Buck might STOP HERE

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 03/04/2010 (5666 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Buck PIERCE is going to play football this season, maybe in Winnipeg or maybe in another city, but he will play.

So will any number of players who, like Pierce, have endured brain trauma during their career, and it raises the question of who decides when a player has had enough.

Pierce says he’s healthy and Bombers GM Joe Mack says he’d never put a player on the field who was at risk. We believe them both. But not all players have the ability to look in the mirror and tell themselves the truth, and not all GMs care to the extent Mack does about the long-term welfare of a player.

“I’m good. I feel healthy and strong and in the best condition I’ve been in a long time,” Pierce said via telephone Friday from Los Angeles. “I’ve received a clean bill of health. When B.C. released me, they understood I was healthy. The concussions, that’s something the media ran with. I took a lot of hits in B.C., but not to the extent the media made it out to be. I played last season after my concussion and I played well.

“There have been no effects since. I need to get out and play and I believe I’ve got a lot of good football left in me.”

The Bombers showed no interest in Pierce upon his release from the B.C. Lions earlier this off-season, citing concern for his health. Reports suggest the club has had a change of heart and the 28-year-old is being courted by as many as three CFL teams, including Winnipeg, as well as three NFL clubs.

“I can’t confirm or deny that,” Pierce said.

“My agent is talking to some people and we’ll let the process play out. I can tell you I think what the people in Winnipeg have done this off-season has impressed me, and I like what coach (Paul) LaPolice did with his quarterbacks in Saskatchewan. That’s an historic franchise with great fans and it’s a great city. Absolutely I’d love to play in Winnipeg if that’s the way things were to work out.”

Pierce says he knows better than anyone about his health and whether he should play football after suffering two concussions last season and as many as five in his pro career.

“Sure, I have a passion and a love for the game and I can’t change the way I play, but I’m also a smart guy and I’m not going to take unnecessary risk,” he said.

Pro sports is about many things, from money to job preservation to ego, but at the core is winning. Winning plows the land, waters the plant and harvests the crop. It also turns drive into blind ambition and distorts many a person’s moral compass.

Mack would not discuss his club’s interest in Pierce.

“When the head is involved, it’s a very delicate situation.” he said. “I will never supersede the advice of doctors or our medical people when it comes to playing a player and putting him at risk.

“You have to be conscious of the health of the player,” Mack said. “You try to make the best decision for the player and the club. And with head injuries, there’s no definitive or comprehensive way of determining when a player shouldn’t play. It’s hazy.”

Mack may be enlightened on the subject, but not all football executives are even close when it comes to an understanding of head injuries and how they should be handled.

“If you took every guy out that was playing with some kind of wobbly head, you’d have half the team off the field,” former Bombers coach Mike Kelly said last summer.

“Anybody that’s ever played the game has been knocked out and gone back in. I know guys that keep smelling salts in their wristbands and sniff it and get their head clear and then go play. It’s a man’s game played by men. That’s what happens.”

Certainly there have been advances in the thinking on holding players out of action after traumatic head hits, but not universally. That’s why there should be legislation that guides a league and doesn’t leave the decision up to a single player, coach or GM.

gary.lawless@freepress.mb.ca