Beware of the MACB!!

I’m just waiting for it to happen and it hasn’t yet. I’m actually shocked it hasn’t. I feel the odds are mounting though and with each passing occurrence the chances increase that it will happen. It’s only a matter of time. You watch! With all the crazy injuries we’ve seen in the world of sports what I am talking about IS GOING TO HAPPEN. Mark my words- on this day November 13, 2008 I proclaim a catastrophic injury occurs in the world of sport because of the “newest thing” that athletes love to do…… the celebratory mid-air chest bump. Yup that’s right, the mid-air chest bump (MACB) is going to alter a career. It may even alter the entire season for a team. A major franchise could lose out on a title because of the MACB. It seems the MACB is most popular in football and in the NBA. Players love it and I can’t believe coaches and owners alike don’t throw down a team mandate that it’s not allowed on their team. Think about what’s occurring. Two highly trained and valuable athletes making millions of dollars are running up to each other when their adrenaline is at its highest and they are jumping in unison and smashing their chests together, thus catapulting one another in an unpredictable direction as their legs entangle! It’s flat out dangerous! If I were a professional athlete I simply wouldn’t take part in it. I’m just waiting for to hear the following from Marv Alberts at the start of a Lakers vs Hornets game- “and folks while we were away one of the strangest occurrences took place during the announcing of the starting line-ups. It seems Kobe Bryant has sprained an ankle because he landed on the foot of Derrick Fisher when landing from his pre-game chest bump”. Are you telling me that this isn’t likely to happen? The law of averages is tilting more and more in the favor of an injury happening. On Tuesday night after Trevor Ariza dunked one home to give the Lakers a crucial 2 points and help almost solidify the win a violent spree of MACB’s started to occur. It was like a car wreck! One of the teammates he chest bumped bounced off Ariza so awkwardly that it almost put him on the ground (I believe it was Shasa Vujacic but I’m not sure). The player landed on one foot and barely saved himself from falling flat on his stomach. I thought “this might be the instance I’ve been waiting for, a torn ACL, a strained knee??” No he was fine. But one of these days a player won’t be fine. The MACB is lurking. He’ll claim a victim soon enough. It’s so easy for me to see this as a danger and I’m shocked that others who have the power to stop it do not. Basketball players are constantly spraining ankles from landing on the foot of another player. Why add to the possibility of that happening by allowing MACB’s to occur for celebratory reason? If I’m a head coach I put it a stop to it BEFORE it claims one of my guys. It’s almost like it’s one of those situations where we’ll look back on it in a few years after a major athlete snaps his ACL doing it and say “I can’t believe we didn’t realize that was dangerous”. Kinda like how we say now “I can’t believe we didn’t realize that McGwire and Sosa were on steroids in 1998, it was so damn obvious”. It won’t be until the crap hits the fan that a team puts a stop to the MACB. Until then I’ll just sit back and wait for my day to say “I told you so”.