Sad Story, someone check on Jaric

Share this page

TommyD420

TommyD420

Joe Milton is my QB1
Joined
Dec 22, 2005
Messages
37,944
Reaction score
13,163
Points
113
Age
48
Location
Worcester, MA
http://deadspin.com/antwaan-randle-el-on-playing-football-if-i-could-go-b-1753934378

Deadspin said:
Former Steelers wide receiver and trick play artist Antwaan Randle-El is very clear about one thing: if he could replay his life, there’s no way he’d play football. “If I could go back, I wouldn’t,” he told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “I would play baseball. I got drafted by the Cubs in the 14th round, but I didn’t play baseball because of my parents. They made me go to school. Don’t get me wrong, I love the game of football. But, right now, I could still be playing baseball.”

Randle El technically retired from football in 2012, but his last season was 2010, his ninth. And like numerous football players before him, Randle El described not just a body messed-up from years of bone-crunching tackles, but also a mind that is beginning to fail him:

“I ask my wife things over and over again, and she’s like, ‘I just told you that,’ ” Randle El said. “I’ll ask her three times the night before and get up in the morning and forget. Stuff like that. I try to chalk it up as I’m busy, I’m doing a lot, but I have to be on my knees praying about it, asking God to allow me to not have these issues and live a long life. I want to see my kids raised up. I want to see my grandkids.”

Randle El isn’t an old-timer, nor did he battle in the trenches and butt heads 70 times a game: he’s a young 36-year-old guy who should be looking forward to decades more of sound health. Instead, he struggles to walk down stairs:

“I have to come down sideways sometimes, depending on the day,” Randle El, 36, said. “Going up is easier actually than coming down.”

Randle El’s harrowing story is part of a larger Post-Gazette project that looks at the post-football lives of some of the most famous players in Steeler history. The stories are really interesting, and I highly suggest you check it out.
Click to expand...

I've teased Jaric about Randle-El over the years, but this is a young, young dude who is feeling these effects. It's sad, he's one of the few Steelers I didn't hate.
 
It is stories like these that are going to be the demise of the NFL. Randall as the story said was not a trenches guy but more of a specialty player and he is hobbled with mind issues at age 36. That is stunning and really does speak to the violent nature of the NFL and the effects on players when they are done.
 
We are living in the golden heyday of the NFL, fellas. They own the sports world and a lot of the world outside of it, but it won't be their executives and owners' stupidity and greed that kills them. It'll be the health issues, especially the mental ones. Who wants Alzheimer's when you're more than 30 years away from Social Security?

In 20 years, you won't recognize the game we're watching now.
 
BradyGirl said:
We are living in the golden heyday of the NFL, fellas. They own the sports world and a lot of the world outside of it, but it won't be their executives and owners' stupidity and greed that kills them. It'll be the health issues, especially the mental ones. Who wants Alzheimer's when you're more than 30 years away from Social Security?

In 20 years, you won't recognize the game we're watching now.
Click to expand...

The prospect makes me sad.
 
BradyGirl said:
We are living in the golden heyday of the NFL, fellas. They own the sports world and a lot of the world outside of it, but it won't be their executives and owners' stupidity and greed that kills them. It'll be the health issues, especially the mental ones. Who wants Alzheimer's when you're more than 30 years away from Social Security?

In 20 years, you won't recognize the game we're watching now.
Click to expand...

I don't recognize it now.
 
Hate to state the obvious for Randel-El but with all that ching why don't you get a house without stairs?

They do make em.

Or an elevatah.

Save the moat for Tom. You're not badass enough to pull that off.
 
BradyGirl said:
We are living in the golden heyday of the NFL, fellas.
Click to expand...


Check out the "This Is The NFL" youtubes from back in the 1970s that I believe Beags posted here a while back.

THAT, truly was the golden age of the NFL. Great teams, great rivalries, and more importantly, great characters. Mind you I did not say men of great character, but great characters. Lyle Alzado, Mean Joe Green, Hollywood Henderson, heck, half the Oakland Raiders.

Heck, any defense worth it's salt had a great nickname. The Steel Curtain, The Purple People Eaters, The DOOMSDAY Defense, Orange Crush... even the Killer B's.

Even the plays had names... The Immaculate Reception, The Hail Mary Pass, Ghost To The Post.

Today's NFL has very little of the stuff that makes things "golden", Ponyboy.
 
I still think the NFL would be safer if they go back to leather helmets. No one would lead with their head on any play then. Yes there would still be fluke head to heads, but I bet overall it would be safer.

The movie Concussion tells the story of he head trauma these guys endure. I highly recommend it.
 
grog said:
I still think the NFL would be safer if they go back to leather helmets. No one would lead with their head on any play then. Yes there would still be fluke head to heads, but I bet overall it would be safer.

The movie Concussion tells the story of he head trauma these guys endure. I highly recommend it.
Click to expand...

I agree, minimal mask and leather helmet with pads needed in pants including the girdle to slow these freaks down
 
this is such an overblown issue, look these guys are not blind of course playing in a violent contact sport can leave you hurting later. you chose this career path you live with it. sick and tired of everybody expecting the nfl to do something about it. does boxing or ufc have to deal with this, how about nice safe soccer which is very concussion prone from head balls. since when did the nfl become the sole bad guy?

its crazy has anybody proven that all this is caused solely by the nfl playing time, these guys spent years playing prior to the nfl, nobody is calling out their college or hs teams.

there are guys, regular working stiffs who put their bodies on the line, ever talk to an old professional diver, or an old carpenter ect. people put their bodies on the line every day to earn a living and these NFL players are no different, well except for the millions they got paid, from every day joes.

look i feel bad for these guys but they chose this and to claim afterward that they didn't have there eyes wide open is just bs.
 
D2maine said:
this is such an overblown issue, look these guys are not blind of course playing in a violent contact sport can leave you hurting later. you chose this career path you live with it. sick and tired of everybody expecting the nfl to do something about it. does boxing or ufc have to deal with this, how about nice safe soccer which is very concussion prone from head balls. since when did the nfl become the sole bad guy?

its crazy has anybody proven that all this is caused solely by the nfl playing time, these guys spent years playing prior to the nfl, nobody is calling out their college or hs teams.

there are guys, regular working stiffs who put their bodies on the line, ever talk to an old professional diver, or an old carpenter ect. people put their bodies on the line every day to earn a living and these NFL players are no different, well except for the millions they got paid, from every day joes.

look i feel bad for these guys but they chose this and to claim afterward that they didn't have there eyes wide open is just bs.
Click to expand...

Have to agree.

And nobodies getting compensated like pro athletes for their CHOSEN endeavors either.

It's a sad result. But you don't need to be a neurosurgeon to know hits to the head are bad. Look at some of the former boxers.

They're going into this willingly.
 
D2maine said:
this is such an overblown issue, look these guys are not blind of course playing in a violent contact sport can leave you hurting later. you chose this career path you live with it. sick and tired of everybody expecting the nfl to do something about it. does boxing or ufc have to deal with this, how about nice safe soccer which is very concussion prone from head balls. since when did the nfl become the sole bad guy?
Click to expand...

The NFL became the bad guy when hundreds of former players from a relatively small, regional sport, began telling their stories and the horrors they had endured later in life.
 
The real scary and disturbing thing is how young this guy is. He is still young enough to play. But as long as there are guys who will play the game will move on. I hear more guys saying "I'd do it all over again" then "I'd never play again" The game will continue and continue to change.
 
The players knew this going into it...it is what it is.

I've had some brutal jobs in the past...and if anyone whined about what the side effects are, they were quickly reminded that they were getting paid much more than an average job ever paid...and to deal with it, or move on.
 
So it's OK for people to be maimed or debilitated by their jobs, as long as they're well compensated? And it's also OK for their employer to deny any complicity?
 
The current players have a lot of this information - yet they continue to throw dangerous hits and then complain the league doesn't care about safety.

How can you have it both ways?

In this sport it's impossible to keep everyone safe. Many occupations have had and continue to have associated dangers.

IIRC Sports Illustrated did an article a long time ago about the effects of football on former players and it wasn't pretty.

I do feel for these guys, but how can anyone not know abusing your body like this isn't a good formula for a long and healthy life?
 
I think they need to get rid of the launch. Make it suspendable.

Make all tackles a wrap with the facemask up. Basic form tackle. If you can launch you can do this. Takes the head target out of the equation and the lead with the head too.

Runners no longer allowed to duck the head like a battering ram either.

Worth a try.
 
Beaglebay said:
So it's OK for people to be maimed or debilitated by their jobs, as long as they're well compensated? And it's also OK for their employer to deny any complicity?
Click to expand...

My sky diving instructor thought so.

There are other jobs like hazmat cleanup specialist, any first responder, maybe even working in a mine or on an oil rig that are dangerous by nature, and there's only so much the employer can do to mitigate the danger (apart from closing up shop).

Whether or not people in those jobs are adequately compensated is a different question.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top