#NEW: @giseleofficial told @CharlieRose on @CBSThisMorning that Tom Brady had a concussion last year. “He does have concussions.” pic.twitter.com/K4B8ixDN9X
— CBS This Morning (@CBSThisMorning) May 17, 2017
Yeesh – this isn’t good. Not good at all. I can already here the murmur of the football community this morning. The greatest quarterback of all time, the most vilified franchise of all time – its centerpiece, playing through concussions. Let’s hit the meat of this story before we break it down:
Tom Brady suffered a football-related concussion last year that nobody knew about — and he secretly gets concussions all the time — so says his wife, Gisele.
The supermodel appeared on “CBS This Morning” on Wednesday and expressed frustration with Tom’s health … particularly the brain injuries he suffers on the field.
“Football … like he had a concussion last year,” Gisele said.
“I mean he has concussions pretty much every [year] … I mean, we don’t talk about. But he does have concussions.”
This could be a big deal … considering Brady was not listed on the NFL injury list for a concussion once in 2016. It begs the question … was the injury covered up to keep him on the field?
In the NFL, if a player is diagnosed with a concussion during a game, he is NOT allowed to return to the field for the remainder of that game. He may return the following week at the discretion of his doctor.
“I don’t really think it’s a healthy thing for your body to go through like, through that kind of aggression like, all the time–that cannot be healthy for you, right?”
“I mean I’m planning on having him be healthy and do a lot of fun things when we’re like 100, I hope.”
So, this is bad news for a couple of reasons:
The concussion issue. Sure, the NFL is taking strict measures to “ensure player safety” in regards to concussions, but it doesn’t keep players from pretending everything is alright. I’ve had several concussions in my life, and I can say they are harder to fake the further removed you are. Hours and days after the initial blow, you start to experience the lingering headache, the nausea, light sensitivity, blurred vision, etc. But, right away – you’re just in shock.
The last concussion I incurred was 2015, and other than being a little sore from being punched in the face, it was two days before I felt the full effect. If somebody had picked me up off the ground right away and performed a concussion test, I might have told them nothing was wrong, I felt no pain other than being socked in the face, but no concussion symptoms.
I’ve never been in an NFL game obviously, but I can imagine it would pretty easy to shake this off as “getting your bell rung,” and getting back into the game. How does the NFL police this?
This is going to bring back up the “Patriots are cheaters” bit. I hate to say it, but once you develop a reputation as the Patriots, regardless of how legitimate it really is, people are going to pile it on.
I’ve usually defended the Patriots – DeflateGate was a shoddy investigation that was presented in a one-side manner. SpyGate was much ado about nothing, but this…well, this is pretty unethically, assuming the Patriots knew about it. There’s a chance they didn’t and Brady kept this information between himself and his family. But, if they did know about it and knowingly kept him off the injury reports and in games, that’s a blatant violation of the rules.
We just have to wait and see what comes of this before we pass judgment. I just know everyone is going to be saying, “those damn cheatin’ Patriots are at it again” around their respective water coolers today.
Not good news for the NFL today.
Stoney Keeley is the Editor in Chief of The SoBros Network. A strong advocate of GSD (get shit done) and #BeBetter, he’s down to talk Tennessee Titans and Alabama Crimson Tide football over a beer any day. Check him out covering the WWE for WrestlingNews.co. Follow on Twitter @StoneyKeeley, @WrestlingNewsCo
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