WALKING MIRACLE

A former NFL star writes about an on-field injury that threatened to paralyze him for life.

Shazier, a standout linebacker at Ohio State and with the Pittsburgh Steelers, liked nothing better than to smack up against the opposing line, and especially to sack opposing quarterbacks. Unfortunately, before the league rules changed, Shazier was a devotee of helmet-to-helmet contact, collisions that were “always dangerous”: They subject both offensive and defensive players to the danger of breaking a neck or experiencing a major concussion. Shazier found that danger realized in a game against Cincinnati, when, after a fairly routine tackle, he was unable to move his legs. Working with accomplished sportswriter Platt, Shazier digs into the statistics surrounding injuries in the football world. For example, defensive backs and linebackers suffer the greatest incidence of spinal injuries on the gridiron, and the numbers are appalling. The author’s injury was different in that it involved a back already compromised by scoliosis. With a grim medical outlook at first, it seemed that he might be forever wheelchair-bound, but Shazier fought the odds: “It actually took more fight and will and stamina to walk on a treadmill in the six months after my injury than it ever did to leave it all on the practice field as an NFL player….On the treadmill, I was fighting my own body.” Now retired from the game, Shazier launched a foundation to aid people with spinal injuries—he reckons there are about 295,000 in the U.S.—and fund research. He also draws on his Christian faith and appreciation of Roman stoicism to offer thoughts on how to keep going “when things look so bleak you want to quit,” thoughts given without the hollow rah-rah of so many sports-oriented motivational texts.

Inspirational reading for athletes and, in particular, those injured in the pursuit of the prize.