NS.. ex-NFL players sue league... It's starting to make sense now

ok well here goes. First off, to the former members of the military and especially those who were injured in combat, thank you for your service to the country. I have the utmost respect for what you guys have done and continue to do for the rest of us. Turley feels the same as I do and he is actually very active in supporting disabled veterans.

As I said, Kyle Turley and I are good friends. He lives nearby me here in Franklin, TN. We've had many conversations about football, inside scoop on Saints stuff, crazy funny stories and what not. Anyway, many of you know Kyle from his helmet throwing days with the Saints. He was also injured pretty badly a few times and is dealing with some of the after-effects of the game currently.

Of course he knew that football is a dangerous sport. He never questioned that he could be severely injured or even be killed due to playing NFL football. However, he was under the impression - as I would imagine most players are - that the team and the team's doctors have the players best interest in mind. I'm sure that is the case in many situations. There are other situations, and in Kyle's case specifically, where it was obvious that the player's best interest were not a consideration.

There are 2 things that happened to Kyle that I would like to share with you all. Both happened while he was with the St Louis Rams. By the way, he never wanted to be traded to St Louis. He had a contract done with Randy Mueller (negotiated by Tom Condon) and it was all but signed. It would have made him a Saint for life. Well, Randy was fired out of the blue and apparently Kyle wasn't in Mickey's plans. So Mickey traded him to the Rams. This is a whole different story of course... Now, on to what happened with the Rams:

The Rams were playing a game against the Packers in St Louis. Sometime in the second half, Kyle was running downfield on a play and was knocked down. As he went to get up, a DB's knee clipped him in the back of his head and knocked his forehead straight into the turf. Everything went black and he was unconscious. The trainers got out to him on the field and woke him up with the ammonia sticks. He was obviously dazed and confused. They were able to get him to the sidelines and sit him down. Everything from that point on is pretty blurry for him. Here's what he remembers. He was sitting on the sideline and people would come up to see if he was ok. He had extreme tunnel vision and everyone looked really warped and surreal when they approached him. He was very disoriented and confused. He was sitting there looking all over the stadium, scanning the box suites for his wife, Stacy. He obviously knew where the suite was - she sat in the same one every game - but he couldn't find her. She commented that she could see him on the bench just looking around...and appearing that he was lost. Finally when there was about a minute left in the game, they had him go to the locker room to get undressed. He had other players coming up to him in there checking on him and most were a blur but he remembers Marshall Faulk coming up to him, who he played with at SD State and was a long time friend...the players seemed concerned because he obviously wasn't himself. At some point, the owner Georgia Frontiere came in. Kyle doesn't remember this but was told by several people...he gave Georgia a big bear hug and was like "Geoooorgiiaaa" haha. Um...funny part is he wasn't exactly dressed appropriately at the time. I'll just leave it at that. Anyway, some time after that they brought Stacy in and just said, "well you can take him to the hospital if you want or just take him home and let him get some rest." They turned him over to Stacy at this point. Stacy was walking him out the tunnel and they ran into Joe Johnson. Joe and Kyle were good friends - as many of you know Joe was traded from the Saints to the Packers. Joe was extremely concerned when he saw the condition that Kyle was in. He implored Stacy to get him to the hospital immediately. As Stacy was trying to get through throngs of people and get to their car, Kyle could barely walk. She is practically carrying a 300lb NFL player through crowds of people when they ran into a police officer. The policeman put them in his squad car and rushed Kyle to the hospital. He was treated at the hospital and was kept there for 2 days!! Upon leaving the hospital, he reported for work the following day. He was having extreme migraines and other concussion symptoms. The doctors and/or trainers asked him if he had any problems and if he could go. He explained his symptoms and yet they encouraged him to get back and practice if he felt he could go. So, being a good teammate, he manned up and got back to work. Not knowing that the secondary trauma that he would be putting his brain through could have very dire consequences for him down the road. As some of you have pointed out, the research being done has proven that people who return to football too soon after having a grade 3 concussion can be severely disabled or even killed. It's this secondary trauma that, from what I'm led to believe, can be extremely damaging to the brain. There are links to alzheimers, ALS (Steve Gleason), and other degenerative and/or fatal diseases as a result of this type of trauma. What is of grave concern in regards to this story are the following: (1) Kyle had an obvious grade 3 concussion. (2) the team doctors/trainers were aware of this. (3) They neglected to take him to the hospital themselves immediately - they left him on the field, then turned him over to his wife to assist him which she was physically incapable of doing. (4) 3 days after suffering this type of injury, they had him playing again. (5) There was medical knowledge available at the time which requires a patient with this type of an injury to sit for at least 30 days without further contact, allowing the brain to heal. (6) The secondary trauma he received as the result of returning to work so soon could be very detrimental to his health and possibly kill him. (7) In this were any other industry, a doctor could very likely be sued for malpractice for allowing him to return to work while still experiencing effects of a concussion.

The second injury also took place with the Rams. Kyle had a back injury that required surgery. I believe it was a herniated disk. He had the surgery and, after 4 months, was asked to return to practice. He didn't feel that he was capable but, again, didn't want to be a wuss so he "manned up". After one practice, he told the doctors that he couldn't push off/ get leverage like he normally could. They told him to trust the surgery and get back on the field. He would be fine. During the 3rd practice, he reherniated the same disk. He was placed on IR, then cut, and the remainder of his contract...and the millions of dollars left on it, were cancelled. He had to have surgery again and was forced to sign on with KC at the league minimum. He played there for 2 years and had some shining moments on the team, but obviously he wasn't the same player he was before the 2 back surgeries and could no longer continue playing. Now, here's the shocking part. After the first surgery, there were several simple tests that could have been done to make sure that he was capable of returning to play. I don't remember all of them, but one test was to simply to arch your foot up towards the ceiling. The doctor pushes down and you have to try to keep your foot pointed up. The Rams never did any of these tests with Kyle. Nor did they go through the proper steps to rebuild the core muscles in his back and/or give his back the appropriate time to heal. In doing so, they sent him back into the trenches unprepared, only to have his back blown out again, his contract cancelled and left without a job. In my opinion, it seems pretty obvious that the negligence of the Rams and their doctors was directly responsible for Kyle's inability to continue working. There is a great deal more specific info that I'm leaving out here, but I would be sitting here for the next hour or two writing. :)

You can debate that players know what they are getting into. And you can debate that players are overpaid. But if a team knows that they can do something to protect a player's long term health after a very serious injury like a grade 3 concussion and they choose not to, there should be some accountability for that. Likewise, if the team doctors fail to take the most basic procedural steps to rehab a player after an injury and rush their "asset" back onto the field despite the risk of further career ending injuries, the team and their doctors should be held accountable for that.

I hope I was able to shed some light from one player's perspective. Sorry, I'm not a doctor and have tried to translate the information that I've been told by Kyle directly to you guys. Please take any medical info above with a grain of salt. You can also check out Nonprofit NFL football charity ? Gridiron Greats Assistance Fund (GGAF) which is an organization that Kyle is hooked up with. They are trying to bring awareness to Kyle's story and many others like his. By the way, many of you already know but KT loves New Orleans and the Saints fans. I'm trying to get him down to a game with me in my section, 281. When he does, we're going to bring a bunch of mini "Jets" helmets that Kyle will be giving out to all the Saints fans! :)