CTE

Wednesday

Kevin Cook

Is flag football the future of the game?

“Where does it stop?” Andy Reid was griping about the NFL’s new kickoff rule. This year, for the first time, players can call for a fair catch on kickoffs short of the end zone, with the play considered a touchback and the ball coming out to the twenty-five-yard line. The rule is meant to reduce concussions on kickoff returns — the most hazardous play in the game, with players often colliding at top speed. “We’ll see how this goes,” said Reid, head coach of the Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs. But he had his doubts. Reid sees kickoffs as a significant “piece” of hard-hitting NFL action. “You don’t want to take too many pieces away, or you’ll be playing flag football.” Travis Kelce went further.

football

Thursday

Matt McDonald

Does Joe Biden have CTE from rugby?

President Biden is being an American tourist in Ireland this week. In comments to the Irish Parliament in Dublin today, the president touted the merits of rugby, a sport in which Ireland is currently the top-ranked side in the world, over the American brand of football. "I'd rather have my children playing rugby now for health reasons than I would have them playing football," the president said. "Fewer people get hurt playing rugby." Biden is a rugby enthusiast, having played while at college at Syracuse. He made a point of video-calling the Ireland men's team after their historic defeat of New Zealand in Chicago in 2021. (In the video, Biden's brother James is sporting an Ireland hat and coat.

joe biden rugby concussion

Tuesday

Kevin Cook

Did Ernest Hemingway have CTE?

It was July 2, 1961. Ernest Hemingway was three weeks shy of his sixty-second birthday. He had been living comfortably in a cabin in Ketchum, Idaho, with his fourth wife, Mary. He liked it there. He liked the hunting and fishing and the clean air. Still he had a plan. That morning he padded to the basement in his pajamas and bathrobe. He unlocked the gun closet. He selected a favorite shotgun, a double-barreled twelve-gauge. He put a shell in each barrel. He put the muzzle of the gun in his mouth. Why pull the trigger now, after so many years of defying death? Eight months earlier he had checked into the Mayo Clinic as “George Saviers,” the name of his elderly doctor in Ketchum.

hemingway