KarateKen

It would be ludicrous for anyone to claim that the NFL forced anyone to play football. However, I have watched the documentary Leage of Denial, and read the book by the same title, and it is reasonable to conclude that the NFL was negligent in how they handled concussions and head injuries for years, and how they likely tried to cover it up. These injuries are not just in the NFL, head trauma from playing football has shown up in college and even highs school football players. Former NFL RB Arian Foster claimed that if he could do things over again, he would never have played football. Despite all the money he made in the NFL, it is not worth what damage it does to your body. He also said he will encourage his son to not play football and go into a different line of work. It was an interesting conversation he had on the Rogan podcast years ago.

When I trained TKD (it was WTF style) we were never taught how to fall correctly. I learned that when I switched to Hapkido. Is this a common thing in TKD? If so, why is it that learning to break fall is not a taught in some TKD training? It is a very helpful skill to have both on and off the mat.

Absolutely. We live in a violent world and knowing how to protect yourself can be lifesaving. Even if you don't use it against an attacker, martial arts are great for fitness, self-esteem, personal growth, self-confidence, and meeting new friends.

ESPN is acquiring NFL Network and NFL RedZone, among others, in exchange for giving the NFL a 10% equity share of ESPN. Lots of unanswered questions about what this will lead to. How will this change ESPN's coverage of the NFL? How will this impact the fan experience? Will ESPN be willing to hold the NFL accountable and run negative stories, or will they ignore them now that the NFL has some ownership in the network? The general feelings early on seems to be that this is a great deal for the NFL and ESPN, but a major conflict of interest for the consumer, especially when you consider that the NFL will now have a financial interest in ESPN Bet, an ESPN app designed for sports gambling. For this deal to go through it requires federal approval, and the NFL has started to lobby congress for exactly that. If the deal does not get approval, then all of this will disappear, so none of this is official, yet. I'm guessing that since the NFL is such a rich and powerful force, they will likely get what they want. This is a complex issue and there is a lot of information to unpack here, so if you care to learn more, I hope you read about it, but there is simply too much to go over in one post.

What is the story on this?

I am not sure what the age should be, maybe 16?, before getting a black belt. A JBB maybe start at 14? I find it unfortunate when schools give out a BB to a 9-year-old just so grandma can brag to her friends.

What is worse is that some students, typically young adults who train at MMA gyms, are hoping and looking for violence when they go out. They are all excited to use their MA training on someone in the bar.

I posted this in the NFL thread but then realized it was probably better fit here. I've copied and pasted the post. A crazy man walked into a building in New York and opened fire, killing four people before committing suicide. He had a note saying that he had CTE from playing football in high school. It appears he intended to target the NFL offices in New York but accidently went into an elevator that goes to a different location. The gunman never played in the NFL but blamed football for causing his brain damage. One of the victims was a police officer who had two children and a third on the way. Tragic and scary situation for sure.

A crazy man walked into a building in New York and opened fire, killing four people before committing suicide. He had a note saying that he had CTE from playing football in high school. It appears he intended to target the NFL offices in New York but accidently went into an elevator that goes to a different location. The gunman never played in the NFL but blamed football for causing his brain damage. One of the victims was a police officer who had two children and a third on the way. Tragic and scary situation for sure.

Beautiful Outlaw by John Eldrege

Do you believe that there should be an age requirement for a student to reach black belt, and if so, what age would it be?

RIP to the Hulk

I have one and that is I wish I had finished my TKD training and gotten to black belt. I was less than a year away and I left to go take up another style.

Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom

I've done thins several times over the years. I met a few people off Myspace back in the day, and some other places. Two of my longest running friendships started by meeting on a discussion board over 20 years ago. However, it has been a very long time since I have done anything like that.

I enjoy a variety of teachers and styles I am not experienced with. One seminar I attended was when I studied Hapkido and we had a day of training with three other schools, one was a TKD school, another a TSD school, and a Judo school. All four schools had their students at the seminar. It was a fun day of learning and working on stuff with people who we were not used to and techniques from styles we had not seen before. This was a free seminar. I also attended a seminar when I was in TKD that was strictly a point sparring seminar, though I found this less beneficial because we only had one instructor, and it was my TKD instructor, so it wasn't much different than our weekly sparring class other than working with students from other schools. Now if I was new to the instructor and/or teachings I would have been more interested even though it was focused on a singular martial art instead of spreading out among four. When I was in TKD we attended a Hapkido seminar which was new to me, I had never heard of it at the time, but after two hours of studying the wrist locks and what not, I was fascinated and wanted to learn more. I ended up joining a Hapkido school a few months later and cross trained both styles. A two-hour seminar, I did not know what I was doing at all, but I understood the value of what was being taught and wanted more. To answer your question, I think it would be A: learning something new and doing things that are outside of usual training and B: the experience of the instructor and C: how useful it would be for what I want to get out of my training. Of course, cost and location are factors. I am much less likely to attend if it is expensive or requires going out of town. Thanks for asking.

Disappointing. The movie felt rushed and unoriginal. Other than the final fight scene I was bored.

I always find it funny in the baseball brawls that the pitchers come running in from the bullpen and by the time they get to the mound the fight is over. I'm not aware of what athletes in other sports have studied martial arts, but being able to communicate with people who are angry would be a great tool for refs and players, and managers. I feel there is something wrong with the sports culture that allows so much verbal abuse, there seems to be almost an expectation of being allowed to scream, name call, and swear at each other without punishment. When the players and umpires get up into each other's faces it is good for TV and the fans love it, but it sometimes goes too far, like when Roberto Alomar spit in the face of an umpire. Conflict resolution is a useful skill, sadly sometimes people are so angry they can't be reasoned with, both in sports and in life. Police deal with it all the time. Being an umpire/referee sound like a thankless job, if you do everything right nobody notices but if you get it wrong the scream at you. Or you get it right, but they still scream at you because it went against them. If you are a referee, a cop, or work in customer service you basically get verbally abused for a living.

Whoever claimed that might have been doing a bit of drinking, sucking back on grandpa's old cough medicine. The movie is available to stream now, and has been since July 8, though I just learned of this. Thankfully the other info I had was wrong, and I will be watching it in the next few days. TTYS!!!

I have not attended an abundance of seminars, maybe three or four in my life, and never been an instructor at one, so I guess I am not much help to you here.

Toronto makes another trade, sending veteran forward Ryan Reaves to San Jose for defenseman Henry Thrun. Reaves is 38, has racked up 137 career points (63 goals) and over 1,000 career penalty minutes. The Sharks will be the seventh team he has played for. Thrun played 119 games with the Sharks since they traded for him in February 2023.

I saw the cops break up some fireworks being shot off just down the block from where I live, I agree, it is rare because the police can't stop everyone and may police stations are facing a shortage already.

Sounds like a typical Saturday night during my drinking years. Kidding aside though, I might have gotten a concussion during my first TKD tournament after a kick to the face left me seeing stars for a few days. Did not get KOed or go out, but enough to where I likely suffered some damage. From what I understand about concussions, and I am no expert or close to it, once you have the first one, you are at higher risk for more of them later on, and one plus one does not equal two, it is more like three or four, the damage sort of compounds the more of them you have. People do not usually see the results of that damage until later in life, meaning that the behaviors you listed do not show up as much when you are young, it shows up big time when you are older. Good on you for donating your body to science, it could help a lot of people who come after you.

Mike Webster (50) Junior Seau (43) and Aaron Hernandez (27) all were found to have brain injuries when they died, with the Webster case being what lead to the CTE search of the NFL, and eventually a lawsuit and a change in the rules for player safety. Both Seau and Hernandez committed suicide, questions remain about how the brain injuries impacted their decision making, especially Seau's decision to take his own life and Hernandez's decision to take others. I did not think about the other aspects, such as damage to facial nerves, those are fair to bring up.

Diddy found guilty on two of the five counts, found not guilty on count 1, which was the most serious. Sentencing is scheduled for early October. He might get some prison time, but he won't be given a life sentence, max would be 20 years. He was denied bail and will have to sit in jail until the sentencing which will likely count as time served. He is also facing dozens of civil lawsuits.