Post
by drd5748 » Sun May 24, 2020 10:58 pm
I don't have scientific research but, having attended 18 Midlands, a South Beach plus five Scuffles, I'm pretty certain injury rates go up when kids go home for the holidays and come back, with blips in weight control + ideal fitness. IMHO, this raises the risk of injuries, many of which are readily recalled.
How many of you attended the Midlands on Dec 29, 2011 when Joe Kennedy went down with a severely separated shoulder? Then Brandon Hatchett went down the next day with an virtually identical 3rd degree shoulder injury? I used to room with Jack Foley back then and nearly threw up after his gruesome summary of what happened to their shoulders.
Brandon, in particular, told Jack: "I'm done; there's no way I can make the post-season." So Jack spent the 1st few days performing psychological counseling just to convince him 'yes, you can'; not easy but we've done this before" ... then went through the next four steps in the grueling process.
Let the record show that Joe returned to a dual on Feb. 11 (44 days); Brandon on Feb 18, or 51 days. How did they get hurt? Each got taken down straight to their backs; never had a chance. A little different from Brad in Feb.17, 2001 when Army start Maurice Worthy barrel rolled him & torpedoed his shoulder into the mat; bad timing for the exact same injury (unlike Springman Feb '02, Brad did not feel Worthy had any inj. intent).
Tough sport. We're very lucky we've had Jack over 30 years to fix things.