Morneau’s Concussion Evokes Bad Memories Of Koskie
The concussion has become one of the biggest battlegrounds in sports over the last few years. Much of the focus remains on heavy-contact sports like football and hockey — and rightfully so, given the myriad of injuries we seem to hear about on a weekly basis from these sports. This article from The Classical, for example, details the struggles Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker James Harrison underwent in the latter half of this past NFL season and is a fantastic read on the impacts concussions can have on players and people.
The nature of injury in baseball is very different, of course. Rather than large masses of metal and human flying at each other, baseball injuries are caused by immense stress on ligaments. That doesn’t mean the concussion isn’t an issue, though, and we’re seeing that now with Justin Morneau. The 30-year-old former MVP managed just 69 games in 2011 dealing with issues stemming from concussions dating back to 2010. Three concussions in and his baseball career could be nearing the end, just like former Minnesota Twin teammate Corey Koskie.
Morneau talked to Minnesota Star-Tribune writer Jim Souhan about his career going forward Friday. The glass seems less than half-empty for the slugger at this point:
Well, I don’t think there will be a career if it’s something I’m dealing with. That’s the reality of the whole thing. I’m obviously not going to continue to mess around with this if it continues to be a problem. There comes a point where you can only torture yourself for so long.
Unlike Morneau’s situation, Corey Koskie’s career was ended by one single concussion on July 5th, 2006. Going back for a pop-up behind third base, Koskie slipped and his head slammed into the ground at Miller Park. Koskie managed to get the ball in his glove and it popped out to Bill Hall who made the catch running behind Koskie’s limp body — it was one of the day’s top plays on all the highlight shows. Nobody realized it would end Koskie’s career.
Koskie’s incident is obviously the worst concussion MLB has seen. His issues threatened to take away not just his career but his ability to live a normal life as well. As he told Gordon Edes:
My head hurt, my body was numb, I couldn’t walk through a door, I couldn’t go in the sun, I couldn’t enjoy time with my kids, my stress level was through the roof, everybody was telling me I’m fine and I wasn’t.
Unfortunately, the language Morneau uses — particularly the word “torture” — connects all too well with Koskie’s experience. At least Morneau is at training camp and participating in baseball activities — something Koskie struggled to do at any level following his injury.
As a post-concussion symptom sufferer myself — I sustained a concussion after taking a foul ball off the mask while umpiring a 14-and-under baseball game in summer of 2009 — I can relate with the issues Morneau is dealing with and Koskie dealt with. It must be extraordinarily difficult to deal with such issues in a clubhouse setting (as Koskie mentions in the Gordon Edes article), where people cannot actually see the battle scars of your injury — the pain, fogginess and other symptoms of the injury are enough to deal with on their own. It can be something that feels like it will never go away, and the feeling can be totally helpless — rehabbing an injured brain is not the same as rehabbing an injured knee.
I am fully behind Justin Morneau and rooting for a swift and full recovery. Unfortunately, it sounds like Morneau is starting to deal with some of the same questions Koskie did when it became apparent the injury would end his career. Every case is different, however, and hopefully Morneau can make his way back to the field without further issue.
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I posted this comment at another site, but am curious what people think here:
Seems like no one ever retired from concussion problems (extreme cases like Coniglieri aside) until the last decade. Is it possible this is kind of a reverse-placebo effect caused by excessive caution? Doctor’s tell players to be hypervigilant after concussions or they might suffer permanent damage, and as a result every twinge is magnified exponentially in the player’s mind, until he can’t play without anxiety. Thoughts?
As a medical professional I can tell you that the scenario you describe is a distinct possibility. The more a person knows about a condition, the more likely they are to incorrectly believe they have it. This is known as Medical Student Syndrome as it often occurs in medical and psych students. In todays culture you see this a lot more as the average person is bombarded with medical information, particularily incomplete or misinterpreted information through various media sources.
However, I doubt that this is the reason we see concussions becoming more of an issue in sports today. I believe that in the past the macho culture of sports encouraged players to live through any and all injuries or disabilities. Players were simply taught that to play through these conditions was a badge of honor and to speak of any lingering effects was a sign of weakness.
Another thing to consider is that some players may have showed a significant loss of skill due to concusssive after effects that caused them to wash out of MLB. Players may well have had their careers shortened by concussions without explicitly retiring due to concussion.
I don’t think anyone really knows the answer. I don’t think it is excessive caution, as it seems players frequently try to come back and experience symptoms. As far as I know, most of those symptoms (e.g., blurred vision, light sensitivity) are not consistent with anxiety.
I think that the more we understand all injuries, the more we see their effects as direct rather than indirect. Football is the obvious sport to look at since there is so much more contact. In the old days a guy would “get his bell rung” and come back in the game although maybe he didn’t remember anything that happened after or the plane ride home. If that happened a few times maybe he gets a little sluggish in practice or he runs the wrong route, misses a blocking assignment because he can’t think straight or can’t keep in shape because he gets headaches if he works out to hard and pretty soon he is out of the sport. The record won’t reflect that he retired because of concussions but that’s what happened.
@MikeS, haven’t they also looked into the life span of some of those players as well? I seem to remember a report on the average life span of former NFL players being significantly shorter than regular people. Sure, those guys didn’t seek medical help, but they certainly seemed to pay the price later. Here is a report on life expectancy: http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/story/14477196/nfl-is-killing-its-players-and-league-doesnt-care
Obviously not all of it is from head injuries as weight is a factor as well, but some of it is from head injuries. The old school mentality of “get back in the game” took a heavy toll and now we just know more and need to be more cautious with guys like Morneau. 20 years ago he might have just tried to play through it and not make “excuses” because he would have been afraid of the stigma of not playing.
As someone who’s had a severe head injury (subdural hematoma), most of the side effects I experienced were memory loss, blurred vision, dizziness, memory loss, occassional nausia, memory loss….okay the memory loss part was a bad joke I tell people.
Really though, for about a year I would get incredibly painful monthly headaches, my vision isn’t at all as good as it used to be, it’s harder to focus at times. My brain injury occurred on the right side of my head though, so that might have something to do with it.
As far as being overly cautious. I was at first, and I still probably won’t ever box my friends or anything crazy like that. It’s honestly more my family and friends that are cautious for me. I can see it happening with players though. It’s scary.