Claimed by television and radio, Dan Le Batard seldom writes. When he does it is pitch-perfect and poignant. Here is his column on Jason Taylor’s pain, as we prepare for the 22nd week of NFL football…

Dolphins legend Jason Taylor, for example, grew up right before our eyes, from a skinny Akron kid to a future Hall of Famer, his very public path out in front of those lights for 15 years. But take a look at what was happening in the dark. He was just a few blessed hours from having his leg amputated. He played games, plural, with a hidden and taped catheter running from his armpit to his heart. His calf was oozing blood for so many months, from September of one year to February of another, that he had to have the equivalent of a drain installed. This is a story of the private pain endured in pursuit of public glory, just one man’s broken body on a battlefield littered with thousands of them. As death and depression and dementia addle football’s mind, persuading some of the gladiators to kill themselves as a solution to end all the pain, and as the media finally shines a light on football’s concussed skull at the very iceberg-top of the problem, we begin the anatomy of Taylor’s story at the very bottom … with his feet.

This is all before we get to the alarming prospect of long-term brain damage. Oh, and that magical, risky painkiller Le Batard brings up, Toradol. It’s used almost everywhere in major college football, with no oversight while the NCAA regulates bagel toppings and supplementary textbooks. Those guys aren’t getting paid.
[Photo via USA Today Sports]