Sunday Morning Recovery
Poor old Justin Koschitzke. The St Kilda player has been plagued by injuries and then appeared on Sunday morning television all sort of vague and with slurred speech before collapsing.
Now, I'm going to admit to uncharitable thoughts when I saw that. "Uh oh", I thought, "Here's another footballer who's turned up to a morning commitment after having too much fun the night before." Was that wrong of me? After all, it was just this week that the Kangaroo's sanctioned full-back Jonathan Hay for getting on the piss the night before and putting in a lack-lustre performance in the VFL. And let's not forget the sorry state of Laurence "Moses" Angwin when he turned up to training ...
But then cool heads pointed out that Justin Koschitzke had in fact recently received a rather bad bump to his noggin, resulting in a fractured skull. Ah, that explains it! If this were an episode of House, then right about now Foreman the neurologist would be urging House to cancel the tox-screen in favour of an MRI (or CT scan?). House, no doubt, would persist with the tox-screen and possibly a lumbar puncture (merciless bastard that he is) ... but would he be right?
In a curious perversion of normal behaviour, St Kilda's PR flaks it seems would back House. The club has been at great pains to point out that his collapse was unrelated to his head injuries. So, now what do we think? One line being peddled is that he didn't have breakfast. So, by 10:30am he was vague, with slurred speech and collapsed on television. Another line is that he had stagefright. Like many people, I've skipped breakfast and didn't pass out by mid-morning. I've also been nervous and didn't have slurred speech. So I'm not sure about these lines, but there may be others.
Anyway, now's your chance to play House and make up your own mind with a video clip of the incident. Here at the Speccy, we're all hoping Justin gets better - even though he's a professional footballer, we don't want to see people collapsing on telly.
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4 Comments:
I like your theories, but to be honest I couldn't tell the difference between Justin's normal speaking and the film clip. I think you've overlooked a simple and obvious cause for the 'collapse'. I think he just fell over.
By
Anonymous, at 11:36 am, June 22, 2006
Thanks for that suggestion. You're not the first person to point out to me that Justin has a touch of "Sly Mouth" ie mumbling speech reminiscent of Sylvester Stalone.
I would like to be privvy to St Kilda's decision-making process about why they were so quick to rule out the head injury. It's an obvious explanation, yet in ruling it out it does raise other questions ... questions with very uncomfortable answers.
By
Greg, at 1:16 pm, June 24, 2006
Did you see what happened to him yesterday in the reserves, crashing into an umpire, smashing up his mouth and teeth, this bloke is going to die out there.
I suppose the mentality is that you're not a real bloke unless you cop the hits, isn't that the culture of aussie rules, that you're only tough if you can sustain multiple hits to various bodily extremeties, you're only a real man if you decide to sexually assault women in nightclubs, or take them home and decide to swap partners mid intercourse without their consent, or drink and drive ad nauseum, or partake in recreational drugs without fear of being shamed and having to take responsibilty for your actions?
I for one do not want to waste my taxes propping up this guys health for the rest of his life just because him and his club decided to do the "manly aussie bloke" thing and play him when he is obviously not phsyically capable. The disproportionate media coverage of this guy and his "unlucky" injury breaks are sickening when you consider barely two months ago a miner lost his life working a more necessary and dangerous job and Australian soldiers lost their lives serving their country. But who cares about them and their families, they weren't AFL stars!
Cheers for your good work in exposing the golden calf of australian society for what it really is!
By
Anonymous, at 12:09 pm, July 16, 2006
It's thankless work pointing out major flaws in the popular culture and value system you're embedded in ... comments like yours are very helpful.
But there may also be a simpler explanation: perhaps Justin Koschitzki just isn't very bright. Hence, he goes around damaging his body and repeatedly causing himself great pain.
Or am I being too simplistic and wider cultural forces are at work?
By
Greg, at 1:11 pm, July 19, 2006
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