Donations

I was looking around on the internet the other day and I came across an article that gave me some insight into what the league has been doing towards concussion research.  Here is the link to the article.  The article talks about how the charities the NFL has set up has donated almost a million dollars towards concussion research.  The exact number they donated was $988,224.  All of this money will go into research in "focusing on head injuries and neurological problems."  This is a huge step forward from 2009. In 2009, the NFL raised almost 1.5 million dollars from its charities but didn't give any of the money into research for brain injuries and such.  "The studies receiving grants from NFL Charities in 2010 include research on concussions in youth football players, the effects of concussions on brain cells and behavior, and dementia in retired NFL players."  After I read this quote I literally jumped for joy out of my seat because these were some of the things I have researched and talked about with my blog.  These donations are great for helping make the game we love a better one for the players.


The article also goes on to show how concussions are a difficult injury to diagnose because they don't show up on MRI or CT scans.  Doctors have to take into consideration the symptoms patients describe to them.  Which also brings up the problem of players hiding their symptoms so that they don't lose any more play time and so that they can get back on the field sooner.  But on a better note, as players are becoming more knowledgeable of concussions and aware of what they can do, more and more players are reporting when they suffer a concussion. 

Has concussion treatment improved in the NFL?

This past NFL season, there seemed to be a lot more conversation revolving around the concussion debate. I recently just read an article on ESPN's website that goes through some cases of players that suffered concussions during the 2010 season and what they think the NFL has done to improve concussion treatment.  This is a link to the article.

The league is actually doing some things to help improve treatment for players that receive concussions.  The NFL has made so that any player who has a concussion during the game has to receive a sideline examination.  All 32 teams have had this standardization added to their sidelines.  This is a substantial step forward for the league especially from previous years.  This is an action from the league that actually shows they are trying to help this problem and protect the players, which of course is the most important aspect of the game.  Even though most of us love to watch the game, we wouldn't be able to watch it if we continue to lose players due to the injuries they receive, especially from head injuries.  Even Jon Madden's video game has implemented a tactic into the game where a person suffers a concussion in the game, he gets tagged as a "no go" because of the injury and the affects it can have on the player the following weeks.

I also want to post a radio recording that Mike Tirico, an analyst for ESPN, did in 2009 that talks about concussions and everything surrounding them.  Here's a link to that recording.  I think that it does a really great job at showing the implications concussions can have on the brain and on the lives of the players affected by them.

Overwhelming

I found an article that I found to be really overwhelming.  It left me with a great deal of thought about players who have suffered from brain injuries and players who are currently suffering form them.  Here's a link to the article.

Ted Johnson was a former New England Patriots linebacker who suffered to what he thinks to be around 100 concussions when he played the game.  That is a gigantic number.  I have talked about players who have received like ten or so, but 100 is definitely the most I've heard of.  Johnson suffered greatly from these hits.  He said that he sometimes barely could get the energy to go and see his kids.  And when he returned home, he got rid of any light, and laid in bed the rest of the day.  He has said that he has suffered from depression, sleep disorders, and mental fatigue as a result from the amount of concussions he has playing football.

What I found most shocking from this article, was the fact that scientists are finding brain damage in 18 year old brains.  This was an amazing fact that I couldn't believe.  Brain damage taking place in that young of brain seems unreal.  I mean, I have always thought of brain damage and their effects as something that happens to adults later in life.  I would never have thought that the hits younger players are receiving to their heads are affecting them at that young of an age.

This article brings about some information that have yielded results that seem to compelling to ignore.  CTE is a major issue that has come from collisions to the head over and over again.  More and more players are affected from these hits and more people are looking into the side affects they can have.

One example of what can happen

There was a tragic incident that the NFL faced with one of its younger two years ago.  A player named Chris Henry, a wide receiver for the Cincinnati Bengals, died in a car crash.  He suffered a traumatic blow to the head that caused serious damage and eventually lead to his death.  He was a young player, only 26 years old when he past.  Chris Henry was known as a player that had many off the field incidents.  He has been caught with marijuana, he's has been charged with aggravated assault, concealment of a weapon, supplying underage girls with alcohol, drunk driving, and assaulting people on multiple occasions.  Henry has gone through a lot of issues that plagued the career of this once talented receiver.

Doctors were given the brain of Henry so they could study it and research it.  Upon doing so, they were able to find and realize that Henry suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy or C.T.E. which was caused from hits he received to his head over and over again from football.  Some doctors believe that his off the field problems were most likely caused from this disease as a result from the brain damage he suffered playing the game.  One doctor named Dr. Francesco Mangano is the name of one of the doctors who analyzed Henry's brain during the autopsy and concluded this.  


This is only one player that has been brought out to show how the hard hits in football are hurting players.  There are plenty more of other players who are suffering from these hits.  Players both retired and still playing the game.  Henry was a young player who had C.T.E. and these are the results that happened to him.  

Some things are being done but at what cost

I found an article that was pretty startling to me.  Here's the link to it.  I was thrown back after reading this article.  Most of what I've found so far and posted didn't really so much about what the NFL is doing to help the problem except for the usual stuff like raising fines, suspending players, or implementing new rules.  But this article showed some action that I wasn't aware of.  The league put together a film that showed how players should tack players.  The video consisted of some popular players like Ray Lewis from the Baltimore Ravens tackling players the right way, without leading with their head.  The video also showed a compilation of nine players tackling the wrong way.  It showed the players leading with their head or shoulder on a defenseless receiver.  But what I was disappointed with most was the remark I read after I was impressed with this video message.  Peter King, who wrote the article, said, "It's probably inaccurate to say all the players heard the entire conversation.  Many of them were too busy catcalling the video - and the message."  I couldn't believe this.  Players are suffering off the field from concussions and such and these players don't seem to care.  Don't they worry about their future after their done with football?  Don't they want to stay in-tune with the world and everything that's going on around them?  Don't they want to live to be healthy?  

After this reading this reaction I was stunned.  I mean I know that the game is hard and demands people to be much stronger and much more athletic in today's game than just ten years ago because of how much the game has changed.  But do players safety and health become a cost because of this?  Players safety and health should be the main thing they should be worrying about.  I know players want to win but their time playing football only spans for around twenty years of their lives.  They need to be thinking about their lives after football is no longer a part of their lives.