What Kind of Teammate are You?

You gotta figure that I'm around athletes pretty much all day.  In the clinic, on the sidelines, at games and events far and wide.  Because of that, I have the opportunity to observe those same athletes at their best and worst.

At moments when they are frustrated, beaten down, maybe about to give up as well as those moments of elation when it all comes together.  Sort of the old Wide World of Sports mantra "the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat."

I happen to believe that our true characteristics, our basic self comes out during those times.  So I find myself categorizing teammates.  I generally categorize teammates several ways:

1.  The Selfish Ones.  You know the type.  It's all about them.

Oh, they might pay lip service to "team first" and all that but if they don't get their playing time or the ball in their hands or (heaven forbid) be relegated to the bench, then you're going to see their true stripes. 

If they are playing, they might be the ones to yell at others for making a mistake.  If they aren't playing, they're usually sulking.

2.  The "I'm Just Glad To Be Here."  They're not really bad teammates but maybe lack the ambition to be on the field or court when it really matters.  Maybe they just want to be a part of something bigger than themselves.  That's OK.

3.  The Vocal Leader.  There should probably be a couple of subcategories here. 

The Vocal Leader that is always encouraging others is a good one.  You've probably seen them.  They are always upbeat and positive.  You want them on your team.  They can make the game more fun.

And then there's the Vocal Leader that just sort of yells all the time.  Maybe they see themselves as an extension of the coaching staff and assume personal responsibility for things like discipline. 

Quick to criticize others, they just might benefit from a healthy dose of self-inspection.  Or maybe it's all they know--it's how they've been raised or coached in the past.

4.  The One That Makes Everyone Better.  You know the type.  You LOVE playing with them. 

Unselfish maybe to a fault, they are more concerned about helping others and are super low on the selfishness index.  You've seen the point guard that seems to enjoy the great assist more than their own production. 

I think most football lineman could be good candidates for this category.  Their name doesn't get in the newspaper often but they enjoy the clear path they make for the running back or the double team they take so the linebacker can make the tackle.

 5.  The True Leaders.  They lead by example, sometimes not so much by words.  They encourage others.  They make everyone around them better.  They work hard, learn from their mistakes, and admit when they're wrong.

They give the proverbial 100%.  You want to be better because of their unselfish play.  They know completely that together any team is better as a team than they are as a collection of individuals. 

Which one are you?

Religion and Politics

Through the years, people much wiser than me have advised me to stay away from religion and politics in this space.  For the most part, I've heeded that advice. 

I mean, think about it.  What two issues do we have today that seem more divisive?  What generates more passion than religion and politics?

But I've slipped one in here and there. 

This is going to be one of those columns that you can probably make it out to be whatever you want it to be about.  Some may read it as a political statement.  They would be right.

Others may have arrived here, in the Sports Pages, looking for something about sports.  They're probably going to find that too.

Maybe you will see it as a piece on religion.  I guess that's OK too.  We shall see.

This all started with Clemson football coach Dabo Swiney's treatise on Colin Kaepernick's choice of protest.  It was good.  You can find it on YouTube.

It also reminded me that I've seen a lot of things that Coach Swiney talked about.  He mentioned Martin Luther King's dreams for the world.  I remember that speech well.  We knew it was profound as were the events surrounding that speech.

I remember thinking that I didn't see all that prejudice and hate in the world but that's because I was blind.  I remember Jim Crow south, where the black friends in my small hometown had to go to a different school, miles away.  I remember how glad we all were to finally get to attend the same school.

Those were my friends.

Call me old (it's ok...I am) but I've witnessed a lot of things in my lifetime.

I can tell you where I was when we learned of JFK's death.  I remember when the Kent State students were shot.  And the fall of the World Trade Center.

I remember the '69 Mets and Dwight Clark's miraculous Super Bowl catch and Hank Aaron's home run to break the record.   I was living in Memphis when Elvis died.

I remember when Gandhi was a real man and not just a legend.  I was in Neyland Stadium when Billy Graham preached and Richard Nixon politicked. 

I've voted in every presidential election since I've been eligible.  I've won a few and I've lost a few.

But folks, I cannot remember a time when we've been more truly divided than we are in this country today.  About everything.  In today's society, you either agree with me or you are wrong.

I shared a taxi with a Georgia Congressman one time and asked him why politics had gotten so partisan.  He said it was because America had gotten so partisan.  He said that the government was merely a reflection of our country.

We hate people because of the color of their skin.  Because of their religion.  Because of where they live. 

We don't like this group because of their gender or this group because of their sexual orientation or this other group simply because they are different from us.  Goodness gracious, there are people that hate each other because of what school they attend or follow.

I've seen teams run up the score on the other team just because they didn't like the school they represented.

And then you can talk about the presidential election.

Why have we let it get this way?  I think a lot of it is learned from our parents.  Kids brought up color-blind simply see another person when they look at others.  Kids brought up with tolerance possess it in abundance as adults.  Kids taught acceptance learn those lessons well.

Kids that are taught that there are two sides to every argument learn to collaborate and compromise.  Kids that learn that together we are better and stronger become better teammates, spouses, and leaders.

I want to see a world where no one cheers when a kid makes a mistake.  I want to live in a world where we work together for the common good and no one suffers prejudice for being who they are. 

I happen to believe that our best days are still ahead of us.  I pray they are so.

Evidence-based Practice

If you watched much of the Rio Olympics last month, you probably heard a lot of talk about a thing called "cupping."  Michael Phelps was covered with bruises from this thing. 

The other one that seemed all the rage was all the brightly colored tape adorning knees and shoulders. 

Here's the problem with those:  They don't work.   There is no evidence whatsoever that cupping has any benefit on performance or on injury recovery.  None.  Nada. Same thing for all those strips of tape. 

The tape may help with muscle re-education and/or biofeedback but not in competition.

Physical therapy, athletic training, sports medicine, and other disciplines responsible for the health care of athletes have changed.  The last 20 years has seen health care embrace what is called "evidence-based" medicine.

What that means is that the interventions that we use today are based more on things to which there is evidence. 

Let me walk you back to the early days of my career.  Treatment of back pain back in those days almost always consisted of hot packs, ultrasound, massage, and Williams Flexion Exercises.  It's all we knew.

Things have changed.  We have hot packs in my clinics but they are rarely used.  Ultrasound is still around but we know that it has very limited benefits.  Massage helps a lot of things but not a bulging disc.  And Williams Flexion Exercises?  Nobody today even knows what they are.  They didn't work then and they don't work now. 

Research has produced evidence which tells us what will work and what won't.  It is our responsibility to base medical care on that evidence.    I do recognize that to remain on the cutting edge we don't have to be open to trying new things but I also know that without some basis of medical physiology, using these techniques detracts from time better spent on interventions based on evidence, experience, common sense, and science.

So why do all these Olympic athletes resort to all this stuff? 

Olympic athletes are not necessarily professional athletes but they share many of the same characteristics.  To compete at that level, you have to devote everything to your training.  Some, like the NBA players, get paid well to play their sport outside of the Olympic venues.  Others scrape and save and depend on the largesse of others to help them pursue their dreams.

And like athletes everywhere, they will sometimes do anything to succeed at their sport. 

Several years ago, a survey was completed of Olympic athletes.  Basically, they were asked if they would trade two years of their lives for Olympic gold.  An overwhelming number of them said yes.

I defended Lance Armstrong up to the bitter end as the most drug tested athlete in all of sports.  But at the end of the day, he and the entire peloton were using Performance Enhancing Drugs (PED's).

And you don't think that PED's in the NFL is rampant?   Yeah, OK...and I have some ocean front property in Arizona for you.

The fact is that at the highest levels of competition, many athletes are willing to do anything and everything to succeed, including a lot of things that simply don't work.  And maybe too many that are illegal (the fact that Lance and a lot of others didn't get caught for a long time is testimony that those drug tests can be beat).

Maybe there's a placebo effect to it and they get some benefit from that but evidence does not exist to support the use of a lot of these "treatments."

So when you come see me or any responsible health care provider, expect us to use what works--interventions that are backed by the evidence. 

What Made You Smile Today?

This has been a very difficult week around here.  Our community has gone through a lot and has responded heroically.   But my message for today (and yes, there's a message here pretty much every week) is something that you've might not heard yet from all this.

I'll get back to that in a minute.  First I'm going to complain about getting old but not in a way that you might expect.

It just seems that I'm losing a lot of friends lately.  I was away this summer when my buddy Skip Murrin died.  If you never knew Skip, then you missed one of our great personalities.  You had to smile when around The Skipper.

Just this week I got word that Tommy Wilson died suddenly.  A gentle, kind man, we first became friends when we co-coached a T-ball team at Maryville Little League.

Another Blount County resident that you probably didn't know was Dr. Bob Bowman who died a couple of weeks ago.  Dr. Bowman, a renowned orthopedic surgeon, moved here from Jacksonville when he retired.  His gardens and orchards on a ridge near Friendsville were quite something until his health started getting the best of him.

And then there was Officer Moats.

I guess if you live long enough, you're going to see things like this.

Lest you think this is going to continue on a morbid note, let me assure you it is not.  In fact, what I want you to do is to see the joy in life, to smile more, to think about the good things in your own life.

I'm pretty sure that's what friends and family would want you to do.  So let me steal from a variety of sources and offer some questions you should ask yourself each day to help you lead a more positive life and get through tough times.

Did I learn something new today?  You've got to always move forward.  I've always heard that you can't teach an old dog new tricks.  Well this old dog keeps trying to learn new tricks every day.  But you need to carefully cultivate where you search.  Social media and Fox News are not places where you want to go to learn more about life.

Did I make others feel better about themselves in some way?  Maybe this is cliché day but Maya Angelou once said that "people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."

Did I do something good today for somebody and they had no idea where that good something came from?  Those are our greatest gifts.

Do I surround myself with positive people?  I don't want to be around people that are negative all the time.  I want to be around people like Tim Teague, who seems perpetually positive.

Do I allow negative thoughts to dominate my day?  If you are an athlete, you've got to embrace this one.  If one of our kickers misses a kick or a receiver drops a pass, I will often go to them and tell them that the only one that counts is the next one.

I have a really great friend in another state who I overheard talking to her young son one day.  She asked him "what made you smile today."  What a wonderful question (I happen to think she must be a terrific mom too).

So when the burdens of the day seem to weigh you down, when you're grieving or dealing with illness or the many things that we encounter that make life downright hard sometimes, let the legacy of a smile and a kind word from those friends and family that may have passed on be your guide.  Allow that to be their legacy to you.

So, what made YOU smile today?

Anniversary Advice

I haven't talked about it here yet but my wife and I recently celebrated 40 years of marriage.  That was one reason for our trip out west that included Glacier, Yellowstone, and the Grand Tetons.

Forty years.  It hardly seems possible.  We were just kids back then.  And it hardly seems like I should be 40 years old, much having been married to the same person for 40 years. 

All this came up in a conversation about football coaches' wives last week.  A common refrain is that "I'll see you when the season is over."  Around here, that could be December.

Being the spouse of a coach is a tough, thankless job.  A good coach devotes a huge amount of time to their team and has so much focus that they often overlook a lot of other things (like responsibilities at home and family and birthdays and appointments...you get the picture).

But back to that in a minute.

On our way back from that anniversary trip out west, we stopped in a shop in the Atlanta airport during a layover.  The chatty clerk asked us where we had been and then asked us what the purpose of our trip was.

When we told her why we were traveling she asked eagerly what the secret was to staying married for that long.

My wife and I hesitated for only a moment.  The wife went first. 

"Commitment. When we said 'till death do us part,' we meant it."  When the preacher said in good times and bad (sort of), he meant it. 

Before he got married, I told Jeff Fuchs, Pastor at Blount Community Church, it's never 50/50.  I'm pretty sure he remembers that conversation.  And it's not.  You may think it is 90/10 with you on the short side all the time.  It really isn't.

But you want to know what the score really is?  It's if you really, really are committed to that relationship and nurturing it and sustaining it.

What did I say?  "Tolerance."  And I was quick to point out that it was tolerance on the part of my wife. 

We got married while I was still in school.  That was a trial and a tribulation all to itself.  That it was in downtown Memphis made it that much harder.

Then you throw in jobs and kids and starting a practice and all that and...well...I'm not the easiest person to get along with.  My wife took a back seat for a long time to all that. 

I do a lot of things, wear a lot of hats.  I'm gone a lot.  And now that it's football season, I'm gone pretty much all the time.

Yeah...tolerance.  She tolerates my quirks.  She tolerates my obsession with staying fit and healthy.  And she tolerates football season.  Has done so now for 35 football seasons.

So when you happen to find yourself in the presence of the spouse of the spouse of any coach, any sport, tell them thank you.

Thank you for allowing your spouse to be a positive influence on our young folks.  Thank you for giving up your spouse so they can help kids grow up better.  Thank you for your commitment to them.  And thank you for your tolerance

The Tenets of Boy Scout Law

I was walking in to a football game the other day.  On one side was a former football coach.  On the other was the mother of one of the players.  The coach told me "thanks for being here" while the  said Mom said "I always feel better that you're here."

Folks, when that stops being important to me, then I'm going home.  I want to be that person that you trust with the welfare of your children.  That trust is very important to me.

I want to be the person there when they get hurt.   Call it arrogant or whatever you want to but I do believe that I can handle any injury, any crisis.  I want to be trustworthy.

So I was contemplating that word, trustworthy (while riding my bike--this column was actually composed with me on the back of a bicycle) and it made me think back to the Boy Scout Law.

Yes, I was a Boy Scout.  An Eagle Scout actually.  Scouting helped form the person that I am today.

Trustworthy.  Loyal.  Helpful.  Friendly. Courteous. Kind.  Obedient. Cheerful. Thrifty.  Brave.  Clean.  Reverent.

You can read this column any way you want to.  But those words are important to me and many others.  You're in the sports pages so you can make a sports analogy for each of them.  Try it.  It works.

Or you can let them speak to you.  Even today, they speak to me.  I did not need any help remembering those 12 basic tenets of Scouting.

Trustworthy.  OK.  We've already been there.  Worthy of trust.  Says it all.

Loyal.  We are all better people and better citizens when we are part of something bigger than ourselves.  Loyalty to our team.  Loyalty to our family.  Loyalty to our employer.

Helpful.  Sometimes the greatest gift you can give someone is a gift that they have no idea where it came from.  Try it.  And promise to never ever tell them.

Friendly.  Another thing I aspire to is to enter a room and try and make friends of everyone in the room.   Can't always do that but I believe I really try hard to be able to say that I've never met a stranger.

Courteous.  My mom used to have a plaque in her kitchen that said "put sugar in what you say and salt in what you hear."  If you want to diffuse a tense situation, try being polite.  And respectful.

Kind.  I remember another cliché:  Kill 'em with kindness.  Don't forget the Golden Rule.

Obedient.  We all struggle with this one from time to time.  There's a time and place for everything (sorry...another cliché).

Cheerful.  Away from my work, I'm a big hugger.  I can be goofy.   On my bike, I wave at everyone.  My humor runs toward the self-deprecating kind.  I don't smile enough but I do try and have a positive outlook on everything.  Isn't that a better way to spend your day?

Thrifty.  Goodness, wouldn't the federal government benefit from following this one?

Brave.  This one takes many faces.  Brave in the face of adversity.  Brave in the face of disease.  Brave in the face of hardships.  Brave in the face of a worthy opponent.

Clean.  Respect yourself.  Take pride in yourself.

Reverent.  I told the story once before about how my Senior Superlative in high school was Most Dignified.  For most of my life, I wished it had been one of the cool Senior Superlatives like Most Athletic or Best Looking or even Funniest. 

I've grown to be proud of exhibiting dignity and reverence when they are called for. 

I carry these with me every day and have taken all to heart, but the greatest of these for me is probably Trustworthy.

Making Football Safer

If you read the Sports Section as faithfully as I do, you will have noticed a photograph in last Saturday's Daily Times from the football scrimmage between William Blount and Cleveland.

What you may remember is a William Blount player moving in for the tackle using perfect form with his head up.  And you will see the Cleveland player drop his head just at the moment of contact, colliding helmet to helmet with his head down and neck flexed.

Folks, that is the exact formula for catastrophic cervical injury.  The angle for the collision for the ball carrier is the perfect position for producing quadriplegia.

I don't want to disparage the young man or the game of football.  But dropping your head like this at the moment of contact is just simply dangerous.   And against the rules.

The helmet cannot be used as a weapon in the game of football.  That's the rule and violation will likely result in a penalty.  Most often, it's called against a defensive player.  This is clearly a case where the offensive player should be flagged. 

If you stop to think about it, many of the rules in football were created to prevent injuries.  Think about clipping.  And grabbing the facemask. 

Roughing the passer?  Obvious.  Just as the quarterback releases the ball, they are most vulnerable.  So rules were made to protect them.  Same with kickers.

Ricky Upton is an assistant football coach at Maryville High School and Player Safety Coach for the Heads Up Football program. 

Head Up Football is a program developed by USA Football to advance player safety in the game of football.  The Player Safety Coaches are responsible for ensuring their organizations' compliance with core Heads Up Football protocols including coaching certification and conducting safety clinics for coaches, parents, and players. 

I talked to Coach Upton about his work and shared this photograph with him.  "Coaches everywhere teach against this sort of thing.  But kids are kids and they see the big stars and the pro's do this sort of thing and the next thing you know, they're using their heads as a battering ram."

That's why it's important for everybody to buy into the things that make the game of football safer for everyone.  There's no doubt that we've got to make the game safer.  We've learned that concussions aren't something to be taken lightly. 

Don't get me wrong--football is still a great game.  It's the game I played.  It's the game my son played.  I love it dearly and believe that it helps young people to grow up to be good teammates in life (and a thousand other things).

But we've got to make it safer.  The future of the game depends on that.   We have to teach strategies and enforce rules that protect all athletes. 

So remember, Heads Up!ealth and safety protocols, including coaching certification and conducting safety clinics for coaches, parents and players