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BannedforConcussions-switchschools.pdf
http://www.statnews.com/2016/01/08/concussions-college-football-players/
Reporting from the frontiers of health and medicine
Disqualified after concussions, college football players recruited back onto the field
S P E C I A L R E P O R T
Disqualified after concussions, college football players recruited back onto the field BY D A V I D A R M S T R O N G
J AN UA R Y 8, 201 6
M A T T H E W O R R / S T A T
High Impact: A Quarterback's Struggle With Concussions
SYRACUSE, N.Y. — The play that would be A.J. Long’s last atSyracuse University ended with the sophomore crouched on the field, wracked with pain and
cradling his throbbing head.
The quarterback had suffered his third concussion during a practice in October, when he
collided with a charging defensive lineman who outweighed him by almost 100 pounds.
He awoke the next morning in a fog, unable to tolerate even the dimmest light.
Six days later, Long was told by the school doctor that he was off the team because of his
history of concussions.
“When you hear those words, and it’s the final verdict, it hurts,” Long said.
“He told me some alarming things. Like by the age of 45 there is an increased risk of
dementia.’’
But where Syracuse officials saw grave risk, other colleges saw opportunity. Coaches
from a half-dozen other universities began wooing Long.
His case is not unique. College football players with a history of incapacitating
concussions are allowed to transfer to colleges that will permit them to play, a STAT
investigation has found. This happens even after doctors at one school determine that
the risk to a player’s health is so severe that he should be permanently banned from
contact sports.
“If [you] want to go somewhere else, you can find someone to clear you for virtually
anything,” said Randy Cohen, the head athletic trainer at the University of Arizona. “The
risk assessment for each institution is different.
The National Collegiate Athletic Association sets no limits on the number of permissible
concussions. There’s no medical consensus on how many concussions pose an
intolerable danger to athletes. And colleges, ever on the lookout for talent that will
reap their teams wins and ticket sales, decide on their own when, or if, players should be
medically disqualified.
In interviews with doctors and college officials, STAT found cases in which some players
were permanently sidelined after three or four concussions, while others with as many as
10 concussions were allowed to still play.
Take the striking case of one of Long’s Syracuse teammates, Luke Arciniega. In 2010,
Arciniega was disqualified from the University of Nevada after suffering concussions.
After more than a year away from football, he began playing for a junior college in
California, then moved on to Syracuse. Arciniega suffered another concussion in
October, and Syracuse then barred him from playing there. He is now done with football.
While he has no regrets, Arciniega said in an interview that he worries that his multiple
concussions might haunt him later. “Being disqualified two times in my college career, of
course I think about it,’’ he said. “I think anyone who plays this sport will have
something down the road.’’
There are about 70,000 college football players, and a 2014 report by the NCAA revealed
that nearly 1 in 10 players reported suffering multiple concussions during their college
career. Multiple concussions make athletes vulnerable to long-term brain damage from
the head trauma.
The NCAA’s chief medical officer, Dr. Brian Hainline, said that in his own neurology
practice, he has recommended that athletes stop playing, only to have them seek second
or third opinions from doctors who disagree. “We are not at a place in society generally,
and the NCAA in particular, to state that there is a universal bar that everyone must
adhere to regarding ability to play,” he said.
Once college athletes are disqualified, they receive little guidance about what to do.
Young men like the 19-year-old Long are left on their own to seek additional tests and
evaluations by concussion experts — and to choose whether pursuing their dream of
playing college football is worth jeopardizing their health.
“I was very confused,’’ Long said of the conflicting signals from Syracuse and other
schools about whether he should play. “It all wasn’t making sense.’’
In interviews over the last two months with Long, his family, his teammates, his doctors,
and officials at Syracuse and other colleges, STAT chronicled the twists and dilemmas he
confronted. Ultimately, the sophomore would decide that — no matter what they told
him at Syracuse — he would not give up football, even after his plan was denounced by
his own coach and strangers on social media.
Disqualified players not tracked
The shuffling of players with concussions from one school to another is rarely discussed.
The NCAA, whose football championship game Monday night will draw millions of
viewers, has touted its efforts to limit concussions and improve player safety amid
mounting public concern. It has banned above-the-shoulder hits on defenseless players,
and required schools to follow standard protocols for detecting and treating concussions.
But the NCAA said it doesn’t keep track of medical disqualifications or how many
sidelined players have transferred to play football elsewhere. Most of the schools that
make up the lucrative, upper echelon of college football refused to release even basic
information about disqualifications.
The college football world is dominated by the 65 schools that are members of
the Power Five conferences — the Southeastern, Big Ten, Atlantic Coast, Pac-12, and
Big 12. STAT asked each of the schools in those conferences for the total number of
athletes disqualified in each of the last five years, the sports they played, and the injury
involved.
Only nine universities provided any information. Just two schools — Washington State
University and the University of Illinois — provided all of the data. Most of the
universities said disclosing even aggregate information on medical disqualifications would
violate federal laws on student privacy and the release of medical records.
The lack of information makes it difficult to determine how many players have been able
to continue their college careers elsewhere after being medically disqualified. But using
information from the few schools that disclose disqualifications, STAT identified a half-
dozen athletes playing on other football teams or in the process of moving to other
schools after being medically sidelined.
One of those is another of Long’s former Syracuse teammates, Kyle Knapp, who was
disqualified in 2014 after multiple concussions but will play this year for Western
Michigan University. Former University of Arizona linebacker Dakota Conwell, who was
banned from play in 2013 after suffering multiple concussions, transferred to West
Liberty University in West Virginia, where he has been the starting quarterback the past
two seasons.
But an Arizona teammate of Conwell, disqualified at the same time for concussions,
decided to end his career. C.J. Dozier said he was tempted by an offer from a University
of Oklahoma coach to be evaluated by their doctors, but ultimately concluded that
returning to football would pose too great a risk to his long-term health.
“You have to swallow your pride and give in,” he said. “It’s about your future.”
