Punch-drunk

NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman would have you believe there is no scientifically proven connection between concussions and the brain disease chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), yet ex-players keep suing the league in this regard.  NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell would have you believe the league is doing everything possible to minimize concussions among players, so please don’t go see “Concussion,” the movie starring Will Smith as Dr. Bennet Omalu, who did the research that has made the football establishment so unhappy these days.

I’m not immune to getting on a high horse to sound holier than thou, but not here.  Hockey and football will never be legislated away.  Sued out of existence, maybe, but not voted out.  To live on this earth is to struggle, to fight, to compete.  Given that sports are part of life, well, you can see the challenge of trying to outlaw one.  Think of boxing.  Our national identity is bound up in part on the exploits of Jack Dempsey, Joe Louis and Muhammad Ali.  How do you wish that out of existence?

The saving grace of boxing is that it has never pretended to be anything but a brutal sport, the notion of a “sweet science” notwithstanding.  You saw the punishment ringside and again years later when certain ex-boxers shuffled by.  No one would dare deny the connection between the sport and the devastation that befalls many of its participants.

Hockey and football could use some of that same honesty.