Post by paytonisgod on May 24, 2020 20:37:24 GMT -6
Strength is somewhat overrated. In fact one could argue being too strong is a limiting factor in sports. He was strong enough. Strength doesn't keep you from tearing your labrum, it doesn't keep you from getting rolled up on and having a devastating ankle injury that keeps you from having your torn labrum taken care of, it doesn't keep you from getting a foot injury, and it generally won't help you from tearing your adductor.
Kyle Longs deterioration in play is not because he wasn't strong enough. It's because his injuries built on one another. He injured his shoulder, and instead of taking time off he played through it. The body needs to compensate, and because of that he injures his tricep. Because he never had his shoulder fixed he injures his neck and that causes a host of issues. I can speak from experience to that. I have a neck issue where the cervical part of the spine meets the thoracic part of the spine. I've recently lost all strength in my left arm and its atrophied. I've had this issue before on my right side too. It takes a while to work out the issues going on around my spine and in my back and build myself up again. His leg injuries all stem back to his ankle injury. Nothing to do with strength.
Now if you wanted to argue he should have taken more time off to actually heal and thats what you meant by taking care of himself, well then I'd be in agreement with you. I know guys who have "just showed up"...they were no where near as good and no where near as injured either. We had a guy who was a starter and has won two super bowls in his career come to train with us once and during the warm up said to us "You know this is week 1 right? Why you killing us?". He later on went to go train with a guy who trained tennis players. LOL...thats a guy who "just showed up".
Contrast that with someone like Matt Forte who rarely missed any games in a 10 year career where he played like 90% of the offensive snaps. He did everything he could to keep healthy. At one point IIRC he was sleeping in a hyperbaric chamber. Forte is certainly the exception with his level of health but if Long had done even a little bit of that kind of stuff I would bet his career would have been longer and more productive.
*I know you do strength training with athletes for a living so I'm not one to be telling you your job. I'm just explaining my rationale for my observations.