The NHL needs to talk about concussions. Now. Everyone now knows the link between repeated head trauma and CTE. We have been hearing about it for years with the NFL. They tried to run from it and they couldn’t.
In 2015 Will Smith starred in the movie Concussion where he plays Dr. Bennet Omalu, who was the first person to publish findings of CTE and how many NFL players suffer from it at the end of their career. Say what you want about the movie, but it definitely painted a good picture of just how shady the NFL is. Luckily in recent years they have been facing a ton of backlash about their denial of the link between repeated blows to the head and CTE.
It seems obvious doesn’t it? Of course repeated blows to the head are going to affect you long term. So why does the NHL continue to deny it? They don’t have nearly the following of the NFL and because of that they haven’t faced as much scrutiny.
In May of 2015 Boston Bruins owner, Jeremy Jacobs asked if he has ever heard of CTE. His reply, “no.” He was then asked if he knew about CTE being found in the brains of former NFL players. His reply, “I don’t know.” How can Jacobs sit there and claim that he has never heard of CTE when his own team employed Marc Savard, whose career was literally ended by a blow to the head? I think the answer is simple. The NHL is choosing to look the other way. They care about the product and not about the players. The same way the NFL does.
Recently I watched a video on The Player’s Tribune of Daniel Carcillo, who at 33 years old was forced to retire from the NHL because of the number of concussions he received. One of the most telling parts of the video was when Carcillo stated that he would give up everything, his Stanley Cups and his entire career to not have the concussion problems he has now.
In 2013 ten former players filed a lawsuit against the NHL claiming that the league purposely hid the dangers of concussions from the players. In 2016 NHL commissioner, Gary Bettman again denied the link between concussions and CTE, even going as far to say, “a causal link between concussions and CTE has not been demonstrated.” Bettman gets booed every year when he presents the Stanley Cup. Never stop booing him. He deserves it.
I’m ashamed that my team, the Boston Bruins, has such a horrible owner in Jacobs. Patrice Bergeron is going to feel the effects of his hockey career for the rest of his life and it’s a shame that the owner of his team denies that.
So what should the NHL do? Carcillo states the best thing that can be done is to have actual brain treatment centers opened for NHL players to get properly diagnosed by a neurologist and not by an athletic therapist or orthopedic surgeon, which is the NHL's current process.
So, I’ll say it again. The NHL needs to talk about concussions. Now. The link for Carcillo’s video can be found below.
https://www.theplayerstribune.com/en-us/videos/daniel-carcillo-head-trauma
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