As athletes move on with their careers, we realize that there are many injuries that they can come by. Some can so much as end an athlete’s career while some have a smaller recovery time. Knowing there are some that we can prevent but some that will just happen out of no where. Obviously seeing an athlete get injured is terrible because it is what they live for and put their bodies out there day in and day out. Certain injuries are more popular in different sports. Finding that there are many processes that we can choose to go through to get better in each case. Many procedures such as surgery, physical therapy, or rest or icing. All injuries differ in their own ways. If we zero in to a certain sport like baseball, we’ll find one of the hardest injuries and something that happens to a lot of pitchers. The injury is called Tommy John, or a UCL tear which is the ligament inside the elbow in which holds the arm together from the inside. Many will strive to see the surgery be performed before the injury comes around. A lot of people think that the name Tommy John came from a doctor that performed the first surgery and not that it came from a pitcher in which had the injury first. An article from fox sports points out a few good things inside. They say “a lot of young players have become more reckless because they figure they can always get Tommy John surgery, but also fifteen percent of people lack the tendon that’s most commonly used to repair the damaged ligament.” This means that kids are pitching their arms out when they are young without the fear of getting hurt because they think that they can just get the surgery but in some cases, they may not even have the ligament needed to perform the surgery. Kids can not go out there thinking that it is ok to get hurt because they can just have it it fixed. People don’t understand that we should never want to fix what is not broken and especially not on the human body.
Why would someone want to be operated on if they do not have an injury? Nothing says that the injury is going to happen, but the way youth baseball is going, we can guess that it is more common. Some studies show that getting the surgery brings pitchers back stronger then they ever were because the support in the elbow is so strong that it is basically adding another spring into the elbow which helps throw harder. Many myths that people are told and believe which are stated in an article by Mike Reinold and they come in the following,”Everyone Returns From Tommy John Surgery, There are No Complications with Tommy John Surgery, Recovery From Tommy John Surgery is Quick and Easy, Velocity Improves After Tommy John Surgery, and All Tommy John Rehabilitation is the Same.” These 5 myths are common reasons why everyone thinks that it is ok to get hurt and get this surgery. In some cases, people do say that the surgery should be performed before an injury is occurred. Reasons why this is not a good idea include the following:
Surgery is always something to be afraid of because no one wants to be knocked out and cut open to fix something that is not necessary. Surgery is not always safe, there are times when people get infections, sometimes nerve injuries can happen, and sometimes Chronic Regional Pain System. This is something that usually happens to a limb after an injury is occurred where pain is always inflected. That is a first reason why we should not be having the surgery done if there is no reason to. Number two, if an athlete is on their way and doing great just the way they are, why would we change that? There is a saying that goes by, “Don’t fix what’s not broken.” No reason to put athletes in danger of these problems for no reason.
Like said, injuries to athletes are always terrible to hear and we never want to see that happen to anyone. If we bring up this argument on whether or not we should put pitchers through the surgery before they have the chance to get injured. People will more or likely respond with no. It just doesn’t make sense. Yes the recovery rate is very high and it makes pitchers strong but we should shouldn’t change what is already working. In a sense, we can think it is cheating. Of course if a pitcher gets hurt who was doing great then we will have to get the operation done so they can come back to their old selfs or maybe even stronger.
Athletes go through so much in their lives that when a career ending event happens, it’s almost as if their whole world and life has ended. Athletes live for what they do and they love every second of it. A quote from a great motivation video for all athletes states one thing in which is, ” when you want to be succeed as much as you want to breathe, thats when you’ll be successful.” This goes to show that we have to have a passion for something as bad as we want to stay alive so that day in and day out, we work as hard as we possibly can to reach the top and say we did it at the end of the day. It goes to show that we all need to respect the athletes between their highs and lows because no one besides them really knows how hard it really is.
Miller, Sam. “Why Pitchers Will Always Have Tommy John Surgery.” ESPN.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Nov. 2016.
“What Can Go Wrong.” In Surgery with Dr. Chris Chiodo. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Nov. 2016.
https://www.facebook.com/mikereinold.pt. “5 Myths of Tommy John Surgery – Mike Reinold.” Mike Reinold. N.p., 26 Jan. 2014. Web. 06 Dec. 2016.
Smiley, Brett. “12 Things You Probably Didn’t Know about Tommy John Surgery.” FOX Sports. N.p., 25 June 2014. Web. 06 Dec. 2016.