The Grind, presented by Bank of Clarendon: East Clarendon's Coker honored with Item's inaugural Thompson Award for Courage after burn injury

Caleb Coker refused to sit and mope.
The East Clarendon junior had suffered severe burns to his hands and face just before the start of baseball season. He watched his teammates kick off their season this spring from his hospital room, where he spent nearly two weeks.
Two weeks after being released from the hospital, Caleb was back on the diamond. Just more than a month later, he was pitching in the two biggest games of his life.
Both of those victories kept the Wolverines' season alive.
Last night at The Sumter Item's inaugural high school sports awards show, The Bobbys, he was presented with the Thompson Award for Courage for his drive to overcome adversity to help his team. While East Clarendon fell just short of a state title this season, Caleb was one of the reasons they made it as far as they did.
"Do I think we would've won more than the 22 games if we had Caleb the whole year? I can't say that. I don't know," former East Clarendon baseball coach Scott Cook said. "But I know we won two games because of Caleb."
THE ACCIDENT
Caleb was in his backyard with Blease Hardy and his girlfriend, Allie Coker, on a Saturday night in late February.
The East Clarendon standout was doing what many high school students do. In his own words, "Messing around, being stupid."
They were playing with gunpowder.
When the gunpowder didn't go off for nearly a minute, Caleb thought he had a dud, so he went to check.
As he approached, the gunpowder exploded, burning Caleb severely on his hands and face.
Allie rushed inside to wake Caleb's parents. Caleb's mom, Shana, is a registered nurse, but she was momentarily frozen by the shock of the situation.
"When it comes to your family, you kind of lose perspective on things," Shana said. "I saw him and looked at my husband and said, 'What do we do?' And I'm the nurse. He said, 'We go to the ER.' Normally, I'm the one that can handle that kind of stuff, but with him, I lost total medical perspective on it."
After a couple moments passed, Shana got into nurse mode. She had Allie search for a temporary solution to soothe the burn as everyone got ready to rush to the ER. They went straight to the Medical University of South Carolina.
Doctors quickly decided Caleb needed to go to the MUSC Burn Center in Charleston.
"My fear, as a parent, was how bad is this going to be? Would it be in his face? Was he gonna be permanently disfigured? Was he going to be scared? I didn't think he would ever come back to school this year, much less play baseball this year," Shana said. "I was thinking we were going to have to put him on homebound status."
THE AFTERMATH
Even with quick medical attention, Caleb had to wait before he really knew how long he'd be in Charleston.
Burns take roughly 24 hours to fully develop, so doctors had to wait to assess the damage.
On the Monday morning after the accident, doctors put cadaver skin on Caleb's hands and face. He would learn the source of that skin a few days later, just before a second surgery.
"He goes, 'Is this dead people skin on my face? That's not something you thought you needed to tell me?'" Shana recalled. "I said, 'No, not at the time. We were waiting for it to get off of you first.'"
Caleb's situation overwhelmed him.
"First, they put cadaver skin on my face and wrapped it up like a mummy pretty much," Caleb said. "I had to wait until Friday to take it off. Then they did a skin graft from my leg right here, ground it all up and sprayed it on my face and got the new skin growing good."
Most of his time in the hospital was spent waiting for skin to grow. It was a slow week and a half.
"Boring. That's about the only word; it's boring," Caleb said. "I didn't really do anything that first week. I was on so many pain meds that I slept that whole first week, pretty much."
After 11 days, Caleb was released on Wednesday, March 8. Thanks to Shana's background as a nurse, the staff felt comfortable sending Caleb home even though his hands and face were still very tender.
"The first couple days, I couldn't really do anything because of nerves in it, like it just kind of stung a little bit when I put it under water or anything like that," Caleb said. "You couldn't nick it on anything for like the first month. It would start bleeding or the skin would break."
SUPPORT FROM TURBEVILLE
By the morning after the accident, all of Turbeville knew.
Cook made the trip to Charleston, as did many others during the next 11 days.
Throughout Caleb's time in the hospital, he was showered with support from his community back home.
Becky Levine, the owner of Becky's Cafe, held a fundraiser to help offset the cost of medical expenses.
"All of Turbeville knew by Sunday morning because that's just how Turbeville is. Our phones were blowing up with people praying, texting and encouraging," Shana said. "My parents and my husband's parents and Caleb's girlfriend and her family, they were all there helping (with the fundraiser), and they said, 'You would not believe the people that turned out just wanting to help you all.'"
Shana still gets emotional thinking about how Turbeville rallied around Caleb. One of the more touching pieces of support was the simple act of bringing home-cooked meals. Caleb's metabolism was at an all-time high as his body fought to recover from the burns, so eating well was a priority.
"They brought us fried chicken and mashed potatoes," Shana said. "He wouldn't eat anything there, and that's what he wanted, so they came — I think it was on a Saturday night — with a cooler full of barbecue chicken and mashed potatoes."
Caleb felt the support of his teammates.
"They checked on me every day. I couldn't have asked for any more out of them. They did an excellent job. I appreciate it very much," Caleb said. "They came to the hospital; I had at least probably four or five visitors every day. It was more than we could imagine."
GETTING BACK ON THE FIELD
One thing Caleb did in the hospital was watch livestreams of the Wolverines' games, wishing he could be there.
Upon his release, he wanted to get back out on the field quickly, but he had to be cautious. He couldn't stay out in the sun for very long as his new skin continued to heal. He couldn't do much with his hands.
"It kind of hurt a little bit because they were doing real good at the beginning," Caleb said of being sidelined. "One of my mom's friends livestreamed the games so we could watch it in the hospital. I started coming back out here about a week after I got out the hospital."
Cook was overcome with emotion seeing Caleb come to practice for the first time.
"It meant the world to have Caleb there," Cook said. "Not the baseball player, the pitcher, the first baseman or his bat. To see him there, from seeing him laying in that bed bandaged up, and all I could see was his eyes and his lips and a little bit of his nose where he was breathing, to standing in front of me with just a wrap on his hands and you could smell he had sun creams on.
"I can't explain it to you. All I can say is God is good."
But it wasn't enough for Caleb just to come to practice. He wanted to play.
Two weeks after he was released, he took part in his first practice. A day later, on March 22, he started on the mound against Manning.
"The first time I saw him take the field in Manning, we literally cried," Shana said. "Just to see him out there and the way the fans reacted just to see him out there, it was very emotional."
Caleb started that game because of a promise Cook made to him while the pitcher was still in the hospital. Baseball only came up one time between coach and player.
The accident held Caleb from pitching in East Clarendon's season opener, a start Cook said he felt Caleb earned because of his dedication to the program. So Cook promised Caleb's season opener would be a start on the mound.
"That was taken from him that day," Cook said. "I promised him the day he came back, whether it was this year or next year, he would start on the mound. He came back, he practiced that one day, threw a bullpen, and he started. Coach (Curtis) Johnson said he couldn't throw many pitches, and I said, 'I don't care if he throws five pitches. I promised that man he would start the day he came back; he's starting on the mound tonight.'"
He threw 31 pitches.
Caleb wore a compression glove on his left hand to make it easier to wear his mitt, pitching an inning to earn the win. He allowed three unearned runs and walked a couple of Monarchs, but he struck out a batter and didn't surrender a hit.
After that first game back, Caleb eased his way into the fold to build his endurance.
He said he started finally feeling back to full strength on the mound "probably about two to three weeks after spring break, right there at the beginning of the playoffs."
When it mattered most, Caleb was ready.
THE PLAYOFFS
East Clarendon's postseason was full of heroic moments. Several of them came from Caleb.
His first opportunity came in their first matchup with Green Sea Floyds on May 4. Caleb served as DH, a true blessing as his batting was the last thing to come back to full strength because his hands were sensitive to the vibrations of the bat.
Caleb stepped to the dish with the Wolverines down 4-2 and doubled home a pair of runners to tie the game at 4-4. East Clarendon went on to win 6-5 to advance to the district championship.
East Clarendon faced off with Green Sea Floyds again for the district title, and Cook said he only wanted the ball in one player's hands.
"I trusted him. It's not that I didn't trust Cade (Cook) or Ja'Shawn (Montgomery), but I trusted Caleb," Cook said. "That pressure, that ballgame, was nothing compared to what he'd been through already. He was not feeling the pressure of that ballgame one bit. He knew it was a gift of God that he got to get back out there on that field, and he was going to take every advantage he could of that opportunity. He wasn't going to back down. He wasn't scared. He wasn't nervous."
That wasn't entirely true, at least at first.
"I was a little nervous at first. You could tell. I hit the first batter," Caleb said. "But after that, the nerves kind of wore off after I hit him, and everything started going my way from there."
Caleb delivered a masterful performance. He allowed just one unearned run, scattering five hits, a walk and that one hit batter. He struck out six before being relieved by Gage Brown with two outs left in the game. Cook told Caleb he was only pulled because he wanted the right-hander to be ready to pitch again later that week, if needed.
"I didn't want him to pull me, but I guess it was what was best for the team in his eyes," Caleb said. "Gage came in there and did his job and got us out of there no problem."
After a heartbreaking 1-0 loss to Lake View, the Wolverines were in survival mode. They couldn't lose again if they wanted to keep their season alive.
The first game was a 5-3 win over Latta, setting up a matchup against Branchville for a chance to punch their tickets to the lower state championship game. Caleb got the ball one more time.
Backed by a quick run in the top of the first and two more in the fourth, he carried a shutout into the sixth inning. He allowed two runs in the frame, including a solo home run, but Cook said he never considered taking him out of the game.
"He let up that home run, but I never felt like he wasn't in control of that game," Cook said.
Caleb finished off the complete game with a 3-2 win for East Clarendon. He scattered four hits and struck out four.
East Clarendon's season came to an end two days later. EC was on the wrong end of another epic battle with Lake View, falling 3-2.
"It hurts," Caleb said. "That's two years in a row we lost it on a play at the plate. It just hurts."
MOVING FORWARD
This season meant a lot to so many people in Turbeville, not just Caleb.
Cook was inspired by the fight in his pitcher and hopes others can learn from his gunpowder mistake.
"Players are supposed to look up to their coaches. This year, I looked up to one of my players for the adversity that he went through," Cook said. "Caleb's got a purpose in this life and this world, and he was given a second chance…
"If he saves two or three more kids in that school or the community or another school, that's two or three more kids that don't have to go through what he went through."
Shana also sees his comeback on the diamond as more than catharsis for an athlete itching to get back on the field. She said she thinks his recovery was aided by picking up a baseball again. One of the priorities when healing a burn is avoiding contracture, when the scar tissue pulls in and hardens the muscle and other tissue. Baseball helped avoid that.
"I honestly feel like baseball has helped him with that because it's made him use his hand so much to keep the scar tissue from forming," Shana said. "That was their biggest concern. If the scar tissue were to be too thick, then he wouldn't have the mobility of that hand like he needed to."
The accident also helped deepen Caleb's love for the sport.
"Whenever I came out here this year, after I got hurt, it meant a lot more," Caleb said. "I didn't know if I'd ever pick up a ball again."
It's been a long process, and Caleb isn't done with treatment. He has laser surgery later this month to help with the scarring and discoloration.
But everything from here on out is mild compared to what he's experienced so far.
"It's just been overwhelming. I'm so appreciative, so grateful for how far he's come," Shana said. "I'm thankful for his coaches for having the faith that they put in him to give him the opportunity to shine."