Tim Daggett

Tim Daggett
Tim Daggett
	Daggett in 1984
Personal information
Full name	Timothy Patrick Daggett
Country represented	United States
Born	May 22, 1962 (age 62); Springfield, Massachusetts, U.S.
Height	165 cm (5 ft 5 in)
Weight	66 kg (146 lb)
Discipline	Men's artistic gymnastics
College team	UCLA Bruins
Head coach(es)	Art Shurlock
Assistant coach(es)	Makoto Sakamoto
Eponymous skills	Daggett (pommel horse)
Retired	1988
Medal record
Representing United States
Men's artistic gymnastics
Olympic Games
Pan American Games

Timothy Patrick Daggett (born May 22, 1962) is a former American gymnast and an Olympic gold medalist. He is a graduate of West Springfield High School and UCLA, who competed in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, along with Bart Conner, Peter Vidmar and Mitch Gaylord.^[1] There, Daggett scored a perfect 10 on the horizontal bar, assisting his team in winning a gold medal – the first for the U.S. men's gymnastics team in Olympic history.^[2] In addition to team gold, he earned an individual bronze medal on the pommel horse. In 2005, he was inducted into the United States Olympic Hall of Fame.^[3]

Personal life

In West Springfield, Massachusetts, at the age of 10, Daggett began his future career in gymnastics by enrolling in the Parks and Recreation program. Advancing quickly, Daggett was invited by the local high school coach to train with his team.^[4] While he was a college student at UCLA, he competed in NCAA Division I gymnastics. He graduated from UCLA in 1986 with a degree in psychology.^[5]

Daggett is married to Deanne (née Lazer), formerly a collegiate-level gymnast at Eastern Michigan University and now an M.D. practicing anesthesiology. Their children are Peter and Carlie Daggett. Tim named his son Peter after teammate Peter Vidmar. Peter's son Tim is named after Tim Daggett. They all currently live in East Longmeadow, Massachusetts.

Medical history

Daggett's ankles had historically been weak. In 1980, Daggett dislocated one ankle shortly after having the other rebuilt. For months in 1986, he was forced to recover from his two ankles again being rebuilt. Immediately following the recovery during training, his horizontal bar release ended with him landing on his neck.^[6] The result was a ruptured spinal disc, and left arm nerves were also damaged.^[4] Daggett, against doctor recommendations, ignored the proposed surgery, which would have ended his career, and caught mononucleosis following his recovery from the near-fatal landing. In Rotterdam, the 1987 world championships proved career-shattering for Daggett. On the vault, he snapped his tibia and fibula and severed one of his arteries following the impact from a pike Cuervo.^[4]^[5] He underwent surgeries adding and removing supportive braces and pins to his left leg. He was under sedation from morphine in hospitals for three months.^[5]

Post-retirement career

Since his retirement following the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, Daggett has worked as a television commentator, covering the gymnastics events for NBC at the Summer Olympics in Barcelona, Atlanta, Sydney, Athens, Beijing, London, Rio, Tokyo, and Paris. He is the primary commentator for NBC Gymnastics. He comments with Elfi Schlegel, Al Trautwig, John Tesh, Nastia Liukin, John Roethlisberger, Amanda Borden, and Andrea Joyce.

He is also the proprietor of a gymnastics facility in Agawam, Massachusetts that features competitive Boys and Girls Team Programs, as well as more basic classes for toddlers and young children. Similarly, Daggett’s facility hosts open gym sessions that are welcome to all, as well as a Martial Arts class.^[7] He coaches the competitive Boys Junior Olympic Team Program. He has had multiple national champions and national team members come from his gym.^{[citation needed]} The Tim Daggett National Invitational, held at the Springfield MassMutual Center, is an annual gymnastics competition in January hosted by Daggett himself.^[7]