A Painful Experience for Dieter Brock : Ram Quarterback Is Still Hurting Two Days After Surgery

Dieter Brock has been waking up on the wrong side of the bed this week. Any side of a hospital bed would be the wrong side for him.

Until surgery was required to remove a kidney stone at Chapman General Hospital in Orange Monday, the Ram quarterback had been in a hospital only once during his 12-year career--the first 11 in Canada--and had never had surgery. “I hurt my knee in ’78 and missed a playoff game and the last game of the regular season,” he said Wednesday, “but I can’t remember if I even stayed overnight.”

Brock learned on a news broadcast that he wouldn’t be playing against the Giants at New Jersey Sunday.

“Was it last night or the night before?” he said. “I’m losing track of time here in this hospital. I called my wife and said, ‘Man, I’m not gonna be playing.’

“But I sort of expected it. I was feeling a pretty good bit of pain. I took a couple of pretty good shots (from the New Orleans Saints) and I had a tough night sleeping that night. I guess it was being banged up a little bit and still having that problem where I felt like I had to go to the bathroom all the time and it wouldn’t come out. It had been like that the last three weeks.”

But after 31 sacks and many other hits after releasing the ball this season, it took a kidney stone a half-centimeter (1/5 inch) wide to put Brock out of action.

Dr. Garo Tertzakian first attempted to remove it by an endoscopic process through the bladder, but when he found the jagged stone embedded in tissue he was required to make a 3 1/2-inch incision in the right groin area.

Brock said: “They put me out with the idea they were gonna go in and try to pull it out. They tried that a couple of times but it was lodged in there too good, I guess, and therefore they had to make an incision to get it out. When I woke up I knew what they had done.”

Tertzakian Wednesday described Brock’s recovery as “ahead of schedule.’

“I’m feeling a little bit tired and sore right now,” Brock said. “I’m a little weak just from lying around.”

He won’t go to New Jersey with the Rams Friday.

“I would probably be resting better if I stayed here rather than making a long trip,” Brock said.

“It’s a good thing they got it out. I hate to miss a game, but I’ll be back--I hope for the Atlanta game.”