SPORTS - Terrible Toll of Concussions

"Death of NHL 'Enforcer' Boogaard Puts Spotlight on Repeated Head Trauma" PBS Newshour 12/6/2011

Excerpt

JEFFREY BROWN (Newshour): His nickname was the Boogeyman.

Professional hockey player Derek Boogaard had one job: to be his team's enforcer, fighting and intimidating opposing players. It was his ticket to a life in the National Hockey League, his dream from childhood in small towns in Western Canada, and he was very good at it.

But years of punishment took a terrible toll, numerous injuries and concussions, eventually addiction to pain killers. And last May, just 28 years old, Derek Boogaard died of an overdose of medications and alcohol.

Researchers later determined he had a degenerative condition similar to Alzheimer's , caused by repeated blows to the head. Boogaard's story has been chronicled this week in a three-part series in The New York Times.

And we're joined now by John Branch, a sports reporter for The Times and author of the series, and Dr. Robert Cantu of the Boston University School of Medicine, one of the researchers who studied Boogaard's brain after his death.

John Branch, so this was a man who rarely, if ever scored a goal, couldn't skate fast, but was a crowd favorite and a kind of star in a particular way. Explain that role for those who don't follow sports.

Another excerpt

JEFFREY BROWN: Now, John Branch, you quote in your story the NHL commissioner, Gary Bettman, saying that it's too early to draw direct conclusions about a direct link between hockey violence and CTE.

Is that the state of understanding or acceptance of this -- these links that you find in sports generally? Tell us a little bit about that.

JOHN BRANCH, The New York Times: Sure.

It's actually very similar to what the reaction was from the NFL a few years ago from the same sorts of research from Dr. Cantu and the others. The NFL, I'm sure Dr. Cantu would say, is -- was pretty dismissive about the research for a long time as well. And it took a few more cases for the NFL to kind of come around and decide that this was a serious thing and needed serious attention.

The NHL has not reached that point. I think the question floating out there is, how many more cases need to come forward before the NHL decides to take it a little bit more seriously?

COMMENT: I know that I'm likely in the minority, but I do NOT consider Professional Hockey (nor Professional Boxing) as a sport. This is nothing but promotion of violence in the name of greed. But we human beings are at 'fault' when we continue to cheer this unnecessary violence on.