One second. One second is all that is needed to ruin years and years of dedication, hard-work, and dreams. Just ask Tony Conigliaro. During a one day span, he went from playing for his hometown major league baseball team to lying in a hospital bed wondering if he would ever play baseball again. Tony is just one victim on a long list of professional athletes whose careers and lives were in question after suffering an injury. Sports can bring people together, generate a tremendous amount of excitement, and can be a very rewarding career. However, not many people realize how sports have the potential to devastate athlete’s hopes and dreams, and be an extremely dangerous and life-threatening activity.
When people think of sports, they think of fun, excitement, and comradery. Rarely do they think of sports as a method of ruining lives or goals. The truth of it is, however, that injuries are a major part of most professional sports. According to www.wrongdiagnosis.com, over one million people are injured playing sports a year, or 1 in 260 Americans. There are approximately 86,875 injuries per month, 20,048 per week, 2,856 per day, 119 per hour, and 1 per minute. Most are minor injuries, like a pulled hamstring or sore muscles. Some, however, are major, and have affected the sports world every year. These injuries occur at all levels, whether in high school or in professional leagues. They occur without any warning at all, and can happen to anyone. I’m going to talk to you about three athletes whose lives were flipped upside down in one instant causing their childhood dreams to turn into their worst nightmares.
The first injury occurred on one of football’s biggest stages, Monday Night Football. It’s week 11 of the 1985 season, and the Washington Redskins are hosting one of their fiercest rivals, the New York Giants. Shortly after the start of the second quarter, famous and hugely talented Joe Theisman relayed to his teammates in a huddle that...