Chris Henry had a progressive generative disease at time of death

There is something wrong with a sport that can a) cause that kind of brain damage and b) allow someone with brain damage to continue to play.
The NFL labor talks should be even more interesting now.

 

The problem with "b" is that nobody knew Henry had brain damage.

 

Yeah, the level of damage they're talking about here isn't apparent on scans. NPR had a huge story on it last year. The level of anatomy we're looking at here — at present, at least — can only be studied post-mortem. They haven't even been able to develop reliable behavioral tests for it yet, though they've been studying it for years.

No way for the NFL to know. Of course, the release of this info on Henry, a very young guy not taking the continual kind of hits RBs, LBs and safeties are absorbing, should suggest to league docs that just about every player probably has damage to some extent.

 

What troubles me is the lack of concern at lower levels of the game, specifically at the pee wee or middle school level. Do kids really need to have their brains turned to mush in at that age? Conceivably they could learn most basic skills as part of a touch or flag football league, and it would probably be a lot more fun.

 

This should be a huge story for the NFL. But for a league with a lax record on taking care of its former stars and a less-than-ideal approach to the safety of current players, who knows if it will be.

There need to be changes. I'm not smart enough to know what those changes should be. But the sport is growing almost too dangerous, especially at the lower levels.

 

Possibly. I know if I had a son, he wouldn't be playing until 7th grade at the earliest and even that would make me nervous.

 

This story is scarier than anything else that has come out about football and concussions, because Henry had never been diagnosed with a concussion (not to say he never had one), and that it's apparent that anyone who has played football for any long period has some level of brain damage. The issue with Henry, as with some of the other players studied, is the presence of APOE, the gene that is linked with Alzheimer's. So basically all the hits Henry took sped up the Alzheimer's he would have in his 70s, back to his 20s.

It really makes you think about whether you want your child playing football -- or any sport in which head injuries are an issue. Then again, it may be that the 75 percent of the population that has no APOE isn't at this level of risk. So what are we supposed to do, have genetic testing for APOE, and tell those kids never to step on a football field?

 

I see what you did there.

 

Not really. The owners are gonna bring the shit-hammer down on the NFLPA.

The negotiations are gonna go like this:

Owners: Here's what we're gonna give you. Like it or go home.

Players: But-but...

Owners: Like it or go home.

 

[blue]No way. This time, the players are going to stand firm and win.[/blue]

 

I take back my point. If we can still send coal miners in to death traps after hundreds of deaths, America will continue to cheer on as millionaires do irreversable damage to their bodies.

Funny thing - when I was a kid my dad got a coffee table book about the NFL called "The Gladiators." I thought it was the coolest book at the time and figured the title was hyperbole. Not anymore.

 

Pro boxers have no idea what you are talking about.