Sam Wyche was a few days from dying.
The former NFL head coach knew it, and his doctors did too. The heart that had been slowly failing him for 15 years had gone into a rapid decline. All the good options had vanished except for one _ a heart transplant.
Wyche had been thoroughly counseled by Carolina Panthers owner Jerry Richardson _ a heart transplant survivor himself _ about what would happen next. The problem was that there was no heart available to give Wyche.
Wyche, 71, understood what it was like not to have much time left. His most famous achievement as a coach had come when he popularized a full-time "no-huddle" offense with the Cincinnati Bengals in the 1980s, and got them to the Super Bowl with it.
In the "no-huddle," the Bengals called every play at the line of scrimmage, stressing out defenses who did not have time to substitute. Defensive players sometimes faked injuries in a vain attempt to stop Cincinnati drives.
Now Wyche felt like one of those defensive coordinators he had delighted in tormenting.
A doctor at Carolinas Medical Center came to the coach's hospital room in Charlotte on Sept. 12 and gave Wyche and his wife of 50 years, Jane, the bad news.
It was about 11 a.m.
They were about to hear a death sentence.
There's nothing more we can do, the doctor said. We still don't have a heart for a transplant. You aren't a good candidate for a heart pump, and you have nearly gotten to the point where you wouldn't survive a transplant surgery anyway. We're going to send you back home to South Carolina tomorrow and let the hospice nurses take care of you for "as long as necessary."
As long as necessary.
Those were the four words that kept ringing in Wyche's brain. He knew what they meant.
He needed to get ready to die.
