I love movies. I love baseball. An obvious conclusion? I've seen all of the movies in the Major League series multiple times. Not always the most baseball accurate films (Eddie Harris' pitching mechanics MIGHT get the ball to the plate) they are quotable, hilarious and have withstood the test of time so far. My roommate in college would constantly hit me with one of Harry Doyle (Bob Uecker) or Rube Baker's quotes. The other night, I put the original on before bed. An hour and 45 minutes later, there was a smile on my face and a ton of excitement for baseball season to be here. Like I said, I've seen these movies countless times so I knew everything that was in there but this time I did happen to notice there are quite a few instances of an Athletic Trainer making an appearance or times when an Athletic Trainer is needed. Let's take a look at a few...
As we all know, Charlie Sheen is a stand up guy and a moral citizen. He'd never do anything to end up in jail... ummm.... However, his character Rick "Wild Thing" Vaughn was signed from the California Penal League and is having a little problem controlling his high 90s fastball. Just as he is about to be sent down, manager Lou Brown stumbles upon the source of this problem. Rick has horrible vision.
Willie Mays Hayes might have a point, but they do solve Rick's control issue. While a yellow legal pad with 4 letters scribbled on it got the job done here, it's not the most scientific approach to determining an athlete's visual acuity. What they need here is a Snellen eye chart. Most Athletic Training rooms have one of these and the lucky ATC's can book a same day appointment with an optometrist or ophthalmologist. Sometimes we might not have the best facilities or may be traveling and might need to come up with our own solution similar to Lou. There is a chart for making your own Snellen eye chart based on the height of the letters and the correlating distance. You can find that grid many places, including here.
Continuing with the Wild Thing example, think about this. We should always be searching for and treating the cause of problems. Yes it is important to break the pain cycle and treat the symptoms but that won't solve the problem. In the real world, before the vision problem was found, this athlete's pitch counts would be exceptionally high due to throwing so many balls. He probably wouldn't stay in the game long, but these Indians were a sad bunch so maybe that's not true. The Athletic Trainer would likely have been seeing Rick about some overuse conditions soon. You might not think that poor eyesight could cause shoulder or elbow problems but it is our job to find the cause, no matter how unrelated or bizarre it may seem.
I had one pitcher who came to me early in his time with this team complaining of diffuse shoulder pain. This particular exam revealed a lot. Poor posture and upper cross syndrome were present. Positive Hawkins-Kennedy and Impingement sign tests were elicited. Manual Muscle Tests revealed weakness in most planes. Already this seemed a daunting rehab but I jumped right in and began postural correction exercises, scapular stabilizing and rotator cuff strengthening programs. In my excitement to get started tackling all of these problems, I forgot to truly figure out the cause. Being a former pitcher myself, I've had lots of training regarding pitching mechanics and its intricacies. After watching this young man throw, it appeared to me that he was rushing and was inconsistent at his balance point. I had him do some basic single leg stands which showed incredibly poor balance. After working with the pitching coach to correct and fine tune his throwing mechanics and correcting his other issues with me, he went on to have some success and remained healthy.
Let's take a look at one more clip for today. As I mentioned before, there are a lot of these little instances in these film (including one where they mount an outboard boat motor in a whirlpool. not safe but funny) This article would be too lengthy to go over them all so I'll hit the one that covers the hot topic of 2010 and continuing into 2011, concussions.
While no research will show voodoo magic as a cause of concussion, 'tis very bad to steel Jobu's rum. 'Tis very bad.
This weekend featured a couple of all star games. We had the laughable NFL Pro Bowl and the NHL All-Star Game. Defense was not present much in either game. Unfortunately, the NHL's biggest star, Sidney Crosby, wasn't present at all. Crosby is still recovering from a concussion. This NFL season brought a lot of attention to the issue and now Crosby's All-Star absence is making the NHL pay more attention as well. Athletic Trainers and Team Physicians have been paying attention to these serious injuries for a lot longer.
There is a lot of attention and new research into concussion right now. I'd say that most ATCs are keeping a close eye on this and some are doing the research themselves. There were two such articles in the latest edition of the Journal of Athletic Training. As important the research is, I think that most of our focus should be on properly dealing with the concussions that we could see at any moment while on the job. While this article isn't here to rehash evaluation protocols, knowing your concussion evaluation protocol is a must. Hopefully it entails more than a bag of ice on the head like our friend Eddie Harris.
At the PBATS conference in January, I got to see a good presentation on emergency care. Richie Bancells, the Orioles Head Athletic Trainer touched on some generalities and some of the new equipment they had. His focus was on being prepared though. He reiterated several times the importance of practicing your emergency action plans and taking an honest look at what your strengths and weaknesses are. I'd like to convey that here as well. Take out your concussion evaluation form tonight and look it over. Go through it in your head a few times and even ask the questions out loud. Make some changes if necessary. I will be doing the same.
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