We’re men, we’re men in tights.
We roam around the forest looking for fights.
It may be time for Mel Brooks to turn his attention to the NFL. Delivering head injuries, it turns out, is manly.
In fact, Steelers linebacker James Harrison offered a sophisticated medical defense of head injuries Sunday, describing the concussion he delivered to Browns running back Joshua Cribbs this way:
“You hate to see anyone down like that, but then you realize he just went to sleep for a little bit and he came out of it and he’s going to be OK.”
So there you go. No harm, no foul.
So long as nobody mentions nine-time Pro Bowler Mike Webster, a former Steeler himself, who got up from the dinner table one night and urinated into his oven in front of his family. His dementia left him homeless before he died in 2002 at age 50.
Dr. Bennet Omalu, who did brain autopsies on Webster and a number of other former players, dubbed this syndrome “gridiron dementia” in his 2008 book “Play Hard, Die Young.”
I was reading an advance manuscript of the book while covering Super Bowl XLII in Arizona. At commissioner Roger Goodell’s annual news conference a couple of days before the game, I had a chance to ask him about Omalu’s link between football head injuries, dementia, depression and death.
“I don’t think any of those claims are backed up by scientific or medical facts,” Goodell said then.
Not quite three years later, Goodell has changed his tune rather dramatically, aggressively moving to get ahead of the issue by ordering suspensions of players who instigate hits to the head like the ones Harrison laid on Cribbs and Mohamed Massaquoi last weekend.
Many defensive players and former players who are now TV talking heads already have criticized this escalation of punishment. Violent hits are part of the game, after all.
Former Broncos linebacker Tom Jackson, now an ESPN analyst, offered a compelling commentary this week about players permanently injured from football hits. But Jackson also hosted the “jacked up” segment on ESPN as recently as last year in which he celebrated the game’s most violent hits.
This is as good an example as any of the conflicts inherent in the game. Football is a collision sport. Always has been. But as players get bigger and faster, Newton’s Second Law — force equals mass times acceleration — means they do more damage to one another. Goodell finds himself in the odd position of trying to protect the very people who are criticizing him.
Still, many former NFL players took plenty of violent hits and seem no worse for the wear. Steve Young and Merril Hoge were forced to retire because of repeated concussions, yet both are television talking heads with no signs of permanent damage.
Former Broncos offensive lineman Mark Schlereth blasted the league for the hypocrisy of escalating punishment for violent hits even as it profits from them through the sale of videos and photographs. He’s absolutely right. Goodell has moved so rapidly to change the league’s position that he has outkicked his coverage.
The truth is we don’t know why some players suffer permanent impairment from football-related head injuries and some don’t. There is no database to give us percentages, just horrific anecdotal tales of former players such as Terry Long and Andre Waters, who descended into depression and finally committed suicide.
But the pace of research is increasing, and the news is seldom good. HBO’s “Real Sports” recently highlighted links between athletic head injuries and clusters of patients with the symptoms of Lou Gehrig’s disease.
Players are bigger, faster and stronger with each generation. The helmets they wear — harder and better insulated than ever in an attempt to protect the players — have become the most fearsome weapons on the field.
Goodell is doing what he must as the steward of an $8 billion business. But he is also doing the right thing in trying to minimize head injuries any way he can.
The critics are right that the practical application of this discipline is likely to be difficult and, at times, capricious. Broncos coach Josh McDaniels probably is right that instant replay would be useful in certain cases to eliminate erroneous penalties.
None of these difficulties mean the attempt to reduce head injuries in football is a bad idea. And if players want to call it unmanly, Mel Brooks may have something to say about their pants.
Dave Krieger: 303-954-5297, dkrieger@denverpost.com or
