Former WR coach fighting for his life
By Robyn Disney - rdisney@macon.com
Frank Orgel is a fighter. Admittedly not the most gifted football player, he worked his way onto the Georgia football team in the late 1950s, helping the Bulldogs win the SEC title in 1959.

When he replaced legendary Warner Robins head football coach Joe Sumrall, Orgel willed the team to its first of 23 region titles. He then had a long career as an assistant college coach, despite not having a lot of coaching experience in the beginning.

But now Orgel is in a battle that makes all those others look small. He is fighting for his life.

On Sunday, Orgel will travel to Zana Rio, Mexico for a second round of stem cell treatment for a motor neuron disease that has bound the once active coach to a life filled with pain and limited mobility.

Orgel hasn't quit the fight, and that is something his friends expect from him.

"I'm sure he has had some down time," said Pat Dye, who was Orgel's roommate at Georgia and gave Orgel a job on his East Carolina and Auburn staffs. "But he doesn't give into it, that's for sure. I just can't fathom being in pain all the time."

Orgel said he started, "not to feel right," while he was still an assistant coach at Georgia. He was tripping and wasn't as coordinated as he once was. He went to numerous doctors who he said told him different things, everything from old age to being hit too many times as a football player.

After he retired from the Dougherty County School System as its athletics director in January 2001, he went to the Mayo Clinic and was diagnosed with having a motor neuron disease that is similar to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, more commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease.

"It affects my left arm and left leg," Orgel said. "My doctors have said it could move to the other side and eventually could develop into Lou Gehrig's. You don't ever expect to hear something like that, and that there is no cure is another blow."

It wasn't a blow just to Orgel. His friends from Warner Robins, Albany, Auburn, Georgia and East Carolina also took the news hard. Players and coaches started calling, writing and dropping by to see the coach in his Albany home. As the disease slowly started to take away his quality of life, his wife, Sarah, had to quit her job to take care of Orgel full-time. His daughter and son-in-law quit their jobs in Tennessee to move back home.

But in true Orgel fashion, he didn't want all that attention. He wanted to be able to play a bigger role in his care, so he connected with Stem Cell Biotherapy to see if stem cell treatments could help. The doctors there confirmed he was a good candidate for the treatments, but since it is not legal in the United States, he would have to pay for it on his own and travel to Mexico to have the treatments, which cost about $35,000.

That's when his friends stepped in. Dye and other coaches from Georgia and East Carolina started the Frank Orgel Fund to help offset the costs. And former players, like Terry Gallaher, have been spreading the word on what their coach is going through.

It didn't take long to get the money necessary for the first treatment, performed in January. Orgel spent just three days in Mexico and had three injections of stem cells into the back of his neck, close to the base of the brain. He said by the time he got back to his hotel room, he felt no pain. For the first time, the thought of taking almost 10 pain pills a day went away.

But about a month ago, the need for those pills came back. He said he's not back up to what he was taking before, but his therapy sessions are becoming more difficult.

"I go to therapy four days a week, swim in the pool twice a week and lift weights twice a week," Orgel said. "Though, I guess you can't call what I do in the pool as swimming. If you saw my strokes, you would think I was just learning how to swim. It's not pretty."

His sense of humor still hasn't faded. Dye remembers Orgel telling jokes while in college and in coaching meetings.

But through the optimism and jokes, there is sadness in his voice at times. A once robust man relies on his wife to cut his food and for people to push him around in a wheelchair when he goes out. He wants to teach his only grandson how to throw a football.

But Orgel isn't letting this disease get the best of him. On Monday, he will have stem cells injected into his spinal cord and will be in the hospital for a week. He said he has nothing to lose, and that is why he keeps fighting.

Former Houston County athletics director and head football coach Doug Johnson said that is just the fighter in Orgel. Johnson played under Orgel at Warner Robins from 1970-72.

"My senior year, we won the (second) region title in school history," Johnson said. "He only had but a handful of seniors, but he was driven in everything he did. I think half of us were scared of him because, if we didn't do our best, he'd get us in line and make us do it right. My senior year, we were not a powerful team, but we won the title and I think that was because Coach drove us and believed we could do it. He had, and still does have, a lot of heart."

Frank Orgel Fund

Contributions to the Frank Orgel Fund can be sent to:

Frank Orgel Fund


Albany Bank & Trust Co.


2815 Meredith Dr.


P.O. Drawer 71269


Albany, GA 31708


Attn: David Guillebeaux

All checks can be made out to the Frank Orgel Fund.

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