Health concerns aren't new

The announcement Wednesday that Rick Majerus is leaving his longtime job as Utah basketball coach for health reasons shouldn't have come as a surprise to anyone who has followed Majerus and Ute basketball the past 15 years. His health has been an issue since his first year on the job.

Majerus was only six games into his first year when he left the team for the rest of the season to have a seven-bypass heart operation.

Soon after that, Majerus shed dozens of pounds and even ran a marathon.

However, he gradually gained weight and missed various games for health reasons over the years, including some for minor heart procedures.

His health was a factor in his missing most of the 2000-01 season.

That was the year he left after the first game because of a sore knee that hadn't properly recovered from surgery. Then the day he was to return he underwent minor heart surgery, which was to keep him out two weeks. A week later he announced he would miss the rest of the season to attend to his mother's health in Wisconsin.

Even though his players and assistant coaches could see Majerus' health getting worse — he reportedly weighs between 350 and 400 pounds — they didn't know it would cause him to quit coaching.

"I looked at Rick as being a little bit indestructible," said Dick Hunsaker, a longtime assistant of Majerus' at both Ball State and Utah. "I know he could get all worked up during games and it looked like the veins were going to pop in his neck and he'd get all red and flushed. But we just figured that was part of the deal and that he wouldn't overstep his limits."

But according to Majerus' longtime friend and legal counsel Bob Henderson, his health really deteriorated in recent months and he needed to get help immediately.

While Majerus has seen and been treated by renowned heart surgeon Kent Jones for years in Utah, the cardiologist he sees in Santa Barbara is supposed to be one of the top of his profession.

---

E-mail: sor@desnews.com