On Ryan Freel, Sports Heroes, and Cowardice

[BuckeyeChuck]

Lately there have been a spate of high-profile sports suicides. Ryan Freel is the latest: Ryan Freel dies of apparent suicide - ESPN

I'm an avid Reds fan. My kids have a love-hate relationship with warm weather because they know that means there will be Reds baseball on the TV, regardless of what they want to watch. I hope to fan the flames of passion for America's national pastime and I have little doubt that when they have little ones, they will be indoctrinating them with the wishbone C on the red hat.

As a child, I idolized my sports heroes. Eric Davis, a man of some controversy in Cincinnati because he was the team's first million dollar player, was my favorite player. They weren't really people; they were something larger than that.

At Ohio State I lived in a dormitory with freshman football players, so the myth of superhumanity was quickly dispelled, especially when I typed their papers for $1/page. (Hey, I was one of the few who had a PC in his dorm room, plus a dot matrix printer.) When you type their semi-literate scrawls, you may still scream for them on Saturdays, but you no longer see them as much different from you ... well, except that I was/am a lot smarter. We all had talents; mine didn't manifest on the gridiron.

As I've aged (now in my 40's), I've increasingly realized the humanity of players and coaches. The truth is that I don't *know* any of them. They are not family; they are not my friends. I don't contribute to their success, and their failure is not something about which to be angry because it is not aggression against my person or property. (I think the average fan often never realizes this.)

In shoft, I am entertained by these men (and sometimes, women) and I hope they have fulfilling lives with their families, just as I hope for me. Now, for the ugly part of this post: I have extreme difficulty with any form of commemoration for those who die by suicide. I was outraged by the outpouring of emotion for Junior Seau. I will not be joining in any commemoration of Ryan Freel, regardless of how fondly I recall the way he played the game, and I do indeed recall it fondly.

Suicide is ultimate cowardice. It is the ultimate selfish act, a striking contrast to the gift of He who gave His life for me.

It is my belief that head trauma in sports contributes greatly to mental illness in many of these athletes, and that this disease contributes to an extreme irrationality leading to this ultimately selfish act. Nonetheless, I cannot see my way to veneration of those who commit this act, regardless of the circumstances. What of Ryan's ex-wife, his child, his parents, his siblings (if any), his friends?

I offer no commentary on the right to die, which is a different topic and can be debated at another time. Choices have consequences, and just because I am free to make a choice doesn't mean the choice is a good one. One thing I tell people who huff about "rights to choose" and all that is "It's your right to choose and it's my right to judge." That's what I'm doing here and my judgement agrees with great rock band Rush, in the song The Pass, from Presto:

No hero in your tragedy.
No daring in your escape.
No salutes for your surrender.
Nothing noble in your fate.
Christ! What have you done?

 

[Onomea]

Well, I disagree. I don't think I have any right to judge a suicide, or any way of comprehending the despair that drove him or her to it. Athlete or otherwise.

I think it is a tragedy, and I will leave it at that.

 

[Mustang51]

I agree with Onomea with respect to suicide. From a purely rational or spiritual perspective, it makes no sense to me, but I'm in no position to judge others, or the specific factors that lead an individual to such an extreme act.

I will say that I've been a watcher of the Reds ( baseball being the only sport I have any interest in) since the late 60s. Freel gave 100 percent at all times. I was there the day he collided with Hopper (i think). It was a very violent collision, and I wonder what long term effect his concussions may have had. I know someone with TBI, and the effects can be debilitating, and difficult to predict.

 

[feralmerril]

I dont belive in suicide but I no longer judge them. I have had two cases of it that I was very close to. The first was my uncle that was almost like a secound father to me. At times we lived together. He was a highly decorated 82 AB glider vet from warII. He never married and I guess war experiances affected him. He had open heart surgery in the early days of it (1972). He had a stroke on the operating table and it affected him mentaly.
The other was another close friend another vet from the war. He married a close lady friend I had that was a guard with me. He was a lot older than her.
I think the doctor gave him very bad news. She brought him home from the hospital, went shopping, came home and found he swallowed a .45 colt barrel. The real story was he didnt want to wear a diaper etc and die slow on her. He was about 86 and this was about 3 years ago. Both men were very couragious and honorable.
I was home watching TV with my dad and we saw 911 live. I was with dad because he had alzheimers. Dad also was a strong old time christian.
We watched the jumpers off the twin towers. Dad said they were going to hell for committing suicide. It was one of the few arguments I had with him. When I was a lot younger I used to feel the same but with age I no longer judge on the matter. I belive I have known closely maybe 10 people through the years that comitted suicide. They all probley were mentaly off when they did it or highly depressed over health issues that were killing them. Who knows?

 

[scooter123]

I am another who won't judge someone because of suicide. After all we all consider it our duty to put a pet down when they no longer have any quality to their life. Cancer runs in my family on both sides and I've watched both my mother and father die from this horrible disease. In my mother's case she was on an "open" prescription for morphine the last month of her life. For my father, "open" prescriptions for pain killers are now illegal so he had to suffer in his last month. If someone wants an easy way out when the suffering gets to be too much, I am not going to blame them a bit for that choice.

PS; I can assure you from personal experience that stage 4 colon cancer is currently untreatable and 100% lethal. However, when caught at stage 2 or earlier it's nearly 100% curable. Anyone over 50 who hasn't had their colon checked should make sure to have it done within 5 years. While the prep and the procedure are likely one of the worst things you'll ever experience, it's a walk in the park compared to what my father went through.

 

[mjr]

Anyone over 50 who hasn't had their colon checked should make sure to have it done within 5 years. While the prep and the procedure are likely one of the worst things you'll ever experience, it's a walk in the park compared to what my father went through.

Nonsense. I've had four colonoscopies now, and none was anywhere near "one of the worst things" I've ever experienced. Getting a tooth filled is worse.

Sorry for the thread drift, but scooter's post might have kept somebody from getting this life-saving procedure.

 

[DCWilson]

I will NEVER attribute cowardice to a suicide. I take it for granted that every human being at every instant is making the best decision he can make about his life and future. My own impressions and knowledge may not permit me to share a suicide's conclusions about the circumstances and prospects that led him to take his own life, but then few have that ability. As the conventional wisdom has it, suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. When one's thought processes are so distorted by alcohol or injury or drugs or illness that suicide seems a rational choice, we should be sorrowful rather than judgmental.

That said, I would agree that stressful and potentially injurious careers like professional sports, or military service, or law enforcement can be environments in which both physical and emotional damage can produce the neurological stress and restricted thinking that will permit suicidal behavior.

A psychologist once told me that almost no one commits suicide as the culmination of a long-term plan. Most suicides are spontaneous and happen simply because no one else was around to interrupt a destructive chain of thought that developed to a level beyond an individual's capacity to manage it on that particular day. I know a few people who are occasionally depressive, and I do what I can to check in with them. Under the right circumstances, a smile and a "Good morning" can break a bad downhill slide. You can't make other people happy, but you can usually nudge them away from the danger zone if they are on the edge of a cliff. That gives them one more day to work on finding a solution to their deeper problems.

Through millions upon millions of such small gestures of good will does the earth become a better place.

 

[feralmerril]

I didnt know the guy personaly but had a friend that I worked with who was on the lapd. A past partner of his went through a bad divorice at christmas time. I had the same experiance. This guy was a motor officer. He didnt make role call. They went to his pad christmas morning and found him fully dressed out in his uniform and MC boots curled around the christmas tree. I can understand that as I probley felt about the same when it happened to me. At one point I thought I was haveing a heart attack, (I dont think it was really a heart attack) and didnt bother to pick up the phone and didnt care. I am okay now but I have been there too.

 

[Dennis The B]

My parents had FOUR of their very close friends commit suicide. These were hard-working, kind people, who raised good families, and were "the salt of the earth"

In three out of four cases, health was an issue. One had terminal cancer, and was severely depressed. His wife thought she had gotten rid of all the guns. A second just had his second severe heart attack. He was depressed over his failed health. The third was also in failing health. He worked for a funeral home and always said he couldn't commit suicide, because he had seen the end results. The fourth was an alcoholic, again depressed.

I don't know of any other close circle of friends with so many suicides.

Even at the first one, I could never judge those men as cowards. We couldn't know the mental pain they suffered. With the exception of the alcoholic, there was nothing medically that could be done for these men. Heart by-pass surgery was still years away, and the man who had terminal colon cancer, couldn't bear the thought of dying so painfully.

We can't be in their minds. No one except the person going through it, can gauge the amount of mental or physical pain one can handle. And when that pain gets too great...

 

[arjay]

A friend of my father's did it.A friend of mine did it.And a close relative attempted it and I sent the cops to find and stop her.That was one hell of a long wait on the phone.