I am a geek, always have been. But my dad was an all state football player and a golden gloves boxer in the Army. Despite my "best efforts" I was muscular, and was (for real) forced to play football against my wishes. I played for 6 years, and finally stopped after an injury that crushed vertebra in my lower spine. Healing from that injury, I went from a weight of 210 to 135, and required therapy to learn to walk again. I took me 10 years after that before I was physically active again. Reading this article is reading symptoms I have. I think I need to go to this clinic...
I played 5 years of football in middle/high school as a defensive and offensive tackle. I played hard and hit hard but fortunately never had a serious injury. The only one I had was a torn rotator cuff in the last game of my senior year. I was ok with that because it got me out of wrestling camp.
I didn't want to play at first, and was forced in 9th grade (2nd year). Apparently my grades were better when I was busy after school. I got to like it after I improved.
I'm also a geek; have been since 3rd grade. I'm glad I did it though, it gave me much confidence and it's good to work and excel at completely different disciplines. It also showed me what hard work really feels like. As one coach said, if you can make it through practices, you can make it through anything. That's stayed with me and helped me get through a lot.
Go check out the clinic. At least get an evaluation. I wasn't aware these sort of things were treatable. After reading of all the problems with concussions that can affect any level of player, it would be silly not to, especially if you are experiencing symptoms. Your weight loss is startling. Good luck.
I find it interesting that at the end he doesn't blame american football in itself for the negative long term effects in his health as I thought he was heading to. He ends up (spoilers alert) coaching football.
I myself do not have a strong opinion on the matter of the ethics of creating a billionaire business around a game that is so dangerous to everyone that plays it seriously, from high school to pros. I am instinctively against, but as long as the issues are clear, transparent and everyone involved have all access to information needed to do their own informed choices, it seems correct.
That said, a very brave and insightful tale on how these personal struggles are. Very well written too. And glad to know that there are effective treatments out there that can help this kind of health problems.
Motor sport used to be very deadly half a century ago, and it took hard work from drivers to change that. Drivers that were often ridiculed for talking about the need for safety. Now professional motor sport is surprisingly safe, just take Scott Dixons crash at Indy 500 yesterday from which he escaped unscathed.
Football players have to demand their safety is taken seriously before any positive change is going to happen to the sport.
> ...as long as the issues are clear, transparent and everyone involved have all access to information needed to do their own informed choices, it seems correct.
That's a tall order though. I don't think all those conditions are necessarily being met!
- Hundreds of competitive basketball games - youth, AAU, high school, etc.
- Thousands of running miles - including completing (and winning) trail/mountain ultra marathons
- Dozens of soccer games at mixed levels
- Training and sparring at a boxing gym for 4-5 days a week for a year
And none of this has caused any major injury.
The two years I played high school football? A separated shoulder, and a torn MCL. Not to mention having my bell rung many times. I could measure the amount of football games I actually played in like under an hour worth of actual time.
As a person who works with their mind all day long, concussions scare me. They scare me more than injuries to my hands do. I took a good hit to my head in a really slow lowside on my motorcycle (I, to this day, don't remember the incident itself, but I'm pretty sure it was a combination of loose gravel and rolling onto the throttle early). For months after that hit, I had more trouble than usual understanding complex concepts; had trouble building that mental model which lets us work.
Concussions result from your brain rattling around inside your skull like Jello. It's hard to write them off as minor inconveniences when you look at it like that. I recommend watching the "beer bottle to the head" episode of Mythbusters; those slow motion shots are scary (though exaggerated).
If you're still at risk for getting a concussion and worry about your future career etc, it might be worthwhile getting an insurance just like this guy did. I mean there's more in the world than what you're currently doing, but it may not be as profitable.
> They had all kinds of neuro training exercises and routines they put me through, but a lot of it was centered around meditation and intense emotional therapy sessions. The exercises and therapy were to stimulate the parts of my brain that were running slow, and the mediation was to slow down the parts of my brain that were going a mile a minute.
I guess that is how they reset his brain. I need the same thing. Three years and still recovering, I have counted five bottlenecks in getting there.
1. Fear of memories, 2. Ego/arrogance, 3. Imbalanced thought pattern, 4. Mental unrest, 5. Lack of stimulating activities.
Now that I think of it, the author has described the same thing. Meditation has worked wonders. I have combined it with philosophy and reasoning. I am also trying to identify and reduce areas of ego. Stimulating activities is a recent discovery but I am still working at finding stuff for it.
And the results are interesting: before my mind was on infinite replay, then had a hard time remembering stuff, and now memories from when I was one years old are coming back like it happened yesterday. That never happened!
> Stimulating activities is a recent discovery but I am still working at finding stuff for it.
Listen to music and learn an instrument, play chess, learn new languages, memory exercises, physical exercise, meditation. I think that hits most of the high points I've read about cognitive stimulation.
Glad to see The Players Tribune on here. If you haven't read it before, it has some amazing content - not just from pro athletes, but college athletes you've never heard of.
Have never seen the site before, but +1 to this after browsing casually.
It's great to see profiles, nuance, perspectives, and discussion from players - not the league or talking heads on ESPN who won't even really touch a lot of issues with or tangential to sports with a 10-foot pole. Sports don't have to be separated from other parts of culture.
A friend of mine has been working on an app (based on research from Dr. David Eagleman) to help you track any cognitive declines from, among other things, participating in contact heavy sports.
One use is for coaches to mandate players retake it periodically, so players can stop playing before the point of no return.
The entire history of the NFL and concussions is incredibly damning, including the league denying the damage concussions cause and the league buying their way into medical journals to push "studies" that supported that position. If you want to know more "League of Denial" is a phenomenal book. PBS also created a two hour documentary with the authors that has the same name.
> So today, I put on football camps and work with kids in the small town of Aledo, Texas, where I live, and I work with my own boys, coaching them up, too.
This is a fantastic story, and a wonderful recovery, but getting to the end of it and coming across this line... it's great that he's helping coach these kids, but it would be even better to steer them in a direction where they won't end up with the same story, or worse. Never making it, but still having the same symptoms. There are other sports, way less impact.
I grew up playing soccer, and even there they, at least in the US, as I understand it from my nephews, heading the ball is illegal until high school.
Concussions are problems in all sports, but American Football is just about the worst, and on top of that does so much other damage from the heavy hits. Concussions are perhaps the most prevalent and biggest problem.
I played a bunch of high school football, and had a very severe back fracture that I'll be living with forever. I'm functional, but have to keep very on top of things to not suffer chronic pain.
I used to be absolutely obsessed about football, and getting used to not playing anymore was a real challenge to my identity.
I look back on it now though (that was > 20 years ago now), and I wouldn't choose to play the game again. It was an amazing way to push myself, and I learned a lot about character and determination. The cost really isn't worth it though, and I've seen a bunch of people pay even higher costs than me.
I also think - if I had kids, I wouldn't want them to play the game. It's just too dangerous, and that danger is built into how the game is played. People in the business often say "don't hit with your head" but watch any game, and you'll see lots of head contact on every play. The cumulative effects of that alone, not even counting the big hits - I think is quite substantial.
Unfortunately I don't see the game or the protective gear actually changing much to lessen the degree to which these (predictable) injuries happen. And to a great extent, more protective equipment means people just hit that much harder - often times still injuring, but in ways that are harder to see.
> I grew up playing soccer, and even there they, at least in the US, as I understand it from my nephews, heading the ball is illegal until high school.
Maybe in a Rec league, but if it's any level of competitive play then they'd have been heading the ball since grade school.
This kind of thing (a friendly intervention) seems to happen more often than you'd think - Allen Iverson is still solvent only because his friends talked him into taking $30 million or so of his last shoe deal as a trust fund that he can't access until he's 55.
Quite a few negative reactions regarding the decision to go back to coaching in retirement. I think change has to start at the coaching level, as boycotting the sport will do little to change the status quo, especially in the immediate.
A few thoughts -
In my own experience in playing contact sports (lacrosse, not football), it's a trained behavior to shake off injuries, avoid trainers, and otherwise ignore your body's warnings of potential harm. This is taught by the coach [or worse, parents]. The encouragement to push yourself beyond natural limits only increases as you progress to the collegiate and professional levels.
The unfortunate effects of competition are that coaches skirt a dangerous line of balancing the star player[s] safety and winning the game, and this behavior is clear to the players lower in the depth chart who wish to become the next star.
Some of the more disturbing things openly shared were how to pass the concussion protocol, that coach will let you take off a week of practice after a hard head hit so don't go to the trainers, and to shake off any and all injuries as you will be rewarded for being tough. I, and any number of my ex-teammates, agree we experienced what are now known as "minor concussions" constantly throughout our season. Only major concussions would go reported. Being able to walk off the field typically meant you had only a minor injury, and could go back in once getting some wind.
The fact that so many are injured during practice goes to show, it's coming from the coach's inaction and not just during the heat of the game.
Under this light, I think Finley is taking a proactive approach to change by inserting himself on the front lines.
Absolutely. Personal experience FWIW -- 30 years ago, different sport (wrestling), different country, different culture, very low amateurish level, but typically the same attitude. First time I got a moderately serious injury (torn acromial ligament, couldn't move the arm for 6 months), I basically got yelled at by the coach saying either I continue to came to training and work with the other hand, or I split off. So the next time (I landed almost vertically on the top of my head instead of flatly on the back -- now he was afraid, but I was so proud of myself, didn't even want to interrupt the exercise.
Fast forward 30 years. I realise now that in some sports, people who didn't make it "to the top", are sometimes left with what seems like small stuff when you're 16 -- damaged teeth, torn ligaments, broken ribs -- but which age much, much worse than the rest of the body.
No one has mentioned the movie, Concussion, with Will Smith, who portray Dr. Bennet Omalu. According to wikipedia, he "was the first to discover and publish findings of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) in American football players." Seeing the injuries dramatized, the effects those injuries have on football players, really drives home how serious concussions are.
Coaching and proper equipment are important. The biggest thing is that the better the equipment gets the more comfortable players are trying to hit harder and faster.
Rugby matches are very rough with near constant collisions but no pads. I'd be really interested to see a comparison study between to two.
I played 6 years of rugby. I also played high school football. My position, lineman, in football was a pretty non-collision position and I never experienced any concussions.
In rugby, every position involves collision. As a backline player most of my job was to run, but there was no way of ever avoiding multiple collisions in a game. Less impactful then football for the reasons you mention, but more frequent. I know for certain that I've had (at-least) a few concussions in rugby. For instance, getting up from a hit and having no idea where you're at for a second, and then feeling the world morph back into you as if it were knocked right out.
Concussions are a big problem in rugby too, and they have only relatively recently realised the extent of the issue. The NFL may have swept the issue under the carpet for years, but everyone was burying their head in the sand until very recently in rugby - there have been multiple cases of players clearly getting knocked out and playing on after a short head injury assessment this decade.
There are many accounts of players saying they don't remember huge periods of matches. Shonatayne Hape gave a great interview which is absolutely terrifying, where he describes the effects and how it became progressively easier for him to lose consciousness to the point where he didn't even have to been hit in the head by the time he retired:
Concussion is a huge huge deal in rugby these days. Something like 50% of international matches see a player having to leave the field for a precautionary "head injury assessment". At junior levels players need to be immediately substituted if there is any suspicion of a head injury.
You don't hit opponents head with your head at rugby, so concussion is not so common.
The most frecuent problem is spinal cord injuries in scrum[1], which year after year leaves some players paraplegic.
A good friend of mine died a few months ago from ALS, clearly - also by his own reckoning - a delayed consequence from a severe car crash in his youth. "I was given an extra 29 years, I can't complain" he tapped out to me the last time I saw him, speechless and immobilised in a hospital bed.
There's a fairly well established correlation between head trauma and this abominable affliction. Why anyone voluntarily would throw themselves into that kind of risk is utterly beyond me.
But then, so is any kind of football, be it the US or the European kind.
Because a lot of these people grow up in poverty and a culture that tells them this is their best chance out. By the time they actually have a shot to do so, football is their entire life. It's easy to sit from a presumably educated and wealthy position and scoff at these people, but it's not going to lead you to any insights as to why it happens.
European football (soccer) is not comparable to the American kind in the amount of risk players are at - it may not be as safe as basketball or baseball, but it actively penalizes contact that may injure a player where as American football incorporate them into the game.
This appears to be similar to "Brainspotting", a technique that emerged from Dr David Grand's work with EMDR therapy. They're trying now to get funding for fMRI studies during treatments to better understand and possibly validate the treatment. The mode of operation appears to be increasing metabolic activity in certain areas of the brain for the purpose of enhancing processing/garbage collection.
tl;dr: "Football gave me multiple concussions and severely broke my brain. Now I am seducing kids into the same passion for football that lead me to that point."
I wonder if similar things (stimulating some parts of the brain and not others) can be done for other professions, such as coding where you are addicted to it, or maybe even the autism spectrum.
[+] [-] bsenftner|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Clubber|8 years ago|reply
I didn't want to play at first, and was forced in 9th grade (2nd year). Apparently my grades were better when I was busy after school. I got to like it after I improved.
I'm also a geek; have been since 3rd grade. I'm glad I did it though, it gave me much confidence and it's good to work and excel at completely different disciplines. It also showed me what hard work really feels like. As one coach said, if you can make it through practices, you can make it through anything. That's stayed with me and helped me get through a lot.
Go check out the clinic. At least get an evaluation. I wasn't aware these sort of things were treatable. After reading of all the problems with concussions that can affect any level of player, it would be silly not to, especially if you are experiencing symptoms. Your weight loss is startling. Good luck.
[+] [-] cheez|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] agumonkey|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] soneca|8 years ago|reply
I myself do not have a strong opinion on the matter of the ethics of creating a billionaire business around a game that is so dangerous to everyone that plays it seriously, from high school to pros. I am instinctively against, but as long as the issues are clear, transparent and everyone involved have all access to information needed to do their own informed choices, it seems correct.
That said, a very brave and insightful tale on how these personal struggles are. Very well written too. And glad to know that there are effective treatments out there that can help this kind of health problems.
[+] [-] tokai|8 years ago|reply
That is actually really sad.
Motor sport used to be very deadly half a century ago, and it took hard work from drivers to change that. Drivers that were often ridiculed for talking about the need for safety. Now professional motor sport is surprisingly safe, just take Scott Dixons crash at Indy 500 yesterday from which he escaped unscathed.
Football players have to demand their safety is taken seriously before any positive change is going to happen to the sport.
[+] [-] skierscott|8 years ago|reply
– "Football, dogfighting and brain damage"[1] by Malcolm Gladwell.
– "Football continues to dominate high school sports despite concussion risk"[2]
– "What Happened Within This Player’s Skull"[3], which examines acceleration/etc from each hit
[1]:http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/10/19/offensive-play
[2]:http://www.foxnews.com/sports/2012/09/08/football-continues-...
[3]:https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/09/sports/footba...
[+] [-] jcstk|8 years ago|reply
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2705935-joe-thomas-says-h...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/sports/wp/2016/06/07/chr...
[+] [-] PhasmaFelis|8 years ago|reply
Jesus. It's like one of those generational cycle of abuse stories.
[+] [-] rdiddly|8 years ago|reply
That's a tall order though. I don't think all those conditions are necessarily being met!
[+] [-] unknown|8 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] ErikAugust|8 years ago|reply
This includes:
- Hundreds of competitive basketball games - youth, AAU, high school, etc.
- Thousands of running miles - including completing (and winning) trail/mountain ultra marathons
- Dozens of soccer games at mixed levels
- Training and sparring at a boxing gym for 4-5 days a week for a year
And none of this has caused any major injury.
The two years I played high school football? A separated shoulder, and a torn MCL. Not to mention having my bell rung many times. I could measure the amount of football games I actually played in like under an hour worth of actual time.
[+] [-] neves|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] agumonkey|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] falcolas|8 years ago|reply
Concussions result from your brain rattling around inside your skull like Jello. It's hard to write them off as minor inconveniences when you look at it like that. I recommend watching the "beer bottle to the head" episode of Mythbusters; those slow motion shots are scary (though exaggerated).
[+] [-] Cthulhu_|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sjg007|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nashashmi|8 years ago|reply
> They had all kinds of neuro training exercises and routines they put me through, but a lot of it was centered around meditation and intense emotional therapy sessions. The exercises and therapy were to stimulate the parts of my brain that were running slow, and the mediation was to slow down the parts of my brain that were going a mile a minute.
I guess that is how they reset his brain. I need the same thing. Three years and still recovering, I have counted five bottlenecks in getting there.
1. Fear of memories, 2. Ego/arrogance, 3. Imbalanced thought pattern, 4. Mental unrest, 5. Lack of stimulating activities.
Now that I think of it, the author has described the same thing. Meditation has worked wonders. I have combined it with philosophy and reasoning. I am also trying to identify and reduce areas of ego. Stimulating activities is a recent discovery but I am still working at finding stuff for it.
And the results are interesting: before my mind was on infinite replay, then had a hard time remembering stuff, and now memories from when I was one years old are coming back like it happened yesterday. That never happened!
[+] [-] jeremywho|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] naasking|8 years ago|reply
Listen to music and learn an instrument, play chess, learn new languages, memory exercises, physical exercise, meditation. I think that hits most of the high points I've read about cognitive stimulation.
[+] [-] jcstk|8 years ago|reply
The perspectives are often fascinating. Here's another great one from Bronson Koenig, a Native American and one hell of a basketball player, on his experience at Standing Rock: https://www.theplayerstribune.com/bronson-koenig-wisconsin-b....
[+] [-] adjkant|8 years ago|reply
It's great to see profiles, nuance, perspectives, and discussion from players - not the league or talking heads on ESPN who won't even really touch a lot of issues with or tangential to sports with a 10-foot pole. Sports don't have to be separated from other parts of culture.
[+] [-] phonon|8 years ago|reply
One use is for coaches to mandate players retake it periodically, so players can stop playing before the point of no return.
https://braincheck.com/
https://techcrunch.com/2016/10/27/braincheck-raises-3-millio...
http://www.tmc.edu/innovation/companies/brain-check/
[+] [-] kikimaru|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mcgrath_sh|8 years ago|reply
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/League_of_Denial
[+] [-] bluejekyll|8 years ago|reply
This is a fantastic story, and a wonderful recovery, but getting to the end of it and coming across this line... it's great that he's helping coach these kids, but it would be even better to steer them in a direction where they won't end up with the same story, or worse. Never making it, but still having the same symptoms. There are other sports, way less impact.
I grew up playing soccer, and even there they, at least in the US, as I understand it from my nephews, heading the ball is illegal until high school.
Concussions are problems in all sports, but American Football is just about the worst, and on top of that does so much other damage from the heavy hits. Concussions are perhaps the most prevalent and biggest problem.
[+] [-] switchbak|8 years ago|reply
I used to be absolutely obsessed about football, and getting used to not playing anymore was a real challenge to my identity.
I look back on it now though (that was > 20 years ago now), and I wouldn't choose to play the game again. It was an amazing way to push myself, and I learned a lot about character and determination. The cost really isn't worth it though, and I've seen a bunch of people pay even higher costs than me.
I also think - if I had kids, I wouldn't want them to play the game. It's just too dangerous, and that danger is built into how the game is played. People in the business often say "don't hit with your head" but watch any game, and you'll see lots of head contact on every play. The cumulative effects of that alone, not even counting the big hits - I think is quite substantial.
Unfortunately I don't see the game or the protective gear actually changing much to lessen the degree to which these (predictable) injuries happen. And to a great extent, more protective equipment means people just hit that much harder - often times still injuring, but in ways that are harder to see.
[+] [-] T_D_K|8 years ago|reply
Maybe in a Rec league, but if it's any level of competitive play then they'd have been heading the ball since grade school.
[+] [-] erentz|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] whistlerbrk|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] culturestate|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] srdeveng|8 years ago|reply
A few thoughts -
In my own experience in playing contact sports (lacrosse, not football), it's a trained behavior to shake off injuries, avoid trainers, and otherwise ignore your body's warnings of potential harm. This is taught by the coach [or worse, parents]. The encouragement to push yourself beyond natural limits only increases as you progress to the collegiate and professional levels.
The unfortunate effects of competition are that coaches skirt a dangerous line of balancing the star player[s] safety and winning the game, and this behavior is clear to the players lower in the depth chart who wish to become the next star.
Some of the more disturbing things openly shared were how to pass the concussion protocol, that coach will let you take off a week of practice after a hard head hit so don't go to the trainers, and to shake off any and all injuries as you will be rewarded for being tough. I, and any number of my ex-teammates, agree we experienced what are now known as "minor concussions" constantly throughout our season. Only major concussions would go reported. Being able to walk off the field typically meant you had only a minor injury, and could go back in once getting some wind.
The fact that so many are injured during practice goes to show, it's coming from the coach's inaction and not just during the heat of the game.
Under this light, I think Finley is taking a proactive approach to change by inserting himself on the front lines.
[+] [-] minipci1321|8 years ago|reply
Absolutely. Personal experience FWIW -- 30 years ago, different sport (wrestling), different country, different culture, very low amateurish level, but typically the same attitude. First time I got a moderately serious injury (torn acromial ligament, couldn't move the arm for 6 months), I basically got yelled at by the coach saying either I continue to came to training and work with the other hand, or I split off. So the next time (I landed almost vertically on the top of my head instead of flatly on the back -- now he was afraid, but I was so proud of myself, didn't even want to interrupt the exercise.
Fast forward 30 years. I realise now that in some sports, people who didn't make it "to the top", are sometimes left with what seems like small stuff when you're 16 -- damaged teeth, torn ligaments, broken ribs -- but which age much, much worse than the rest of the body.
[+] [-] beautifulfreak|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] WoodenChair|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] abandonliberty|8 years ago|reply
I wonder how the health damage of sitting at a desk for years compares.
[+] [-] brightball|8 years ago|reply
Rugby matches are very rough with near constant collisions but no pads. I'd be really interested to see a comparison study between to two.
[+] [-] prodtorok|8 years ago|reply
In rugby, every position involves collision. As a backline player most of my job was to run, but there was no way of ever avoiding multiple collisions in a game. Less impactful then football for the reasons you mention, but more frequent. I know for certain that I've had (at-least) a few concussions in rugby. For instance, getting up from a hit and having no idea where you're at for a second, and then feeling the world morph back into you as if it were knocked right out.
[+] [-] de_Selby|8 years ago|reply
There are many accounts of players saying they don't remember huge periods of matches. Shonatayne Hape gave a great interview which is absolutely terrifying, where he describes the effects and how it became progressively easier for him to lose consciousness to the point where he didn't even have to been hit in the head by the time he retired:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objecti...
[+] [-] dmurray|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] marianov|8 years ago|reply
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrum_(rugby_union)#Safety
[+] [-] interfixus|8 years ago|reply
There's a fairly well established correlation between head trauma and this abominable affliction. Why anyone voluntarily would throw themselves into that kind of risk is utterly beyond me.
But then, so is any kind of football, be it the US or the European kind.
[+] [-] djohnston|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ido|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mnm1|8 years ago|reply
How so?
[+] [-] rrggrr|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] everyone|8 years ago|reply
From the Mayo clinics page on CTE
"CTE is a progressive, degenerative brain disease for which there is no treatment."
[+] [-] egypturnash|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] SkyMarshal|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] EGreg|8 years ago|reply