Can You Love The Game Too Much?

The world can be a very interesting place when it comes to embracing death. In our Western culture, every death appears to be someone’s fault. There are negligence suits, malpractice suits, anything you can imagine.

But all of this begs the question: What happens when there really was nothing anyone could do?

Late last year the million dollar question entered the sporting world. Cuttino Mobley was sent to the Knicks last November, in a trade for Zach Randolph. The Knicks were trading for his contract, so he was going to have his minutes limited.

But within three days of the trade, the Knicks learned that Cuttino Mobley had a heart condition. Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy has been known to cause sudden death in athletes.

After discovering this, the Knicks refused to play Mobley, who retired from basketball less than a month later.

That story would presumably strike you as sad—an athlete has his career shortened by a rare heart disease. But a few months ago, Mobley sat down with ESPN for an interview that shot this story into a totally different stratosphere.

Regardless of all the tragedy and heartbreak involved, this story, more than anything, is the story of two people at age 19 who decided that what they wanted to do was worth dying for. Not only do I applaud that passion, I envy it.

Mobley said that he had known about this illness for more than a decade, and initially hid it from the Houston Rockets. When the Rockets eventually discovered it through a physical, they forced Mobley to essentially sign away his life, so that the Rockets could in no way be responsible for a potential catastrophe.

In mere seconds, the story went from heartbreak to the awe-inspiring tale of the man who played more than 13 years of professional basketball, while knowing full well that he could have died any second.

Obviously, there are several stances one could take on this situation. Had Mobley died on the court, it could have been a financial and team disaster—and what he did was certainly reckless. But regardless of all the potential Westernized problems, there was a spiritual element to me that was absolutely fascinating.

Here is a man who apparently had nothing to live for except for the game of basketball, and apparently based all of his decisions on how the game treated him. And he was able to make it out OK.

But recently, there was an athlete who didn’t.

Alexei Cherepanov was the 2007 first round pick of the New York Rangers. Cherepanov was playing for the Siberian hockey team Avangard Omsk. Last October, he collapsed on his team’s bench after a shift change and could not be revived. It turned out that Cherepanov had the rare heart condition myocarditis, and it had the potential to cause sudden death in athletes.

Cherepanov was only 19 years old.

The backlash of his death was unprecedented in the Westernized sporting world. If you were at all associated with the team on a management level, you were suspended indefinitely. Believe it or not, even the president of the opposing team was suspended, due to allegations that the medical support on his home ice was not strong enough.

Cherepanov’s death will certainly make you think twice about athletes like Cuttino Mobley who made it out alive. But the reason why it is news today gives the two athletes even more common ground.

Today marked the end of a lengthy federal investigation of Alexei Cherepanov’s death. And as it turns out, Cherepanov knew about his condition and never revealed it to the Rangers organization or Avangard Omsk. Investigators, after speaking with his former teammates, went on to say that Cherepanov feared that he would lose playing time if he revealed his condition.

Further evidence also indicates that Cherepanov, much like Mobley, used a private physician to try to address his illness.  His autopsy discovered hearty amounts of a circulation and breathing drug in his system.

And now the floodgates open again. How can an organization be blamed for something like this? How can a 19-year-old make this kind of decision? How is this legal? And if you have read this far, I am sorry to disappoint you, but I don’t have any of those answers.

I do have this to say, though.

I am 23 years old, and I constantly beat myself up over the fact that I have yet to find anything in my life so meaningful that I would die for it. My Web site is nice, I love the drums, and my ex-girlfriend probably could have been the one, but nothing has ever hit me in the head and stuck.

Regardless of all the tragedy and heartbreak involved, this story, more than anything, is the story of two people at age 19 who decided that what they wanted to do was worth dying for. Not only do I applaud that passion, I envy it.

And while I raise a glass and toast to an athlete who died too young, I also stop to remind myself why sports are so powerful in the world. In the end, sport is just another thing someone can fall in love with, and sacrifice his life for.

Is there anything more bittersweet than that?