Onus on players to recognize symptoms of concussion
If Brady did suffer one during last season, he was hiding it like many other athletes do
Two weeks ago, my 14-year-old daughter sat out soccer practices leading up to her rep team’s season opener.
Which made her livid. She possesses a competitive zeal that scares me sometimes.
A tendon sprain behind her right knee kept her from jogging, let alone running, without piercing discomfort. Suddenly at practice the night before the game, however, she declared herself pain-free — and convinced me, her coaches and her team’s trainer and physiotherapist as much.
So, she practised that night without incident, then played — fabulously — in the next day’s opener.
But a week later, guess what? She admitted to me she was not pain-free at the time. There was just no way on earth she was going to miss that opener, she said. So she willed herself into doing the prove-it stretches and runs without any visible discomfort, hesitation or hedging. Basically, she lied. It was reckless. It was foolish. And yeah, she got the waggingfinger lecture.
Although my daughter really did feel fine a few days later, I felt terrible, stupid and duped. But then how was I, or anyone, to know she was still experiencing pain? Only she could know.
I’ve been thinking of that the past two days as many in the sports world have tsk-tsked themselves mouth-dry, aggrieved and aghast that a superstar pro athlete — in this day and age of concussion and CTE awareness — could so wantonly keep concussion symptoms to himself, apparently on more than one occasion.
The athlete? Why this decade’s favourite pro-sports punching bag, of course: New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady.
His wife, super-model Gisele Bundchen, told a U.S. TV morning show that her husband — possessor of five Super Bowl champions’ rings — sustained a concussion last season.
“I mean, he has a concussion pretty much every — I mean, we
don’t talk about — but he does have concussions,” Bundchen said, shutting it down once she realized she said too much.
Those in the press with an itchy “-gate” quick-key command on their laptops immediately dubbed this Concussion-gate.
Spare me. There is no -gate here.
If Brady suffered one or more concussions last season, he did not inform Patriots medical personnel. He was listed with only assorted minor hurts during his abbreviated (thanks to his fourgame Deflategate suspension) 2016 season.
If Brady was concussed at a game, and not a practice, he did not show visible signs of such distress to warrant a sideline team doctor or trainer, or sideline independent neurotrauma specialist, or a game official, or an “eye in the sky” athletic-trainer spotter, to stop the action and get him checked for a concussion.
That didn’t even happen in the Super Bowl, when the Atlanta Falcons’ young, ferocious pass-rushers beat the crap out of Brady for two-plus quarters, before he and the Patriots launched their epic 25-point comeback overtime victory for the ages.
But was Brady even concussed last year, at any point? He almost certainly would have shown outward signs of it. An athletic physiotherapist who specializes in concussion treatment told me two years ago that no concussed athlete can hide all symptoms from a trained specialist.
What’s more, as some pro athletes apparently really can recover from milder concussions in less than a week — see Crosby, Sidney — it’s quite possible Brady knew he wasn’t hurt seriously enough to seek help via the protocols, and thus didn’t tell anyone but his wife.
If so, that wouldn’t jibe with what Brady told an ABC News interviewer last May.
“It’s a very important topic,” he said of concussion diagnosis and treatment. “If you are going to put yourself kind of in the line of fire, so to speak, you better educate yourself. … As an athlete, you have to take all those things into consideration and try to be as proactive as you can. Gain information, then go through the proper protocols if you do get a concussion.”
If Brady did suffer one last season, and didn’t tell anyone, he must have willed himself into practising and playing without any visible discomfort, hesitation or hedging. If so, basically he lied. If so, it was reckless and foolish. Even if he really did feel fine just a few days later.
And if so, how were we to know he was concussed? If mild, perhaps only he could.
Still, we’re all supposed to be outraged. As if Tom Brady was the first star pro athlete who kept concussion symptoms to himself.
Oh, can you hear that? That’s Peyton Manning snickering.
Look, uber-competitive athletes of nearly all ages are going to fib about their injuries so they can play and compete.
Not even CNN would call that breaking news.