If you're a professional athlete and you injure another player with a violent action, there aren't too many excuses you can use for your behaviour. You can't plead "Not Guilty" because EVERYBODY saw it - and they probably saw it in slow motion replay a hundred times afterwards too. And you can't plead "Insanity" if you want to keep your job - nobody wants a crazy person running loose on the sporting surface. So, the athletes typically suck it up and make a teary apology in a press conference the day after.
That is, until now. It looks like athletes could soon be using "Temporary Blackouts" as an excuse for their violent behaviour. The Vancouver Sun reported last week that Dr. Brian Hunt, a respected North Vancouver neurologist, believes that often times in sports incidents the attacker was himself concussed, which is why many pro athletes are sometimes prone to erratic behaviour. He uses the Marty McSorely of the Boston Bruins hit on the Vancouver Canucks' Donald Brashear as an example. He says:
"Earlier in the game, Brashear had really clocked him [in a fight]. The shaking and jarring of the brain affected McSorely. He was partly brain damaged."
Poor Bert (you may recall the infamous Todd Bertuzzi hit on Steve Moore in the Vancouver-Colorado in 2004). If only he had met Dr. Hunt while he was here in Van. All he had to say was that he had scrambled brains and he may have been able to avoid his lost salary (during his suspension), lost endorsements, thousands in lawyer fees...and that horrible sobbing press conference apology.
