A baseball hall of famer was back in Okotoks last week to recognize the efforts of members of the Dawgs family for something that doesn't show up in a box score.
That is, saving his life.
Bob Elliott, a Canadian sportswriter who is in the Baseball Hall of Fame writers' wing in Cooperstown, nominated Okotoks Dawgs athletic therapist Savannah Blakley and team photographer Angela Burger for a Red Cross Rescuer Award for performing CPR after he collapsed during his key-note speech due to heart complications at the team's awards banquet in February at the Foothills Centennial Centre.
"These two women didn't know me from Adam," Elliott said from Toronto on Thursday. "And here they are climbing on stage and everything to help me. I remember telling the doctor I felt bad for ruining the banquet.
"He said: 'You were lucky. Three hours early or three hours later, where would you have been?' The answer is the same, I would have been all alone in my hotel room.
"The doctor said 'While it was embarrassing, you were very lucky to have this happen in front of trained professionals who knew what they were doing and didn't freak out at the moment.'"
Blakley and Burger were presented the award by the Red Cross prior to the Dawgs game at Seaman Stadium on July 30. Elliott was on hand for the presentation.
"We had been notified about the Red Cross about three weeks ago," said Blakley, who also works at ProSport Therapy in Okotoks. "We were both surprised and honoured that Bob nominated us.
"I am so thankful that our efforts worked and that he survived, I feel that is the biggest thing."
She said the effort at the banquet was a team effort.
"I consider this as part of my job, even though it is something you don't ever want to do, I have been trained in it," Blakley said.
Burger was honoured to receive the recognition.
"This is special memento I will cherish forever," said Burger, who has taken CPR training. "I am so grateful that Bob thought of Savannah and I to nominate us for the award."
Elliott said he had not formally met Blakley and Burger until later in February, about three weeks after he collapsed when he and his wife took the pair out for dinner in Calgary.
The trio were reunited at Seaman Stadium on July 30.
"It was really great to see Bob, he is such a really funny man and he's doing really well," Burger said. "The three of us — and Lou Pote — have a real connection that will last forever.
"It's very special and in a weird way, I have got to know them very well through this whole experience."
Okotoks Dawgs Academy coach Lou Pote had the wherewithal to grab a defibrillator machine, which had to be used on Elliott at the banquet."Lou has already replaced Eddie Matthews as my all-time favourite player," Elliott said. "I think Lou had six saves in his career and I was his seventh. (Pote had six saves in his five-year major league career, which included a World Series ring with the 2002 Los Angeles Angels).
"Some people say I got zapped three times but the fireman, Geoff Scott, said it was only twice. The girls did it once, they zapped me back then I crashed."
Scott who was at his son's hockey game at the Centennial Arena was there in 90 seconds.
Meanwhile, Mayor Bill Robertson was outside directing traffic on a busy that Saturday night in February.
Elliott said he had never known the true meaning of what Okotoks Dawgs announcer and director William Gardner calls the 'Dawgs family' until his life was saved.
And those efforts helped him see his family again.
"On Thursday, my three grandkids are coming to visit me from Moncton," Elliott said. "I will think of Lou, Angela and Savannah, because if it wasn't for them, I wouldn't be seeing them."
