Middle of the day and the hustle and bustle in the Eagles' Sports Medicine/Athletic Training Room is high. Players are in and out and seeking treatment and looking for answers and in the middle of it all is Tom Hunkele, the Eagles' Vice President of Sports Medicine/Head Athletic Trainer. He is the one in charge of the team's medical treatment plan, surrounded by an outstanding staff of athletic trainers, grateful for all of those around him and very much ready to attack the Training Camp days that begin at 6 AM and often don't end until 10 PM.
Long days. Exhausting nights. Every bit of it is a dedicated love affair.
"A new year is totally different than the year before," Hunkele said. "New team, new opportunity, everything is fresh. Fresh start. And it's really about everybody on the team – the athletes, the coaches, everyone on my staff – having a chance to get better, to grow and do things that maybe didn't get a chance to do the year before.
"Our mindset is: What can we do to help the team win? What can we do to help the athletes on the team have the success they can have and ultimately be on the field to play their best football."
It isn't just Hunkele, of course. The athletic training staff consists of Hunkele and experts like Jerome Reid, Joseph O'Pella, Steve Feldman, Shaneice Jackson, and Monte Wong, and Hunkele works directly with Fernando Noriega, the team's director of player performance and sports science/head strength and conditioning coach and his staff.
Everything works hand in hand, says Hunkele, from the way the coaching staff treats the players on the field to the Player Performance Department to how the athletes rest and recover on a day-to-day basis and, yes, to how Hunkele and his staff tend to the needs of the men throughout this long and demanding season ahead.
The Eagles are as healthy right now as they are going to be all season, so let's make that clear. The bumps and bruises and injuries are going to happen in this sport. Philadelphia is fortunate to have Hunkele, in his 25th NFL season and 11th with the Eagles, leading the way in medical treatment.
"I think the biggest thing is the overall level of trust between the players, the medical staff, the coaching staff, and everybody in the organization," Hunkele said. "They know that we have our eye on what is best for these players. It's not about just the next day. It's about the year, their full contracts, their careers. It all starts when somebody gets injured and it's going to happen in this sport. Our physicians and their expertise to really recognize, see what is going on, the clinicians in my room to formulate a plan and for us to say, 'This is how we're going to lay it out.'
"We present that and then it's important that the athletes feel good about the plan. They've got to feel good about the progression and they have to feel good about what it means for them. They are a large part of what the rehab is. We guide them. We will put our hands on them and we will guide them to certain points, but they are as big a part of the rehabilitation as anyone in the building."
Hunkele's message to the players is this: The Eagles have an incredible team of physicians and consultants and hands-on staff that aim to bring out the very best in every individual throughout the course of a long, successful NFL career.
Trust is a huge part of the story here. Hunkele has earned the players' faith and the team has been rewarded.
It all works together.
"It's always a prove-it year. The only way to have success is to show them that you truly care about the players, you do your best, you treat each player individually the way they want to be treated, you take care of them to the best of your ability, and you go above and beyond to make sure what you're during is in their best interest," Hunkele said. "We're treating them as people and we're answering every question and every concern and then helping them get on the right path to having a great season and many more after that."
