Posted on 05/18/2014 3:29:48 AM PDT by OldRanchHand
Devon Walker's journey to the NFL has not been a conventional one. In September 2012, the Tulane safety suffered a spinal cord injury after he collided with a teammate during his university's game against Tulsa, leaving him paralyzed from the neck down. After months of hospitalization and extensive rehabilitation, Walker returned to Tulane in the fall of 2013 to rejoin his team on the sidelines and finish out his senior year. His ardent support served as motivation and inspiration to both his Green Wave teammates and the community as a whole, and Walker was given the 2013 Disney Spirit Award as college football's most inspirational figure last November. On Saturday, Walker graduated from Tulane with a degree in cell and molecular biology. And on that same day, at New Orleans Saints rookie minicamp, the team announced the signing of the former safety to a one-day contract. "When Devon got hurt, his football career was just starting to take off after three years of hard work," Saints coach Sean Payton said on the Saints' website. "Despite the devastating injury he suffered, Devon refuses to let that define him. He is an outstanding young man, who is not only an inspiration to his coaches and teammates at Tulane, but to all of us. Devon's character, determination, intelligence and work ethic are everything that we look for in a New Orleans Saint when we sign a player. This is the least we can do to recognize Devon and these attributes that we want all of our players to have."
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.foxsports.com ...
I’m not a sports fan but that is one athlete that I’d like to meet... & we could talk science.
Good on ya, Saints!
With the billions that the NCAA makes off these guys, they should purchase insurance policies for them, that way when something catastrophic happens the kid has something to help him the rest of his life. Catastrophically injured players is why the NCAA was formed, so that the colleges and universities aren’t responsible. The NCAA has nothing to do with “protecting” the student-athlete and the integrity of the game as they claim.
Good post, I’m on board 100 percent.
But...but...but... is he gay?
Catastrophically injured players is why the NCAA was formed, so that the colleges and universities aren’t responsible.
...and this is why I’m slowly turning against football...a game I absolutely love to watch...the very notion of catastrophic injury in an endeavor to make use of your physical abilities is oxymoronic, one should be able to do so with very minimal odds of catastrophe, and a the personnel of a football team at the beginning of the year should at least resemble the ending roster...
...I’ll be laughed off this forum...but I say let’s go forward with flag football, so as to minimize collisions, while retaining the finer points of the game which make it such a joy to watch...there will still be some hitting, and blocking, and linemen collisions are unavoidable, but career shattering injury...? Maybe not so much...isn’t that what we all want...?
I wouldn’t go as far as you, but to each his/her own. As a former NCAA student-athlete I know the org is a crock. They were created to keep players from suing. I understand that those young men signed up for this on their own free will. What I dislike is the billions the NCAA makes of of these athletes’ backs in the guise of protection.then a kid gets paralyzed and his scholarship is yanked and everything.
I attended the graduation at Tulane....was a totally assume event...I was not expecting much...
lessen the gear - no facemasks, no shell [maybe a leather hat], smaller shoulder pads etc.
Then hits would be what the body can deliver not what some super polymer plastic can do pasted onto a body
It’s basically armoured conflict
Yeah. This is the kind of football story I want to read. Mr. Walker has turned an adversity into a triumph. What has Michael Sam done other than being gay? That’s not achievement, that’s not courage. Yet, the media will continue to call Sam a hero, but largely ignore Mr. Walker.
That's they way they played 100 years ago, and there were far more severe injuries, including fatalities, back then.
" With little protective equipment, players sustained gruesome injuries—wrenched spinal cords, crushed skulls and broken ribs that pierced their hearts. The Chicago Tribune reported that in 1904 alone, there were 18 football deaths and 159 serious injuries, mostly among prep school players. Obituaries of young pigskin players ran on a nearly weekly basis during the football season.
Source: http://www.history.com/news/how-teddy-roosevelt-saved-football
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