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Tua appears to absorb Back 2 Back concussions vs Buff/Cinci and the NFLPA terminates neurotrauma consultant that cleared him to return (1 Viewer)

rockaction said:
By the way, I am not a doctor. At all. That wasn't by way of definitively correcting ignatius. I just saw a majority of our board just assume he'd had a terrible head injury the week before and I personally thought, "that very well could have been a lower back injury." It was the first thing I thought when I saw the replay and they said "back" and not "head." I knew people would be all over that as if they'd tried to hide it.

I could be totally wrong. It could have been his head. But the way he fell and stumbled is not entirely inconsistent with what I went through with my lower/mid back problems.
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After your back gave out, we're you capable of playing in an NFL game? Not skill side obviously but you know what I mean.
 
rockaction said:
ignatiusjreilly said:
It seems implausible that his stumbling was a result of a back injury.
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I came in to post about this. His stumbling because of his back and falling was completely natural for a lower back injury if you've ever had one. I have. My back completely gave and I just fell to the ground. I've seen it happen in other manual laborers. Back just gives and they're on the ground.

Happens all the time. It's highly unlikely the mouth breathers of the NFLPA aren't aware of this. I'd trust them as far as I trust the owners.

That's all I have to say about this aspect.

It is highly unlikely they got to the independent neurologist and convinced him he was okay to play. The back thing and its plausibility is exactly why Tua was cleared to play.
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It's interesting that some people on here are saying they have had back injuries and this looked totally different, and you're saying it's consistent with your experience. Having never had a back injury, I'm taking no position on the matter. But I definitely appreciate hearing the different perspectives. I also hope the NFLPA will hold the league's feet to the fire on this investigation because the last thing we need is another NFL whitewash a la Daniel Snyder
 
GregR said:
Have just read the articles on it. They indicated a specialist not affiliated with the team cleared him at half time as not having a concussion. He passed all the tests, etc.

Which led me to a thought. Instead of having just a non-affiliated specialist, I think the NFLPA should take full ownership of that part of the process, with full oversight of the non-team specialist who does the evaluation. They choose them, sign off on the tests, etc, and take full responsibility for their decisions.
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Maybe, but is the NFLPA really free of bias? Obviously as a union they have an interest in ensuring player safety, but what if it's Tom Brady? Or the team's union rep? I'm not saying it definitely would be different, just that it might.

Actually, that's one of the questions I'd really like to know the answer to: If it had been the Dolphins special teams gunner as opposed to their starting QB, would he have been less likely to be cleared?
 
moleculo said:
After your back gave out, we're you capable of playing in an NFL game? Not skill side obviously but you know what I mean.
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I actually popped right back into things but was so surprised and startled that I never would have been able to mentally do it. It was weird. And when I went to the doctor and chiropractor, they had majorly different things to say about it.

It was after lifting about twenty of those fifty lb. bags of mulch for my mother. The next day, I just crumpled like a shot when I went to bend over for something. I absolutely hit the floor with a force you wouldn't believe. I was able to get right up after the shock of it and didn't feel much pain. It just totally caved.

That's my experience with it. It may be radically different for other people.
ignatiusjreilly said:
It's interesting that some people on here are saying they have had back injuries and this looked totally different, and you're saying it's consistent with your experience.
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Very much so. That's why I'm qualifying what I say to the nth right now. I thought about it, and backs are so tricky that it could take a team of specialists and they'd all disagree about the cause until serious X-Rays and other things were done. Sounds like Tua had no X-Rays.

I really don't know what to make of all this in all honesty. It seems so shady, but I think I get what the doctors and neurologists were led to believe. I find it hard to believe that the independent neurologist at this game all of the sudden forgot his Hippocratic Oath, but money does all sorts of things, so who knows?

I'm just saying all along that this isn't as cut-and-dried as it looked.
 
Although not convinced of this, for the sake of discussion, I'll concede that what happened in the Bills game was indeed the result of a back injury. This was a back injury that was severe enough to cause instability and buckling to the ground in the immediate aftermath. If player safety is a concern, shouldn't Tua have at the very least gone through imaging and diagnostic tests to examine the back and spinal column before ever being cleared to play again? How does he re-enter that game against Buffalo? I do not know what, if any, tests and/or treatment was done over the few days leading up to the Thursday game. I would hope just as much caution would be taken with a back/spine injury as would be for a head injury. So, concussion possibilities aside, I definitely think Tua should not have been cleared so quickly as to finish the Buffalo game. As for being cleared for the Thursday game, I guess that would depend on what transpired from Monday through Thursday. Head or back, I am not sure decisions being made here were in Tua's best interests.
 
Lots of misinformation and confusion in these threads.
There is three people in the booth looking at literally every play in real time on 10-15 different camera feeds. 2 ATC spotters, and 1 UNC (doctor). The ATC spotters have to log every injury but the UNC is only looking for head/neck injuries. The amount of visual scrutiny on every play is very high. This is in addition to all the people on the field watching the plays and pulling players out for evaluation. The players will also pull themselves out on occasion.

Once a player is identified as needing an evaluation, the only people involved are the team's specific concussion doctor and either the home side or visitor field UNC. There is no other staff from the team or the league making any decisions. There is absolutely no communication between the UNC and the coaching staff. Typically you go to the blue tent and do a "sideline" exam. You can also do this in the locker room for various reasons (like close to the half or end of the game). If the players passes this initial exam they can go back into the game as long as they don't report any red flag symptoms and there is not any "no-go" criteria on the game film. Both the docs review the film in real time on the field before making a decision. Schefter was absolutely wrong in his tweet that the docs didn't look at the film, if they didn't then it is a huge protocol violation.

As far as thursday, the finger stuff is indicative of a head injury, not a spinal injury. He was taken to the hospital and evaluated, they almost certainly did a CT head/cervical spine. If those were clear and his neuro exam is ok, there is no reason to keep him in the hospital. The hospital staff is not going to be influenced by the team to do anything off the books, if anything the hospital overtreats in a situation like this, not undertreats, trust me on that.
 
The game is meant to be played on grass. I have not heard anyone talk about it but you have to think the carpet covered cement they play on in Cincinnati contributed to the severity of the concussion. On monday night Sheppard blows out his knee running on that crap they call a field at Metlife Stadium. The league makes billions of dollars per year. It's an absolute joke that even a single field is not grass. How can the league say they first and foremost care about player safety and then allow them to play on this garbage?
 
Willie Neslon said:
The game is meant to be played on grass. I have not heard anyone talk about it but you have to think the carpet covered cement they play on in Cincinnati contributed to the severity of the concussion. On monday night Sheppard blows out his knee running on that crap they call a field at Metlife Stadium. The league makes billions of dollars per year. It's an absolute joke that even a single field is not grass. How can the league say they first and foremost care about player safety and then allow them to play on this garbage?
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Doesn’t Green Bay play on real grass? Has to be a few. What about Denver? Chiefs?
 
JohnnyU said:
Willie Neslon said:
The game is meant to be played on grass. I have not heard anyone talk about it but you have to think the carpet covered cement they play on in Cincinnati contributed to the severity of the concussion. On monday night Sheppard blows out his knee running on that crap they call a field at Metlife Stadium. The league makes billions of dollars per year. It's an absolute joke that even a single field is not grass. How can the league say they first and foremost care about player safety and then allow them to play on this garbage?
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Doesn’t Green Bay play on real grass? Has to be a few. What about Denver? Chiefs?
Click to expand...
Yeah, those are all grass.
 
ghostguy123 said:
I just watched the Tua vs Bills incident. That........did NOT look like a back issue when he was wobbly, mostly because he looked dazed and wasn't even grabbing at his back, not to mention immediately shaking his head after falling.
I have definitely been wobbly and fallen from lower back pain before, but everything else involved leads me to believe that was NOT a back issue, or at best both a head AND back issue.
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Are you a dr?
 
There is no way in hell they let him in last week if he had a head injury
Not with everything we have seen the last 10 years. And if they did they need to be dealt with
 
GregR said:
Have just read the articles on it. They indicated a specialist not affiliated with the team cleared him at half time as not having a concussion. He passed all the tests, etc.

Which led me to a thought. Instead of having just a non-affiliated specialist, I think the NFLPA should take full ownership of that part of the process, with full oversight of the non-team specialist who does the evaluation. They choose them, sign off on the tests, etc, and take full responsibility for their decisions.
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no way no how is the NFL going to let the player association dictate to them who plays and who doesnt. Im sure the NFLPA would love nothing more.
 
I've seen a few people use the term 'bottom line' about this situation.

Bottom line for me is there's no way he should have played on Thursday after walking on skates on Sunday. You call it a back spasm, I call it a potato. Either way, he should not have played last night and there's no talking around that for me.

Bottom line.
 
osubuckeyeman said:
What are the Dolphins to do? And really no one was crying about this during warmups. I mean no one said a word about it till after the sack last night. Or at least that I saw. I did not see an outcry as to why Tua was even in uniform last night prior to the game.
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I completely agree with this. The problem isn't the with the Dolphins, it's with the league. It absolutely was irresponsible for Tua to be playing 2 games in a five day stretch.... but it was also irresponsible for the other 100 players on the field as well. The league treats these guys like replaceable widgets and the fans don't really care enough to be heard unless there's a sex related angle off the field.

It's understandable that you become an NFL owner by worshipping money at all costs so I don't even blame the greedy owners nearly as much as the fans to be honest. During the negotiations of the last CBA I suggested that the league should limit players to no more than 3 games a month based on everything we already know about head trauma. Maybe you have to start the season in the middle of August. Or play the SB on the last Sunday of February instead of the beginning of February. Or both. Who cares? The number of fans that whined, "Well I have a really important trip I take every Labor Day weekend and.........". JFC. Well you can still wear your blood splattered Junior Seau jersey to your "REALLY IMPORTANT" Labor Day weekend trip and just stream the game when you get home.

Until fans care about the issue good luck if you are waiting for the owners to take meaningful steps to protect the players. And by meaningful I don't mean throwing more flags. I mean steps that actually cost the owners something. All this "concern" for player safety from the fans and media rings more than a little hollow to me. We'll see if the media follows this Tua concussion story as breathlessly as they do an ejaculation story for 18 months. Fans care right up until the season starting a couple of weeks sooner allowing the players to recover "ruins" one weekend for them. It's pretty gross and they should be better than that. I expect the owners to be gross. If Tua played for the Cowboys I'm sure Dr. Jerry Jones would expect him to be at practice on Monday.
 
need2know said:
There is no way in hell they let him in last week if he had a head injury
Not with everything we have seen the last 10 years. And if they did they need to be dealt with
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Hey, that's what I assumed in week 3. It looked to me like Tua was obviously concussed, but I figured it was more likely that it was just a really weird back injury than that a team would downplay a concussion in the year of our Lord 2022.

We should all update those beliefs after what we saw on Thursday. It's a lot more likely that either a) somebody violated the concussion protocol in week 3 and/or b) somebody seriously misdiagnosed Tua in week 3. The "back" thing isn't very credible at this point.
 
IvanKaramazov said:
need2know said:
There is no way in hell they let him in last week if he had a head injury
Not with everything we have seen the last 10 years. And if they did they need to be dealt with
Click to expand...
Hey, that's what I assumed in week 3. It looked to me like Tua was obviously concussed, but I figured it was more likely that it was just a really weird back injury than that a team would downplay a concussion in the year of our Lord 2022.

We should all update those beliefs after what we saw on Thursday. It's a lot more likely that either a) somebody violated the concussion protocol in week 3 and/or b) somebody seriously misdiagnosed Tua in week 3. The "back" thing isn't very credible at this point.
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McDaniel repeated "back" many times at his press conference yesterday describing the Sunday game vs Buffalo
 
Not really sure what everyone is looking for / hoping for here, but this thread is silly if you take the dolphins' position at face value:

Bills Game:

Tua gets hit and goes down. He is immediately taken into the locker room to be assessed for a head injury. The Dolphins doctor and the independent doctor do not find a concussion and Tua informs them that it is his back that is hurting, not his head. He goes back out in the second half and shows no ill effects of the injury. People get their panties in a bunch bc we have a lot of Facebook degree doctors these days.

The Days leading up to the Bengals game: Tua shows no signs of a brain injury, but is questionable bc of his back/ankle. He is assessed by the medical staff every day for this and possible concussion effects. He passes all of those tests and makes it onto the field Thursday night.

MEANWHILE: The Dolphins are 3-0. They are also 3-0 in their conference and 2-0 in their division. The Bengals game isn't "meaningless" but Dolphins could half *** it in this game, Lose, and still start the season better than even the most optimistic Dolphin fan could have hoped. There is no reason to start Tua unless he is showing no signs. Guess what, he isn't.

Bengals Game: Tua doing just fine. Did get a call on a late hit where he was bent weird and 2 plays later he holds the ball too long and the incident occurs.

Since then: Blame to go around. Pitchforks out. yada yada yada. Much like everything else in the game of Football, things are open to interpretation. I do not believe in the limited sample size f Mike McDaniel as head coach that he would put his players health in danger to win a game. I think the doctors who checked Tua both in miami and cinci likely know a little more about these type of injuries than you or I. I will say (as a Doctor), sometimes you do the "math"" on symptoms and findings and come up with a wrong answer that only gets corrected after more findings or information come into play.

With that said: Tua likely did hurt his head last week in Miami, but not "enough" to fail the cognitive testing. He rallied throughout the week and seemed fine in the game UNTIL another hit to the head occurred. He is now in the protocol bc he is showing symptoms synonymous with a head injury. When those symptoms clear he will likely be back on the field until it happens to him again. Is he more at risk now than say 15 days ago before this happened, sure, and it likely will affect his career going forward (both in terms of the player himself and the contracts he garners in the future)
 
This is going to turn into a massive s###show. Huge repercussions, and likely significant changes to the concussion protocol in the off-season, if not earlier.
 
Steve Tasker said:
Marcel Louis-Jacques saying there were "several mistakes" in the evaluation.
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I like MLJ, but I was really disappointed with his reporting on this last week. All he did was parrot what the team was saying and never seemed to express any skepticism about what occurred. Shame on him for not pressing on this sooner. Maybe if the local media guys had been pushing and asking the right questions sooner, the mistakes would have been found out and Tua wouldn’t have played.
 
Just another source for the fired Doc:

www.espn.com

Source: Doctor who evaluated Tagovailoa fired

The unaffiliated neurotrauma consultant involved in clearing Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa during Sunday's game against the Bills has been fired after it was found he made "several mistakes" in his evaluation, a league source told ESPN.
www.espn.com www.espn.com
 
I think it's naive to think that there still isn't enormous pressure on the independent doctors to clear these guys unless they're absolutely sure. Yea - it's their call - but with millions and millions of dollars literally on the line on these calls, there is no way they feel empowered to err on the side of caution.
 
Chaka said:
IvanKaramazov said:
The NFL Players Association has terminated the unaffiliated neurotrauma consultant involved in Tua Tagovailoa's concussion check last Sunday, as
@ProFootballTalk
said. Both the UNC and the #Dolphins team physician were interviewed Friday, per source. Investigation ongoing.
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Wave goodbye to the horse on your way out Mr. Barn Door.
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Don't let the door hit you where the Good Lord split you!
 
ignatiusjreilly said:
raidersraidersraiders said:
I think the people who hire these doctors know exactly who they are hiring and are now trying to scapegoat.
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I think it will be very interesting to find out whether this was “The doctors screwed up” vs. “The doctors did what they were supposed to do but the system is screwed up”. Could be a little of both
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Pretty sure it will follow the other Golden Rule. He who has the gold makes the rules.
 
Tua probably lied to the UNC about the back injury and it's relationship to his "gross motor instability." I wouldn't blame him if that were the case.
 
SoBeDad said:
Tua probably lied to the UNC about the back injury and it's relationship to his "gross motor instability." I wouldn't blame him if that were the case.
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You can't lie or fake your way out of concussion symptoms. Anyone who has any sort of head trauma and then stumbles the way he did should be evaluated for a concussion, regardless of their insistence that they are okay.

There's really no excuse whatsoever.
 
ATB said:
SoBeDad said:
Tua probably lied to the UNC about the back injury and it's relationship to his "gross motor instability." I wouldn't blame him if that were the case.
Click to expand...
You can't lie or fake your way out of concussion symptoms. Anyone who has any sort of head trauma and then stumbles the way he did should be evaluated for a concussion, regardless of their insistence that they are okay.

There's really no excuse whatsoever.
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Tua: Doc, I had an excruciating pain in my back on that sack, which nearly caused me to black out.
DOC: OK, let's do an xray of your back. And BTW, where are you, what's today's date, and what was the score of the game when you got sacked?

Based on the Dolphin's line, I think there would have to be evidence of an xray of Tua's back. And notes about a concussion evaluation.

Worse case for Miami: coach MM was involved and he gets fired. I like him, but is there another example of such a close relationship between a coach and his players?
 
ATB said:
SoBeDad said:
Tua probably lied to the UNC about the back injury and it's relationship to his "gross motor instability." I wouldn't blame him if that were the case.
Click to expand...
You can't lie or fake your way out of concussion symptoms. Anyone who has any sort of head trauma and then stumbles the way he did should be evaluated for a concussion, regardless of their insistence that they are okay.

There's really no excuse whatsoever.
Click to expand...

He was evaluated for a concussion. He passed, presumably the full test, but at least the sideline exam.

I can almost guarantee that Tua came off the field immediately saying "my head is fine, it's my back". Clearly, you have to factor into the evaluation what the player says is his symptoms. My issue is that the film shows gross motor instability, so one could/should argue that the player gets pulled regardless of what he says and even if the exam is ok.
 
Seems like they're pinning it to the loophole that lets a "No-Go" condition of "gross motor instability" not count as an immediate failing of the protocol.

It's impossible to read in this version of the checklist, but there's an asterisk to the gross motor instability that says: "*Determined by team physician, in consultation with the UNC, to be neurologically caused." If Tua keeps insisting it's his back, easy to see how there's wiggle room for passing the protocol when you shouldn't have.
 
-jb- said:
raidersraidersraiders said:
I think the people who hire these doctors know exactly who they are hiring and are now trying to scapegoat.
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100% scapegoat. So much so, that I even think that’s why they have the “independent” “consultant” in place. Protect the shield.

“Wasn’t our guys.”
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Agree this dude is a scape 🐐, I read today that it’s ultimately up to team doctors.

This is far from over.
 
growlers said:
My issue is that the film shows gross motor instability, so one could/should argue that the player gets pulled regardless of what he says and even if the exam is ok.
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That’s the part that’s preposterous. They do an eval and make the call, like the thing everyone just saw was the mulligan.

“Ok, well he was just stumbling around like a drunken sailor after that hit, but he said he was ok on the sidelines, and said it’s his back. Out ya go, and good luck, kid!”

Absolutely should have made the call based on the actions on the field. Independant observer should be like “that’s it. Out.”

Watching replays I can’t imagine why that wasn’t the case by the Miami training staff.
 
I keep seeing that Tua is too small to play Qb in the league. But I see his weight is that of the average league quarterback.
 
I do believe he had a concussion in the Buffalo game. My son played QB and he took a similar hit when he hit the ground on the back of his head. He lost the rest of his junior season. The doctor he saw described concussions and they aren’t things to mess around with.
 
growlers said:
ATB said:
SoBeDad said:
Tua probably lied to the UNC about the back injury and it's relationship to his "gross motor instability." I wouldn't blame him if that were the case.
Click to expand...
You can't lie or fake your way out of concussion symptoms. Anyone who has any sort of head trauma and then stumbles the way he did should be evaluated for a concussion, regardless of their insistence that they are okay.

There's really no excuse whatsoever.
Click to expand...

He was evaluated for a concussion. He passed, presumably the full test, but at least the sideline exam.

I can almost guarantee that Tua came off the field immediately saying "my head is fine, it's my back". Clearly, you have to factor into the evaluation what the player says is his symptoms. My issue is that the film shows gross motor instability, so one could/should argue that the player gets pulled regardless of what he says and even if the exam is ok.
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Of course. And the independent doctor almost certainly knows he's not supposed to err on the side of caution. If there's doubt, you send the multi-million dollar product back onto the field.
 
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