sad, because I saw him just before his knee surgery and
he was looking forward to getting rid of the pain in his knee so he could
golf more often. We were talking about our next golf outing. We'd get
together to play golf four or five times a year."
"It seemed to be a situation that just spiraled out of control,"
said Kay Bailey, his wife of 40 years. "He fought, but he had lost
so much blood by the time they found the bleeding, and he was so weak."
Bailey played football and wrestled at the University of Utah, where he
got his undergraduate degree in physical education, and then went to USC
and earned a graduate degree in physical therapy. He began working at
Long Beach State that same year in the health office, became a part-time
assistant on the athletic training staff, and then was named head trainer
in 1974.
"Tom Oxley was the trainer when I was at Long Beach with Dan as his
assistant, and he became the head man when Tom went to Tampa Bay (in the
NFL)," 49ers football star Jeff Severson said. "Dan had this
great ability to never over-react to things. If a kid feigned an injury,
he'd treat him and tell him he could go play. If a kid was really hurt
but wanted to play, Dan would make sure he didn't jeopardize himself."
"Dan was one of my favorite trainers and one of my favorite people,"
said Glenn McDonald, the 49ers former basketball star and former women's
basketball coach who is intramurals director at the school. "Even
when I went to play pro with Boston and Europe, I'd always come back to
Dan if I was hurting. When my kids went to play at other schools"-Michael,
basketball at Stanford; Alexis, volleyball at Washington-"they would
always consult with Dan about their health before anyone else.
"He was a great trainer, but that doesn't come close to describing
how important he was. This hits me as hard as any loss I've had in my
life."
Bailey expanded his career in the '80s, opening his own physical therapy
clinic and helping work with Olympic rowers like Joan Lind Van Blom. In
1982, he began volunteering his services to the U.S. national water polo
team and became its full-time trainer in 1990. He was the trainer on the
1996, 2000 and 2004 Olympic men's teams.
"Dan knew more about knees than anyone I've ever dealt with,"
former 49ers volleyball standout Tyler Hildebrand said when Bailey retired.
"I've had three orthopedic surgeons and they had no idea. Dan taught
me how to rehab. He makes you do things you don't think you're capable
of doing. He knows what your limits are and he pushes you to get to them."
Bailey's son Joe competed in water polo and track in high school and threw
the shotput at UCLA. His younger son Ryan has been a U.S. national water
polo team performer for more than a decade and is currently playing professionally
in Europe.
Ryan Bailey and the U.S. secured a spot in the 2008 Olympics with a win
in the Pan Am Games, and Dan Bailey and his family were looking forward
to attending the Beijing games.
"When I first came to Long Beach, I remember going into his training
room and realizing that no athlete was better than another," said
Ken Lindgren, the long-time 49ers and U.S. national team water polo coach.
"He took care of everyone in the order they came in. It didn't matter
if they were football players, basketball players or water polo players.
"That was what made the kids like him so much."
"What made Dan special is that he didn't care who he was working
on, be it Ed Ratleff or some tennis player," Greenberg said. "Everyone
got his full attention, and everyone got in the same line. The athletes
loved him for that. He was the kind of fair guy who could cross all of
the lines easily, coach to player, player to trainer, trainer to coach."
"He was a legend, one of a kind," former 49ers athletic director
and long-time booster Perry Moore, who hired Bailey. "The kids loved
him and he was devoted to the coaches.
"I remember how fond guys like Tex Winter were of Bailey. They depended
on him and trusted him."
"Everybody thought he was mean and gruff, but he was a pussycat,
the original stuffed bear in a tough bear outfit," said Don Dyer,
the long-time Long Beach lawyer and 49ers booster who eventually worked
in athletic administration before retiring. "There was nothing he
wouldn't do for you, but he wouldn't want anyone to know it.
"He was also one of the best judges of character I ever met. If Dan
told you a player or a coach or an administrator was a jerk, he was a
jerk. He knew people. But he also wasn't the kind of guy to say things
like that to many people. He kept his confidences."
There will be a memorial service for Bailey Tuesday at 11 a.m. at the
Walter Pyramid. Funeral services are pending. In lieu of flowers at the
memorial service, the family requests donations be made to fund a scholarship
in Bailey's name at Long Beach State. Details are forthcoming.
"God has a plan for everybody," McDonald said, "but this
is one of those times when you have to say `why him?' He had so much to
live for and he was looking forward to these years."
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