THE SPORTS LISPERER #3

After what we all witnessed this past Monday, it’s magnificent to see that Damar Hamlin is speaking and is improving. While he has a long way to go, the breathing tube has been removed and he is speaking with family and friends. In a sport as violent as football, this event moved even the staunchest of the ‘kill em’ mentality crowd. We love our sports, and I am, in many ways, obsessed with certain sports. I can rattle off stats and rosters from the sixties, seventies and eighties as well as contend with anyone on most sports in the present tense. But, in the end, it is a game. True, a highly lucrative game and a game that feeds our economy in so many ways, but these young men are playing a game that will eventually be the downfall of their lives. While it is true, that many of these young men and women are making generational money and setting up families for decades and decades to come. But, from crippled knees to spinal fusion surgeries, from CTE to all sorts of long-life ailments, the gladiators in the arena are paying the ultimate price. We love football. I love football. But let’s not take our eyes off the ball when it comes to the true dangers of the sports.

APPRECIATIVE NOD OF THE HEAD this week goes to the Buffalo Trauma Team that rushed onto the field and saved Damar Hamlin’s life. I’ve many times seen the multiple ambulances and workers on and off the field during the games, but I never truly understood the massive undertaking that goes into all of it. The Trauma team and the professionals that were involved in everything from assessment, to CPR, to evacuation to … I don’t know enough medical terms apparently, to whatever needed to be done to save this young man were spectacular. We throw words like heroic around perhaps too much, but if saving someone’s life as they did is heroic, then that befits. If only all of us had access to that type of treatment when we are most in need. Tremendous job.

A SHAKE OF THE HEAD AND ROLL OF THE EYES goes to everyone involved in the US Men’s Soccer Team Fiasco. I had an entire article written about this event but in the end, I just couldn’t justify writing something that in some way defended a guy who assaulted his girlfriend thirty years ago (even though they’ve been married twenty-five years since and have four kids) and threw his player under the bus in a post-World Cup discussion. That being said, Entitlement is alive and well in the Reyna family. Oh Momma. When a Man-child (making professional money, in a professional sport, paid by one of the richest professional teams in the world, in a foreign country across a very large ocean) goes to his Momma to complain about playing time… he deserves the crap he’s going to receive in every locker room he’s in until the very end of time. Now, I’m not saying Mrs. Reyna committed the most pound for pound, inch for inch Karen move of all time… but it’s in the discussion. I just hope she’s there to wet a napkin to wipe the crumbs from the corner of his mouth when his butler doesn’t remove the crusts from his PB and J. This horribly disappointing story clouds all the good done for US Men’s soccer in the World Cup. First Class work done by all.

And the GAME OF THE WEEK is this Monday night’s National Championship game between massive underdog TCU and defending champ, Georgia. Yes, I know it’s technically next week, but let’s give this game some love. True, TCU is 13-point dogs, but they’ve been looked down upon again and again this year and ask Michigan how that worked out. TCU was able to run against Michigan and I’m just not sure they can do that against Georgia. Now, I would like to see TCU take that smug look off Stetson Bennett’s face (he’s a year older than Tua) but I’m afraid Georgia goes back-to-back, for the love of Vince Dooley. And that, in pretty convincing fashion. Take Georgia with the points. Georgia 38 and TCU 20.

And that’s all from The Sports Lisperer this week. Hold onto your loved ones and enjoy the New Year!