You start on your own five-yard line, and drive all the way down the field—fifteen, eighteen plays in a row sometimes. Every play: collision, collision, collision. By the time you get to the other end of the field, you’re seeing spots. You feel like you are going to black out. Literally, these white explosions—boom, boom, boom—lights getting dimmer and brighter, dimmer and brighter.
Former NFL lineman Kyle Turley, explaining what it felt like on the field after a tough hit, in Malcolm Gladwell’s 2009 New Yorker piece, “Offensive Play.” On today’s Fresh Air, we’re going to be talking about brain injuries, concussions and contact sports. (via nprfreshair)

The ugly reality of the #NFL for linemen. #BloodSport? Jr has been told he’s never playing organized American football because of the injury risks (particularly brain trauma)…even though he’s a very good playground wide receiver - fast, good hand.

I wonder when the sport will be dramatically changed for player safety or marginalized (think boxing…which was MASSIVE through the 80s and is now marginalized).

(via nprfreshair)

20.01.11
14
#nfl #blood sport #brain trauma #boxing
My thoughts are with Smokin’ Joe Frazier and his family.  via shortformblog: Iconic boxer Joe Frazier in hospice with liver cancer: The famous foe of Muhammad Ali, a former heavyweight champion, was diagnosed with cancer last month, according to his manager. source Follow ShortFormBlog

My thoughts are with Smokin’ Joe Frazier and his family. 

via shortformblog:

Iconic boxer Joe Frazier in hospice with liver cancer: The famous foe of Muhammad Ali, a former heavyweight champion, was diagnosed with cancer last month, according to his manager. source

Follow ShortFormBlog

(Source: shortformblog)

05.11.11
17
#boxers #boxing #hospice #joe frazier #muhammad ali #Smokin' Joe Frazier

RIP Smokin’ Joe Frazier

When I was a kid, boxing was a LARGE, vibrant, world-wide sport and not at all the sad pathetic sham it is today. It was epic. Heavyweight title matches were bigger than the NFL’s Super Bowl. And the heavyweights were ruled by Ali, Frazier, & Foreman. Ali and Smokin’ Joe were my heroes.

Frazier and Ali had a complicated history. Frazier helped out Ali financially when Ali was banned from boxing for refusing to fight in Vietnam. Frazier was the force that pushed for the first of their three beyond epic fights. The story goes Frazier held a massive grudge for Ali’s promotional showboating, verbal abuse, and for never recognizing his help.

But those fights…oh they were brutally glorious. Ali-Frazier I (The Fight of the Century) in Madison Square Garden was a pop culture event (Frank Sinatra shot photos of the fight for LIFE Magazine)…and Joe knocked down Ali and won the fight on a decision (and spent two weeks in the hospital recovering). Watch it here on YouTube.

In Ali-Frazier II, Ali was danced quickly landing punches in combos in the early rounds before trading punch for punch with Joe in the later rounds. ABC TV’s Howard Cosell hyped and called the fight. Ali won. Watch it here on YouTube. 

That set up the utterly EPIC “Thilla In Manilla” where both fighters absolutely fought themselves to the verge of collapse. Watch it here on YouTube. After the 14th round, Frazier’s trainers worried about his health wouldn’t let him go out for the 15th round. Ali briefly celebrated his TKO and then actually collapsed in the ring.  

Whoa. It still gets me all these years later.

It’s good to hear that Frazier and Ali reconciled before Joe died. 

RIP Smokin’ Joe. RIP. 

08.11.11
30
#Smokin' Joe Frazier #Joe Frazier #Philadelphia #Ali #Muhammad Ali #Boxing #Sweet Science #Thrilla In Manilla #Ali-Frazier I #Madison Square Garden #Ali-Frazier II #The Fight of the Century #Heavyweight Champion of the World #epic #sports
via kateoplis: 1944-2011

via kateoplis:

1944-2011

08.11.11
1784
#for dad #Joe Frazier #vintage #Muhammad Ali #Boxing #Sweet Science #Sports
Remembering Smokin’ Joe Frazier…Watching Ali-Frazier I online…just #Amazing ~ Burt Lancaster was a color commentator between rounds, “Joe is just murder.” #boxing #SweetScience #MadisonSquareGarden #NYC (Taken with instagram)

Remembering Smokin’ Joe Frazier…Watching Ali-Frazier I online…just #Amazing ~ Burt Lancaster was a color commentator between rounds, “Joe is just murder.” #boxing #SweetScience #MadisonSquareGarden #NYC (Taken with instagram)

09.11.11
1
#madisonsquaregarden #nyc #amazing #boxing #sweetscience

Love what you do. 

This is so NY and why I miss New Yorkers. #Brooklyn yo!

31.05.12
#Eric Kelly #NYC #NY #Work #Life #New Yorkers #Boxing #Animal #Brooklyn #Brooklyn In Austin

The Greatest in the prime of his career…goes. to. Mars. #dope

via storyboard:

Muhammad Ali Goes to Mars: The Lost Interview

It was in the summer of 1966 when a star-struck 17-year-old set out to interview his idol: Muhammad Ali. Twenty miles from the South Side of Chicago, in Glencoe, Ill., Michael Aisner was calling repeatedly to the gym where the boxing champ was training. Finally, a man named Mr. Shabazz — Jeremiah Shabazz, perhaps? The man who introduced Ali to Islam? — picked up.

“Where are you from?” Shabazz asked the boy.

“I’m from WNTH, a high school radio station,” Aisner said.

“The champ doesn’t have time to talk,” he told him.

Aisner called back two days later. And then two days after that.

“Can I interview the champ?” he asked again.

Finally, Shabazz relented.

“Ok,” he said. “The champ will meet you.”

Read More

18.09.12
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#animation #blank on blank #boxing #chicago #david gerlach #history #jessica bennett #journalism #michael aisner #muhammad ali #radio #sports #storyoard #video #sky dylan robbins