The Adventures of Bimbus and Nimbo!
Bimbus: beer and football
Nimbo: I’m gonna try to read. I wasn’t sure where else to go.
Bimbus: reader
Nimbo: Tim Tebow!
Bimbus: poopinator
Nimbo: Why do you keep saying that?
Bimbus: i’m obssessed with poop. Ur fault.
Nimbo: Why is it my fault?
Bimbus: u love poop
Nimbo: What? You never explained why I love poop?
Bimbus: you are obsessed with ur poo
Nimbo: NO. I am not. I don’t understand while you would say that.
Bimbus: weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! We talk about poop a lot
Nimbo: Anal penetration.
Bimbus: eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Nimbo: I feel like I am talking to a mechanical squirrel.
Bimbus: I am that
Nimbo: You can only repeat certain phrases & make certain noises. “You’re obsessed with poop,” or “eeeeeeeeee!”
Bimbus: yep
Nimbo: my waitress has abandoned me
Bimbus: go get the manager!
Nimbo: what an asshole move that would be
Bimbus: i’m gonna do it again… get prepared…. EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!
NEXT DAY:
Bimbus: I can’t stop farting
Nimbo: Stop whatever you are doing right now & stand up & scream “I’m a fucking mechanical squirrel!”
Bimbus: while I fart?
Nimbo: Sure. It’ll hide the gas for a little while.
Bimbus: EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! Do u need underwear?
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So I haven’t written in a while so naturally I am going to write about football. Professional sports is finally starting to acknowledge its “concussion crisis;” i.e., permanent, long term, degenerate brain damage that can occur if an individual suffers multiple concussions, or chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). Symptoms include depression, dementia, memory loss, and aggressive behavior.
The National Football League has instituted new stricter concussion rules including more rigorous sideline testing and post game neurological testing by a third party to ensure a player has no signs of impairment before they can return to an active roster. Unfortunately, the enforcement of these rules seems to be inconsistent at best. Two recent examples: Pittsburgh Steelers safety Troy Polamalu was knocked unconscious after colliding with the knee of another player. Polamalu was taken out of the game and didn’t return due to “concussion-like symptoms.” Interesting to me, the hit which knocked him out did not seem to be that severe. But Polamalu has a history of concussions. It becomes progressively easier to sustain a concussion after initial concussions. Like a weak ankle after a sprain. Polamalu played the next week. A more blantant example of the NFL ignoring its own rules happened this Thursday during the Cleveland v. Pittsburgh game. Cleveland’s quarterback Colt McCoy took a intense helmet to helmet hit from Pittsburgh linebacker James Harrison. McCoy was knocked unconscious and lay on the ground twitching. He was out for two plays. When he returned, after little or no evaluation, he threw an interception that lost the game. The next day it was admitted he began to show symptoms of severe concussion after the game. (Sadly, enough the discussion after this incident seemed to focused on how much Harrison will be fined for the illegal helmet to helmet hit, and not that the Browns training staff put McCoy back in the game at the risk of permanent brain injury.)
Not only is the NFL ignoring or fudging its own rules, it is missing the point entirely. If a player sustains a concussion he needs to not play a number of weeks. A high number of weeks. This is how to protect a player. Let’s say six weeks. You get a concussion you don’t play for six weeks, period. The problem with NFL is threefold: 1) a culture of toughness (players want to play at all costs); 2) winning equals money and teams want the best players to play regardless of the consequences; and 3) long term effects of concussion can often be invisible in the short term and it is often difficult for players not to want to play (or more importantly coaches “encouraging” aka forcing players to play) when not showing outward signs of being “hurt.” As far as the league rules are concerned it likely the money issue that is preventing them from enacting stricter rules.
This brings us the National Hockey League whose enforcement of their own concussion rules are just as befuddled. The matter of CTE slapped the NHL in the face when Bob Probert was posthumously diagnosed with CTE. Then this year when three of hockey’s toughest pounders, Wade Belak, Derek Boogaard, and Rick Rypien, all died due to suicide or accidental overdose after a struggles with depression and substance abuse. Boogaard was posthumously diagnosed with CTE. All three of these players sustained most of their head trauma from fighting without gloves. In light of this, or because of his superstar status, Pittsburgh Penguins’ Sidney Crosby was inactive for ten and a half months due to a concussion. In this case the NHL seems to be willing to take the steps to ensure the health of a superstar player that the NFL is not willing to take. But what about the bruisers on NHL teams? Will the NHL be as protective of players whose job it is to fight? The bigger issue: is the NHL willing to ban fighting? In a strange echo of NFL/McCoy incident, Nashville Predators Jordin Tootoo was suspended for two games for an illegal check to Buffalo Sabres’ goalie Ryan Miller. Much of the discussion of this incident focused on whether Tootoo’s punishment was too severe, and not that Miller, who league is trying to protect due unique status of the goalie position, landed on top of Tootoo and immediately started punching Tootoo in the face. Severe penalties for illegal checks, but fist-to-head blows go without comment?
No discussion of CTE would be complete without a mention of Chris Benoit, the professional wrestler who committed suicide after murdering his wife and son. He was posthumously diagnosed with a severe case of CTE. Arguably this would be expected from a performer whose signature move was the “flying headbutt,” but doubling the intrinsic tragedy of his grisly death was Benoit’s positive reputation with the wrestling community. He was known as a kind and open person, someone who loved his family and gave back to his community, and someone who was an extremely passionate and talented performer. In short, he was as good a person as you could find inside the fascist basement of professional sports that is professional wrestling. And that description of Benoit is also fitting of the NFL’s Troy Polamalu. How will the NFL react if their poster boy of good sportsmanship (and citizenship) someday kills his wife and son and them himself due to dementia caused by on the field injury? How many more “enforcers’” lives will the NHL let go down the toilet while is protects its money making skill players before it considers banning fighting and/or protecting concussed fighters with same diligence? As for professional wrestling, well, I just saw a TV ad for a chairs, tables, and ladders match. You do the math.
I have a hunch that there are a number of NFL star quarterbacks whose careers where cut short due to multiple concussions who are now exhibiting signs of CTE but the league is keeping that under strict wraps.
Of course the counter argument is the athletes know the risk, or at least now they do. In boxing, they accept the risk.
