This is just one more reminder how much tougher Sam Young is than me.
Young participated in Friday’s skill work for the first time without a wrap on his left biceps. He was involved in one of the most bizarre incidents ever in predraft workouts.
A week ago in Toronto, Young was impaled by a metal piece off a vertical testing pole. “It was one millimeter away from hitting my nerve; three millimeters away from a blood vessel,” Young said.
He described the incident as follows, and the account was corroborated by at least one Raptors official: Young jumped up to slap the pole, turned in the air and the piece of metal popped into his skin. But the piece had two sides, and it went in two different directions, making it impossible for him to just pull it out. Young was suspended in the air on the pole before Raptors personnel gently took him down with the pole still attached to him.
“It didn’t break off, so I hung on it,” Young said. “They turned the vertical pole sideways. But I couldn’t take the whole thing with me. So the guys in the gym weren’t sure what to do. I waited 15 minutes for paramedics. They came, put a towel over my face and with a chain saw separated me from it. There were sparks flying everywhere.”
The worst part was when Young was in the ambulance. “I’m holding part of the pole that’s still in me, and the ambulance had to go over speed bumps to get out of the arena,” Young said. “I’m trying to keep it steady, but it’s pulling on my skin. It was crazy. I wanted to yank the whole thing out, but I wasn’t sure about the effect. I finally got to the hospital, they drugged me up, they fiddled with it and yanked it out. I would have been in trouble had I pulled it out. It was the craziest hour of my life.”
There were no stitches and almost no blood from the puncture wound. Young said he was told not to do the weightlifting portion of the testing in Chicago, and he isn’t supposed to do any lifting for two weeks as a precaution.
He said doctors told him to rest for a few weeks, but that wasn’t going to happen. Young went and worked out for Chicago and Indiana after the incident. He’s heading to Golden State for a group workout next week. “I was determined to not let it affect me,” Young said.
If it’s me, I’m running around freaked out screaming, “Get it out, Morton! Get it out!”
The more details that emerge from that incident, the crazier it gets.
Temple guard Dionte Christmas witnessed Young’s mishap.
“That was pretty crazy,” Christmas said. “He’s a tough guy. I can see that just from seeing him out on the court, but after that, he’s definitely got my respect.”
On the bright side, that means when the NBA commentators bring up Sam Young, they have something else to mention beyond the backflips and poetry.
Hopefully he got to keep the piece for the potential lawsuit.
