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Comments that don't warrant a thread - Part 4


TravJ1979

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I am so tired of hearing people on podcasts, especially the Thompson ones, say "We didn't know then what we know now" about CTE or concussions. That's the biggest load of bullshit. I got a severe concussion in 1984 when I was 14 and my doctor told my family and I all about the possible effects and long term concerns. Everyone knew in wrestling and sports, nobody cared.

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36 minutes ago, Johnny Sorrow said:

I am so tired of hearing people on podcasts, especially the Thompson ones, say "We didn't know then what we know now" about CTE or concussions. That's the biggest load of bullshit. I got a severe concussion in 1984 when I was 14 and my doctor told my family and I all about the possible effects and long term concerns. Everyone knew in wrestling and sports, nobody cared.

We've known about concussions for a long time. But I think it's fair to say our knowledge base has grown considerably in the last twenty years. 

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25 minutes ago, Al said:

We've known about concussions for a long time. But I think it's fair to say our knowledge base has grown considerably in the last twenty years. 

Yeah, it is a lot more to it than being "punch drunk" or slow to the draw. There's a vast amount of emotional, behavioural and mental health/depression issues attached too.

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We've always known concussions are bad, what's new is just how far reaching CTE can be, It used to be believed concussions were something that can be shaken off and only folks like boxers suffer long term effects. Now it's understood more how long lasting it can be.

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2 hours ago, Johnny Sorrow said:

I am so tired of hearing people on podcasts, especially the Thompson ones, say "We didn't know then what we know now" about CTE or concussions. That's the biggest load of bullshit. I got a severe concussion in 1984 when I was 14 and my doctor told my family and I all about the possible effects and long term concerns. Everyone knew in wrestling and sports, nobody cared.

People need to get on the Network and go to 12/4/95 Raw and watch the segment with Dr. Unger talking about Shawn Michaels. He frankly and convincingly lays out the long-term effects of even a single concussion and does it in so matter-of-fact of a manner that it's obvious that the medical community was pretty much at a consensus over the short-term and long-term effects 25 years ago.

1 hour ago, sek69 said:

We've always known concussions are bad, what's new is just how far reaching CTE can be, It used to be believed concussions were something that can be shaken off and only folks like boxers suffer long term effects. Now it's understood more how long lasting it can be.

That was transparently bullshit even in 1995, at least with actual doctors who weren't marks on some organization's payroll. People just had their heads in the sand over it, and the NFL was actively covering the long-term effects up.

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I suppose that's fair. The big shift came when the main sports leagues were forced to acknowledge the long term effects and could no longer rely on mark doctors to clear players with scrambled brains anymore. Although anyone who saw the NFL try to kill Cam Newton last year might argue that still happens. 

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Not to compare the two medically, but it sort of reminds me of how the public have treated PTSD over the years as well. I know that George Carlin had a bit on it once. People used to be "shell shocked" when coming back from war & they even went so far as to make light of it in programming, like the TV show SOAP, in example. The more we learned over the years & seeing the effects it actually had on people, a lot times even leading to things like suicide, people started to take it more seriously & it wasn't such a lighthearted topic anymore.

Concussions are similar in that regard. People used to "get knocked loopy" or "get their bell rung" but after Junior Seau, I think people finally woke up a bit. 

I know there's a Rob Van Dam documentary that goes into his concussions that I'm interested in seeing eventually. I think it also comes up in the Vampiro documentary but I'm a bit more leery to watch that one as he might be one of the biggest liars in wrestling history.

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I know here in Pittsburgh, which is probably the most (American) football obsessed city in the world, our eyes were opened when we found out about Mike Webster. Learning a dude we saw as the centerpiece of an iconic sports dynasty reduced to living in his car because concussions cost him his ability to be able to function as a normal adult was a hard slap in the face. 

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1 hour ago, Coffey said:

Not to compare the two medically, but it sort of reminds me of how the public have treated PTSD over the years as well. I know that George Carlin had a bit on it once. People used to be "shell shocked" when coming back from war & they even went so far as to make light of it in programming, like the TV show SOAP, in example. The more we learned over the years & seeing the effects it actually had on people, a lot times even leading to things like suicide, people started to take it more seriously & it wasn't such a lighthearted topic anymore.

Not to get off PWO but that's actually the opposite of the premise of Carlin's bit, which is that the condition was treated more seriously when it was known as "shell-shock" and not buried under jargon like "post-traumatic stress disorder." The whole bit was an attack on the dishonesty of euphemisms.

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4 hours ago, Johnny Sorrow said:

I am so tired of hearing people on podcasts, especially the Thompson ones, say "We didn't know then what we know now" about CTE or concussions. That's the biggest load of bullshit. I got a severe concussion in 1984 when I was 14 and my doctor told my family and I all about the possible effects and long term concerns. Everyone knew in wrestling and sports, nobody cared.

This week's Broken Skull Sessions on the WWE Network is with Kurt Angle, and it's shocking how lax WWE was about concussions as late as the early '00s. Nothing we didn't already know, but seeing the clips and hearing it all laid out really hammers the point home.

They also missed/ignored a shitload of warning signs about Eddie Guerrero's heart-related health problems.

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Never forget Kerry Von Erich got released when he did because Vince didn't want him to commit suicide while under contract. 

Also Vince was adamant he didn't want an Olympic medalist dying on his watch either, which is why he never brought Angle back until he was convinced Kurt was clean. 

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Man, I can't imagine how much of a social media shitstorm it would be if the Summerslam 1999 match went down the way it did in today's modern climate. It would be Matt Hardy/AEW x50 because of it being the main event of one of WWE's biggest PPVs, and just the optics of Angle being slumped over in the announcers chair, walked back, and then walking back out for the final stretch. 

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On 10/1/2020 at 4:40 PM, Coffey said:

I know there's a Rob Van Dam documentary that goes into his concussions that I'm interested in seeing eventually. I think it also comes up in the Vampiro documentary but I'm a bit more leery to watch that one as he might be one of the biggest liars in wrestling history.

I've seen the RVD documentary.  It's a bit disappointing.  It's partially about his problems with concussions but it's also about his attempts to break into stand-up comedy.  Also. it's just barely an hour long. The kindest way to put it, is that it's obvious that the people who made it weren't experienced documentary filmmakers.

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"Concussions aren't good for you" has been obvious for all time.

"Suffering a second concussion while recovering from a first will exponentially increase the risk of long-term or permanent damage" is a more recent (2000s) finding.

It's particularly relevant to wrestling where the repetition of specific spots (and even entire match sequences several times a week on house show swings) means there was a good shot you'd do something that caused a concussion, suck it up, then go out the next night and do the exact same thing.

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1 hour ago, JNLister said:

"Concussions aren't good for you" has been obvious for all time.

"Suffering a second concussion while recovering from a first will exponentially increase the risk of long-term or permanent damage" is a more recent (2000s) finding.

It's particularly relevant to wrestling where the repetition of specific spots (and even entire match sequences several times a week on house show swings) means there was a good shot you'd do something that caused a concussion, suck it up, then go out the next night and do the exact same thing.

Exactly. The difference between back when we were kids and now is that the evidence back then was mostly anecdotal and common sense based. Its only been in recent years that long term damage has had an official name, guidelines for diagnosing a concussion were formalized, and treatment protocols were established. I've had 6 diagnosed concussions. I bet if I grew up a generation later, that number would be a lot higher. 

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23 hours ago, Coffey said:

Or the Foley/Taker HIAC or the Brock/Angle Wrestlemania match.

There's been a lot of "just tough it out" in the history of wrestling. Definitely not a good look.

Taker had a broken ankle or some other kind of serious leg injury going in to that match, so he had no business climbing to  the top of a cage to begin with. 

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11 hours ago, joeg said:

Exactly. The difference between back when we were kids and now is that the evidence back then was mostly anecdotal and common sense based. Its only been in recent years that long term damage has had an official name, guidelines for diagnosing a concussion were formalized, and treatment protocols were established. I've had 6 diagnosed concussions. I bet if I grew up a generation later, that number would be a lot higher. 

That and even small collisions leading to bigger problems down the line, like they’re finding in youth football.

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Rollerball Rocco is one of my top 10 all-time favorites to watch in WoS, but his stuff as Black Tiger in New Japan doesn't really cut it for me. He had far better matches in the UK against Dynamite Kid, Marty Jones and even Chris Adams than his matches against Tiger Mask, Kantaro Hoshino and Kuniaki Kobayashi. From what I've seen, the most memorable match he had in New Japan was a match where he teamed with Peter Roberts against Tatsumi Fujinami and Gran Hamada and even then that wasn't that great. There's a match he had with Liger in New Japan that I haven't seen yet, but have queued up, but I don't have high expectations for it as they had a match in the UK and it wasn't memorable.

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The family and I just moved into a new house.  When we were packing, I found my old Nintendo 64.  I have WCW/NWO World Tour, WCW/NWO Revenge and No Mercy.  It's been a huge hit with the kids!  Unfortunately, we only have one controller.  I just ordered two more so we can all play.  

Also, I just ordered Virtual Pro Wrestling 2 off ebay.  I'm so excited for it.  The roster is incredible.  Can't wait!

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