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Ravens OL John Urschel, 26, retires abruptly, two days after CTE study

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Re: Ravens OL John Urschel, 26, retires abruptly, two days after CTE study

#21

Post by afthonos »

mysterydip wrote: post #7
sna1l wrote: post #2

For someone so smart, I'm a little surprised it took this CTE study to push him over the edge. But maybe he wanted more conclusive data before leaving a job which paid him millions. :)

I would imagine being in front of a stadium full of fans and nationally televised each week would also be hard to give up. Not that people necessarily need the adoration, but it has to give you a high of some kind.

I know people who used to play varsity sports in high school and college, and, even at that level, moving past those years was difficult. They had come to really enjoy being in stadiums full of people cheering.

I can only imagine how much more difficult it is when you're a pro, the stadiums are bigger, and you are on TV.

Re: Ravens OL John Urschel, 26, retires abruptly, two days after CTE study

#22

Post by wyager »

backtoyoujim wrote: post #17

Trying to watch NFL reminds me of the moment in "Django Unchained" when we meet diCaprio's character sitting in a chair watching to slaves beat each other to death. That moment of that movie comes to me every time the TV producers cut to the team owner sitting in their fancy box in their fancy chair paying lots of African American men to beat each other up for our entertainment and profit.

The primary difference, of course, is that NFL players often make more money than God.

Re: Ravens OL John Urschel, 26, retires abruptly, two days after CTE study

#23

Post by accountyaccount »

wyager wrote: post #22
backtoyoujim wrote: post #17

Trying to watch NFL reminds me of the moment in "Django Unchained" when we meet diCaprio's character sitting in a chair watching to slaves beat each other to death. That moment of that movie comes to me every time the TV producers cut to the team owner sitting in their fancy box in their fancy chair paying lots of African American men to beat each other up for our entertainment and profit.

The primary difference, of course, is that NFL players often make more money than God.

College Football on the other hand...

Re: Ravens OL John Urschel, 26, retires abruptly, two days after CTE study

#24

Post by smeyer »

keeptrying wrote: post #15

There is a significant bias here in that its 99% of NFL players brains * which have been donated to the NFL *. But honestly even if you could peek into every NFL players brain, I'm sure the likely incidence after 4-5 years of playing would be orders of magnitude greater than whats found in the general population.

There's obviously a bias, but the mentioned study claimed that even if the rate of CTE were 0% among brains not donated to the study, their sample would still be large enough to indicate a significant deviation from the general population.

Re: Ravens OL John Urschel, 26, retires abruptly, two days after CTE study

#25

Post by fotbr »

simlevesque wrote: post #19
HiroshiSan wrote: post #8

Don't bother googling his name...seems that everyone who's getting their PhD is a genius.

> everyone who's getting their PhD is a genius No but anyone with a PhD has a brain worth preserving.

Not entirely true. Anyone who's EARNED their PhD might very well have a brain worth preserving, but there's many PhDs out there who purchased their doctorate from degree mills, and are dumber than a box of rocks.

Re: Ravens OL John Urschel, 26, retires abruptly, two days after CTE study

#26

Post by grogenaut »

sna1l wrote: post #6
sputknick wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's talked before about how addictive the feeling of playing is. It probably takes a lot to give up something you love.

Yeah, I realize that my armchair comment was a bit flippant. If someone told me that writing software (insert profession/thing you love) led to CTE, I'd obviously be really torn about it as well.

And you're likely not even considering the Fame and fortune parts as well as the ability to parlay that money and noteriety into something with the degree.

Re: Ravens OL John Urschel, 26, retires abruptly, two days after CTE study

#27

Post by stupidcar »

afthonos wrote: post #21
mysterydip wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would imagine being in front of a stadium full of fans and nationally televised each week would also be hard to give up. Not that people necessarily need the adoration, but it has to give you a high of some kind.

I know people who used to play varsity sports in high school and college, and, even at that level, moving past those years was difficult. They had come to really enjoy being in stadiums full of people cheering. I can only imagine how much more difficult it is when you're a pro, the stadiums are bigger, and you are on TV.

Urschel at least has another passion and career that he can focus on. I expect for a lot of players the problem is also that, if they quit, then what? What do they do with themselves? How do they support themselves and their families when they're no longer on a pro's salary?

Re: Ravens OL John Urschel, 26, retires abruptly, two days after CTE study

#28

Post by Azkar »

So what's the big picture here? We've suspected for years that football leads to brain trauma. Does that mean the NFL should shut down? Should they continue to operate as normal?

There have been efforts recently to make the game safer for players, but the amount of concussions and injuries seen every season don't seem to be decreasing.

Can you make the game "more safe" without drastically changing the game? Any game played at this high of a speed, with this strong of players is going to have some inherent danger to it.

Do we just need to make the effects more widely known and understood by the players, maybe treat football like smoking with warnings printed on the outside of helmets? Anything less than that and you run the risk of not making your point.

Should I feel bad as a fan for watching football? Is it any worse than buying clothing made by child labor from a third world country?

Re: Ravens OL John Urschel, 26, retires abruptly, two days after CTE study

#29

Post by siegecraft »

wyager wrote: post #22
backtoyoujim wrote: post #17

Trying to watch NFL reminds me of the moment in "Django Unchained" when we meet diCaprio's character sitting in a chair watching to slaves beat each other to death. That moment of that movie comes to me every time the TV producers cut to the team owner sitting in their fancy box in their fancy chair paying lots of African American men to beat each other up for our entertainment and profit.

The primary difference, of course, is that NFL players often make more money than God.

NFL players are probably compensated the worst out of the 4 major US sports. That's just in terms of what they get paid and doesn't even look at the total package of the risk they expose themselves to in terms of chronic injury, painkiller addiction, etc.

Re: Ravens OL John Urschel, 26, retires abruptly, two days after CTE study

#30

Post by HiroshiSan »

simlevesque wrote: post #19
HiroshiSan wrote: post #8

Don't bother googling his name...seems that everyone who's getting their PhD is a genius.

> everyone who's getting their PhD is a genius No but anyone with a PhD has a brain worth preserving.

Everyone has a brain worth preserving...my point was when you google "John Urschel", most of what the news has to say about him is that he is a Math Genius, because he is doing his PhD at MIT, which I don't believe is the case.
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