FanPost

PT/Medical Folks...Please Explain the Weird Injuries

I'm one of many posters who never had a brief sniff of pro football, let alone any experience with high-quality, scholarship college football.

I did, however, play with and against many guys who were D1 and D2 scholarship players...and a solid handful who spent meaningful time on NFL practice squads and active rosters at one point or another.

I understand concussions. Back then, a lot of us walked around with them all through camp for two weeks. Every step during conditioning drills felt like a bass drum in your head. Oftentimes, these were the result of close-quarters Oklahoma-style drills. "Run between the pads", which were all of 10 feet apart, ensuring significant contact every single time. Again and again and again in 90 degrees. I "get" concussions.

I also understand contact-related separated shoulders (been there), broken collarbones on skinny high school athletes (been there), shin splints from over-conditioning (been there), and other impact-related ailments such as bruised/broken ribs and broken fingers/hands that got smashed between two bodies.

As I look at the number of odd-looking pro injuries (such as Josh Harris's "foot" injury), torn biceps, torn triceps, Golson's rotator cuff (were you throwing baseballs too much?!), Achilles injuries, etc...these were things that were never seen among high school athletes...and rarely among scholarship-football-playing friends, who were very close to NFL measurables.

PT/Medical folks...what's the deal? Is this the result of guys being 25 instead of 20? Just too big? Fast-twitch vs slow-twitch too out of whack due to positional specificity?

Any positive info and feedback greatly appreciated...I'd love to understand the plethora of weird/random-looking injuries that don't seem to correlate to any movement/collision/action I've ever experienced on a football field.

Thanks!

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