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Coaching in the NFL is grueling enough by itself. Fulfilling coaching duties while managing a life-threatening illness, then, should be impossible. But it wasn’t for Thomas McGaughey, the New York Giants special teams coordinator who somehow managed to undergo six rounds of chemotherapy last season while helping his unit improve from dead last to third, according to Football Outsiders.
As Giants special teams captain Michael Thomas told The Athletic's Dan Duggan, after watching the physical and emotional pains McGaughey went through to continue coaching in 2018, he wouldn't want to play for anyone else.
“This man literally came in every single day while he was fighting for his life, even when he didn’t have it,” Thomas said of McGaughey. “When he wasn’t here, we knew what he was doing, what he was going through. For him to show that strength and still be out here fighting with us, that’s a testament to who he is. I wouldn’t want to play for another coach.”
McGaughey's health issues first surfaced in spring 2017 when he was diagnosed with sepsis. Then a member of the Carolina Panthers' coaching staff, he was given medication after five days spent in the hospital, and coached through the 2017 season without further incident.
Though he wasn't retained by the Panthers, McGaughey quickly landed back on his feet with the Giants, with whom he was assistant special teams coordinator from 2007 to 2010. His symptoms returned that spring, leading to another hospital stay that resulted in surgery to remove a benign tumor blocking his bile duct. Doctors assumed that procedure would fix his health woes, but learned after cutting into the tumor that it was malignant, leading to a diagnosis of periampullary cancer.
McGaughey finished his chemotherapy treatment in October of last year. A PET scan taken earlier this week revealed that he's still in remission.
