University of Oregon Football Conditioning Lawsuit Brings a New Factor: ‘Only’ Near-Death

by Irvin Muchnick

In a case with obvious implications for some of Concussion Inc.’s own storylines, Yahoo Sports has the story that one of the three University of Oregon player who was hospitalized with rhabdomyolysis following January 2017 workouts is suing the school and former head football coach Willie Taggart. The link is https://sports.yahoo.com/ex-oregon-player-files-11-5-million-lawsuit-school-willie-taggart-231009298.html.

Of course, there have been lawsuits in the 36 deaths this century in college football conditioning. The exertional heat stroke death of Braeden Bradforth at Garden City Community College — which this site is reporting in depth, while a few mainstream news outlets limp along in pursuit — is the most recent such fatality, and seems all but certain to culminate in litigation. (More Bradforth developments are coming from here shortly. Our most recent report: https://concussioninc.net/?p=13537. Complete headline links: https://concussioninc.net/?p=13441.)

Also looming is an anticipated key ruling by a California court in my Public Records Act lawsuit to daylight, among other documents, the 141 pages of secret campus police reports in the 2014 football conditioning death of the University of California-Berkeley’s Ted Agu, which resulted two years later in a $4.75 million wrongful death lawsuit settlement. (Latest: https://concussioninc.net/?p=13498. Complete headline links: https://concussioninc.net/?p=10877.)

What makes the new Oregon case unique is that it is about not death, but “merely” potential death. The incident from two years ago was widely reported in the national media, and discussed here at https://concussioninc.net/?p=11761.

Broadening the context of Alameda County Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Brand’s upcoming decision in my UC case is the fact that just a week ago another Cal player, Bryce Turner, died from causes that so far have not been disclosed, after being stricken while working out in Southern California. I’ve emphasized that the Turner tragedy may well be unrelated — he was pushing himself in a solo offseason session at home, not in a team session on campus — but also that the university has hardly earned the benefit of the doubt in light of its cover-up conduct in the Agu fatality. And connected or not, Turner’s is the second sudden conditioning death of a Berkeley student-athlete in five years. See https://concussioninc.net/?p=13556.

In a final grisly note (and again, as Concussion Inc. has uniquely reported), Cal also had a rhabdomyolysis case with hospitalization, almost exactly a year ago. And the stricken player, like the late Ted Agu, was a sickle cell trait carrier. See our August 3, 2018, post:

In Scary Echo of 2014 Ted Agu Cal Football Death, Another Player With Sickle Cell Trait Was Hospitalized in Berkeley With an Overexertion Muscle-Death Syndrome — Here Are Exclusive Details

Complete headline links to our Ted Agu series: https://concussioninc.net/?p=10877