On the Penguins: 1 day, 1 hit, 1 life-altering concussion
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Jason Botterill -- Assistant GM and one-time first-round draft pick out of Michigan
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Jason Botterill had been hit hard before, and he had the medical history to prove it.
And this check, well, it really seemed like nothing special.
"I remember going to the bench thinking, 'I got dinged a little bit,' " Botterill said. "But I didn't think too much of it."
Not until a few hours later, anyway.
"After the game, I felt something was wrong," Botterill said. "Especially the next morning, once the adrenaline wore off."
What seemed like a routine hit at the time turned out to be the most significant one Botterill absorbed in his career, because it was the one that ended that career.
Botterill, who already had been diagnosed with three concussions after graduating from the University of Michigan, picked up his fourth in late October 2005 while playing for Buffalo's American Hockey League affiliate in Rochester, N.Y.
That one, though, was different.
In just about every way.
The previous three times, he had been concussed by big hits. The kind that often leave the victim dazed and on all fours, or perhaps stumbling toward the bench like a guy whose blood-alcohol level was approaching the spontaneous-combustion stage.
And each time, despite the ferocity of the check that injured him, Botterill rebounded in about a week. Took it easy for a few days, then went back to work.
Not this time.
Oh, he didn't have to spend his days in bed or in a darkened room after No. 4 was diagnosed, but it was evident from the start that his recovery would not be like any of those he had experienced previously.
"I was very fortunate because, from the standpoint of day-to-day life, I was fine," Botterill said. "I didn't really have too many issues at all. But whenever I started to get my heart rate up, my symptoms were room-spins and [seeing] black spots."
Botterill spent most of that season hoping that he'd be able to resume playing, but he eventually accepted his doctors' advice to leave the game before he suffered something even more serious.
Which, they advised him, was a pretty good bet to happen if he didn't retire.
"They pretty much assured me that I would recover from this concussion, which I feel I did," Botterill said. "But they felt my ability to take a hit had diminished and my ability to recover from concussions had diminished.
"This one was going to take a little while to recover [from]; the next one probably wouldn't be a big hit that would cause it and how long it would take me to recover from that one was a question mark."
First Published February 19, 2012 12:00 am
