{"id":21336,"date":"2013-08-12T21:16:25","date_gmt":"2013-08-13T01:16:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jetnation.com\/?p=21336"},"modified":"2022-04-01T04:43:17","modified_gmt":"2022-04-01T08:43:17","slug":"joe-mcknights-head-injury-may-be-worse-than-you-think","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/2013\/08\/12\/joe-mcknights-head-injury-may-be-worse-than-you-think\/","title":{"rendered":"Joe McKnight’s Head Injury May be Worse than You Think"},"content":{"rendered":"

Joe McKnight has had his issues of staying healthy over the course of his brief three-year career.\u00a0 His first training camp, McKnight failed to come into camp in shape and thus, failed his physical.\u00a0 After he passed, he quickly became one of the better kick return specialists in the NFL, returning 2 for touchdowns (100 yards and 107 yards<\/a>) and has averaged 29 yards per return.<\/p>\n

However, this season McKnight failed his physical again.\u00a0 After finally being allowed to participate in practice, he suffered a “head injury” as coaches and front office executives would describe it.\u00a0 He has been limited in practice ever since.\u00a0 Is this really just post concussion protocol as written in the NFL’s policy on concussions <\/a>or is this something more severe? The answer\u00a0to that question\u00a0may be troubling to most fans.\u00a0 As a certified trainer, I will give you my feelings on McKnight’s injury and his potential future with the New York Jets.<\/p>\n

A concussion occurs when a force causes by an impact on the head that happens below the skull whent he brain hits the inner bones of the skull and richochets to the other side.\u00a0 In severe cases, the brain may actually twist\u00a0when it is\u00a0rebounding off the inner wall of the skull.\u00a0 In these types of severe concussions, the brain swells causing pressure to be placed on the spinal cord and brain stem.\u00a0 The brain stem is largely responsible for breathing, walking and other life functions.<\/p>\n

The word commonly used for severe head injurys is “Traumatic Brain Injury.”\u00a0 This occurs because the force of a sudden impact creates that ricochet of the brain and can cause bleeding, bruising, and oftentimes nerve damage.\u00a0 According to Medical News Today,<\/a> 2 million adults and children suffer from a traumatic brain injury per year.<\/p>\n

There are many different levels of Traumatic Brain Injury that can be diagnosed.\u00a0 A mild T.B.I<\/a>. would have symptoms such as, confusion, blurred vision, headaches, dizziness and problems focusing.\u00a0 A moderate to severe T.B.I.<\/a> can include symptoms like, agitation\/confrontational, continuous headache, persistent\u00a0vomiting,\u00a0weakness in arms and legs, and coordination problems.<\/p>\n

Recently, it has been reported that McKnight was “rude” or “standoff-ish” to the media, which could be out of frustration or agitation.\u00a0 He was confrontational to the point where media members were tearing into him for not speaking enough about his injury.\u00a0 As recently as this morning’s practice McKnight was walking to the practice field when he fell to a knee several times.\u00a0 A trainer brought him fluids and a garbage can in case of vomiting.\u00a0 Coordination issues, weakness in legs, fatigue and vomiting sounds more like a moderate to severe T.B.I. to me.<\/p>\n

I am not a doctor so I won’t diagnose Joe McKnight, however, I can formulate an opinion that his head injury is indeed traumatic and is in the moderate to severe level.\u00a0 The Jets are not speaking on this matter, labeling it simply as a “head injury.”\u00a0 The media should not be making jokes about this or trying to make light of this situation.\u00a0 I’m sure the team doctors are going to continue to keep an eye on McKnight in the upcoming days and weeks and monitor his progress or regress.\u00a0 The NFL has become very strict in their concussion policy for players, and with an injury as severe as I feel McKnight has, the Jets must do everything in their power to protect the player.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Joe McKnight has had his issues of staying healthy over the course of his brief three-year career.\u00a0 His first training camp, McKnight failed to come into camp in shape and thus, failed his physical.\u00a0 After he passed, he quickly became one of the better kick return specialists in the NFL, returning 2 for touchdowns (100 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":4566,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1337,213],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-21336","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-home-slider","8":"category-jet-news"},"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/mcknight.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peLffi-5y8","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21336","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21336"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21336\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21338,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21336\/revisions\/21338"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4566"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}