Concussions In Football

Last night the CBS Evening News ran a story on four thousand former NFL players and their surviving family members about suing the NFL owners for their lack of knowledge, sharing of information and general lack of interest in the health of their players and former players. The focus was on concussions.

Imagine that, labor suing management over health related issues in the workplace. They discussed several players, their untimely deaths and the preponderance of concussions in the NFL going back decades. If you saw the story, I would bet you stopped to ask yourself, "I wonder if that is why I continue to get these migraine headaches now I am in my 40s?" That is, if you played football starting before you could read, up to junior high, high school, college or even professional football.

When the issue of what is commonly referred to as concussion syndrome has started to raise its ugly head in these last few years, it has forced all of us who ever had anything to do with football to stop and question the validity of the issue.

I am pretty sure I suffered a concussion when my head hit the ground after my accident. I do not remember if any attention would have been paid to a concussion while I was in Sioux Falls since there were more pressing issues we were dealing with.

In doing some research for this post, I came across an article from Business Week.com about Junior Seau, the former standout linebacker for the San Diego Chargers and New England Patriots. Seau committed suicide in May 2012. He was not alone in former NFL players who have killed themselves as they suffered from brain injuries many people are wondering if they  were linked to their on-field hits over long careers.

In the CBS piece, one of the players who has passed away from dementia and had a long career as an NFL lineman showed a brain the size of a child.

Gregg Dovel of CBSSports.com paints and even grimmer picture for what is happening to the lifespan of NFL players. You can read his article by clicking here. His article appeared December 23, 2010; well before all of the concussion syndrome discussion had started. If this link does not open, cleck on this URL: http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/story/14477196/nfl-is-killing-its-players-and-league-doesnt-care

The fact remains, young boys and girls are playing football at an early age in equipment that may not be adequate to protect their young and growing brains. We are learning so much about the human brain these days, it puts research that may have been done even today in the dark ages, figuratively speaking.

Jarrett Bell of USA Today.com claims in an article updated May 9, 2012 just the opposite.  He concludes NFL players live longer lives than the average person. You may read his article by clicking here. Several former players dispute his results. If that link does not take you there, try clicking here: http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/sports/football/nfl/story/2012-05-08/Study-shows-NFL-players-live-longer/54847564/1

I loved playing football. I made lifelong friends playing football, basketball, baseball, track and every other activity I took part in before my accident. I do not regret playing football, I regret every day of my life getting hurt playing football!

The game is changing. The players are getting bigger, stronger, faster and the equipment is not keeping up. Changes are made in the rules all the time to protect the players and make it a safer game. That does not mean you cannot get hurt playing football. It simply means the odds are cut down some when the equipment is safer.

About every adult I know who played football while they were younger has a football injury of some sort. I believe most of them would tell you the same thing I did about how they enjoyed playing football. Once it was not fun anymore, they stopped playing.

Some of us just stopped our careers before we planned to call it quits.

I look forward to your comments.

Later,

Mike

As Easy As Riding A Bike

The CBS Evening News ended tonight with a great story about a fantastic program that is teaching young people with special needs how to do just that ... ride a bike.

Watch CBS Videos Online

According to the University of Michigan, the numbers are staggering about how many children with Down Syndrome or autism who cannot ride a bike. The accompanying article to this video links us to two exceptional programs to help children with disabilities learn to do something most people take for granted ... riding a bike. You can read the article and learn about what is happening at losethetrainingwheels.org and the University of Michigan's Center for Motor Behavior & Pediatric Disabilities by clicking here.

If you want to see some HUGE smiles and learn what is going on in Kansas and Michigan, I encourage you to check it out.

As always, please feel free to comment.

Later,

Mike

Elpis Enterprises

I met Paul Ramsour in about 1996. At the time, Paul was a member of the Minneapolis Jaycees, and was working with kids making birdfeeders in small workshops with groups all over the city. Meanwhile, I was running a small business I call Prairie Woods in an old lumberyard in White, SD, commuting between Minneapolis and White. Prairie Woods was trying to make a for-profit business profitable by building products made out of old barn wood, a manufacturing company's waste redwood pieces, old fence boards, pallets and any other waste and recycled wood we could get our hands on. I saw raw materials everywhere I went.

Paul was buying pine boards to make the birdfeeders, and I asked him why he would buy new wood when there were so many raw materials out there, free for the taking? Now, he uses cedar cutoffs from fence companies, and old cedar fences people give us when they tear down an old fence and build a new one. Elpis Enterprises is the result of countless hours of work on Paul's part, along with several other people who have made a commitment to helping young people in Minneapolis.

We now have a shop in an old building in St. Paul. I say, "We" because I'm now a board member trying to do my part in helping with the mission of building hope for youth. Besides the woodshop, we also run a screen-printing business. If you ever need any T-shirts silk screened, give us a call, or send us an email and we'll give you an estimate. We can work with your design, or help you design a shirt you can be proud to use.

I have been helping to run a few workshops lately and have been working mostly with Jessyca, a young woman who is actually coming to work as a staff member for Elpis. We conducted one workshop last week that stands out for me. We had about ten young people involved in a summer recreation program at a Minneapolis park and recreation center. The two young women who were their leaders were excellent and helped Jessyca and me assist these children each build their own small birdfeeder.

It was a fun experience for everyone but one young boy. He was giving up because it was too hard. He just couldn't get the nails pounded in and was very frustrated. I tried to get him to keep trying to no avail. One of the leaders told him he couldn’t take part in their next activity if he didn’t build a birdfeeder. He made a birdfeeder.

Afterwards, I talked to the group and asked them a few questions. My first question was, “Did you learn anything from this experience?”

After a couple of answers like, “I learned how to make a birdfeeder,” and “I learned nails bend pretty easily,” and “I learned how to hold a hammer.” My little friend then replied, “I learned never to do this again.”

I said, “Wait a minute. I hope you didn’t learn that. I hope you learned if you give up, you wouldn’t accomplish your goal. I hope you learned just because a problem is hard, doesn’t mean we should give up. I hope you learned you can accomplish things you never thought possible if you put your mind to it.”

Then I quoted Henry Ford and said, “No job is too great if you break it down into a number of small tasks.”

I told them they started with five pieces of wood, and made them into two pieces, the base and the roof. Then they had Jessyca add a small brace, help them drill some holes, put the pieces together, inserted two pieces of plexiglas, added a bag of birdseed, and before you knew it, your project was complete.

I hope my little friend learned he is capable of doing all kinds of things, and he’ll never accomplish anything if he doesn’t try.

Michael Jordon, the great basketball player once said, “I missed every shot I didn’t take.”