Posted on 05/05/2012 6:20:18 AM PDT by MinorityRepublican
A gray-haired woman in a green floral dress is screaming the worst moment of her life in front of the entire world. Luisa Seau stands in front of microphones, in front of cameras, on televisions across the country wailing the sometimes incoherent words of every mother’s worst nightmare.
“I pray to God,” she screams, “please take me, take me and leave my son, but it’s too late. Too late.”
You might’ve seen the heartbreaking video already. If you watched television at all Wednesday, or opened up a web browser, it was hard to miss and harder to stomach that Junior Seau, 43 years old, apparently killed himself with a gunshot to the chest.
This is a former NFL Man of the Year not even retired long enough to be inducted to the Pro Football Hall of Fame but leaving behind three children and a line of crying teammates.
Police believe his death was a suicide. If so, Seau is the third former football player to shoot himself to death in the last 15 months, and what might be the most serious issue in sports has a new face that a new generation of fans can remember and some painful questions must now be asked.
How much longer can this go? What’s your tolerance for this? How much stamina do you have for the men you cheer today dying tragic and premature deaths in the coming years?
How much longer can you be a fan of a sport that appears to be killing its athletes?
(Excerpt) Read more at kansascity.com ...
You really don’t like football do you...
The article states, “football leads to concussions, concussions leads to depression, depression leads to suicide”. Okay. In the past ten years, I have learned of teens that I knew attempting suicide or unfortunately succeeding and dying. Should we ban the teen years? What about other sports? I haven’t personally read one article about hockey players, soccer players etc... Don’t tell me that they don’t get a concussion in their sport. IMHO... I am reading a lot lately about banning football in high school, eliminating it at colleges and simply damning the NFL. An assault on an American sport (if you ask me). If the media wants to inform the public about a travesty... how about discussing how many military vets (suffering from PTSD) kill themselves (since they get very little help from our government). Why not do articles about what they saw and what they dealt with?
Imagine someone had told Junior Seau when he graduated from USC that he had two choices:
!. be one of the greatest linebackers in the history of the game, make millions of dollars, and have millions of fans, and die at age 43.
2. Pursue some other career, make a normal middle class income, and live to be 80.
I strongly suspect Seau would have taken option #1. He made lots of money doing what he loved. I bought NFL tickets and thus helped pay Seau’s salary. I was happy to pay the money to watch the game. He was happy to take my money to play the game.
I have no guilt over his death. I also buy fish and wooden furniture. Fishing and logging are two of the most dangerous professions in the U.S. Should I feel guilty about buying fish and wooden furniture?
That doesn't surprise me. Hey, just getting themselves out of the way for the greater good, right?
My God! The nancy-boys are out in force this weekend.
I really don’t have a horse in this race as I stopped watching the NFL about 6 or 7 seasons ago.
But, on general principle, we sure do have a lot of beta males parading around as feature writers.
I grew up a car racing fan during the late sixties and seventies. The continuous and ongoing drumbeat of deaths of racers was long and depressing during that time. It seems much better today with more advanced safety systems. That said the nature of the sport will still kill although hopefully at a minimal rate. I still like the sport so yeah you can be a long time fan of a sport that kills some of its greatest. Jim Clark, Ayrton Senna, Dale Earnhardt to name just a few.
“... we sure do have a lot of beta males parading around as feature writers”.
What crossed my mind is that many of these writers or supporters of eliminating football didn’t make the team or didn’t have the physical and mental capabilities of playing the sport. I heard a phrase at last year’s high school football game that popped into my mind, “Suit up or shut up”.
My brother had neither fame nor money and he killed himself.
Did I wail in front of cameras and blame everyone in sight?
No.
These are grown ass men consenting to engage in a sport. What’s next? Ultimate fighting? Martial arts? Soccer? Rugby? Baseball? Basketball? Golf? I’m sick and tired if our government at times. Congress should have a 30 day session to pass a budget and that’s it. Stay out of steroids and football.
Oh I enjoyed the Hell out of that movie :D
I heard a sports talk show host, Irv Brown discussing the brain damage problem in football 15 years ago. Mr Brown had a solution but no one was interested. he said that the problem was the helmets. They are very hard and can be used as a weapon. The answer is so simple that no one and I mean no one can see the answer.
Bring back LEATHER helmets.
Think about it.
I wonder if the use of steroids, Hgh, cocaine, marijuana, alcoholism, vicodan, poor impulse control, and just possibly loss of identity when they aren’t adored by millions of fans every week, might contribute to suicides.
If they want to eliminate high speed injuries, there is a very simple solution. Get rid of the helmets and pads. it would actually be much safer as far as head injuries.
So turn NFL Football into Rugby...?
You indeed have my sympathy and I hope you have been able to overcome it. I've known far too many people who unfortunately succumed to it. It's a horrible disease and unlike a person with cancer who can still maintain hope, the depressed have no hope......
Fan? I hardly think it is the fans who suffer when this happens. Sure, there is saddness, but it has not affected my life one iota.
The players and their families are the ones affected.
Besides, this article is not about the fans except in the context of being responsible.
There was one last year who was in Indy Cars. He died about two weeks after winning the Indy 500.
NFL football is nothing more than an extended system for beer delivery.
I stopped watching in the seventies.
So they went with making it safer. No one wants to see a driver get hurt or killed, but we sure do want to see spectacular crashes! What's wrong with safer barriers, safer restraints, safer clothing, safer gas tanks/fuel pumps, safer tires?
You mean to tell me that they can't make a safer helmet? Maybe spend some of that player salary money on R&D on helmets. Bubble wrap?, Styrofoam?, Popcorn? Works for packages. Crushable helmets that after a big hit, need to be changed for a new one.
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