Randle El suffering after-effects of football career

[welch]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/dc- ... -football/

Former Washington Redskins and Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Antwaan Randle El is perhaps best remembered for his 43-yard touchdown pass in Super Bowl XL that aided a Pittsburgh win over Seattle, but a decade later, the physical and mental drawbacks have been so significant that he regrets ever playing in the NFL.

“If I could go back, I wouldn’t” play football, he told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in a Steelers-themed project posted Tuesday. “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, who played in Washington from 2006 to 2009 between two stints in Pittsburgh, said he regularly experiences trouble walking down stairs — “I have to come down sideways sometimes, depending on the day” — and has serious memory lapses.

“I ask my wife things over and over again, and she’s like, ‘I just told you that,’ ” Randle El told the Post-Gazette. “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.”

<snip>

We keep seeing articles like this, but it hits me harder when the player is a former Redskin.

[Burgundy&GoldForever]

CTE is no laughing matter. We love football but given the risk associated with playing the game at a competitive level I can't say I blame Randle El for his hindsight here.

Symptoms of CTE are like those of other conditions that involve progressive loss of function or structure of nerve cells (neurodegenerative diseases), including:

Alzheimer's disease
Parkinson's disease
Frontotemporal dementia
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — also known as Lou Gehrig's disease

Overall, people with CTE first have problems with thinking (cognition), mood and behavior. Later, they may also develop physical problems.

Military personnel who have experienced traumatic brain injury may experience post-traumatic stress disorder.

Signs and symptoms of CTE usually begin eight to 10 years after repetitive mild traumatic brain injury. These include:

Difficulty thinking (cognitive impairment)
Impulsive behavior
Depression or apathy
Short-term memory loss
Difficulty planning and carrying out tasks (executive function)
Emotional instability
Substance abuse
Suicidal thoughts or behavior

Over time, memory and executive function may become worse, and other signs and symptoms may develop, including:

Irritability
Aggression
Speech and language difficulties
Motor impairment, such as difficulty walking, tremor, loss of muscle movement, weakness or rigidity
Trouble swallowing (dysphagia)
Vision and focusing problems
Trouble with sense of smell (olfactory abnormalities)
Dementia

Researchers use the following stages to describe the progression of CTE symptoms:

Stage I. Headache, loss of attention and concentration
Stage II. Depression, explosivity and short-term memory loss
Stage III. Decision-making (executive) dysfunction and cognitive impairment
Stage IV. Dementia, word-finding difficulty and aggression

They have also created four stages to describe the process of damage to brain tissue.

CTE causes ongoing pathological changes that once are started, continue to have an effect for years or decades after the original traumatic brain injury or after an individual retires from a sport. Symptoms progress throughout an individual's life.

CTE progresses in two patterns. In younger people, it may begin with behavior and mood changes, whereas in older people, it may begin with cognitive problems that progress and may lead to dementia. It's not known whether there are two different disease processes or if the process changes over time.

Source: http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/chronic-traumatic-encephalopathy/basics/symptoms/con-20113581

[DEHog]

As a coach, I’m seeing declining numbers when it comes to kids playing the game. My fear is that the game will evolve into a social economic problem where billionaire owners pay poor kids to play a violent game. I do see football coming to an end, not in our lifetime but I think my kids will see it. The game at the youth and HS level is still great and mostly safe. As it progresses to the pro level it’s become watered down as they (rightly) try to make the game safer. But to Randle El’s point, I would choose baseball too. My son play HS football and he was pretty good, but I can’t say I’m disappointed that he wasn’t good enough to get to the next level.

[Hooligan]

The NFL is going to have to make some sweeping changes in the next few years, I think. This can't keep happening.

I'd almost like to see them change over to more rugby-style rules. No padding other than a soft skull-cap, maybe just for linemen. No tackling someone in the air. Etc. I think we'd see a lot more wrap-up tackling and fewer players launching themselves at each other like missiles.

[Countertrey]

The NFL is going to have to make some sweeping changes in the next few years, I think. This can't keep happening.

I'd almost like to see them change over to more rugby-style rules. No padding other than a soft skull-cap, maybe just for linemen. No tackling someone in the air. Etc. I think we'd see a lot more wrap-up tackling and fewer players launching themselves at each other like missiles.

To a great degree, many of the changes made since the 70's, designed to increase offensive production have served to speed up the game, resulting in much more violent collisions when thet do happen. The bump and run, for example, prevented less skilled receivers from gaining separation, which prevented them from accelerating, AND kept defenders in much closer proximity... this must have had the effect of reducing the violence of many collisions relative to today. It also rewarded receivers for execution of routes and for body control.

It would make me very happy to see some of those rules return... It would also give today's receivers greater appreciation for men likePaul Warfield, Charlie Taylor, Bobby Mitchell, Fred Belitnikoff, and Charlie Joyner... who did it while wrapped in a blanket.

[welch]

...and now Kenny Stabler. About my age, and someone I watched from his college play at Alabama through most of his NFL career. For younger folks: "The Snake" was a Raiders' star for years, winner of two Super Bowls and leader of some powerful teams.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/sport ... -news&_r=0

The day after Stabler died on July 8, a victim of colon cancer at age 69, his brain was removed during an autopsy and ferried to scientists in Massachusetts. It weighed 1,318 grams, or just under three pounds. Over several months, it was dissected for clues, as Stabler had wished, to help those left behind understand why his mind seemed to slip so precipitously in his final years.

On a scale of 1 to 4, Stabler had high Stage 3 chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or C.T.E., the degenerative brain disease believed to be caused by repeated blows to the head, according to researchers at Boston University. The relationship between concussions and brain degeneration is still poorly understood, and some experts caution that other factors, like unrelated mood problems or dementia, might contribute to symptoms experienced by those later found to have had C.T.E.

This is bad.

[SkinsJock]

+1 - CTE is a HUGE issue and the NFL is NOT 'managing' it at all well