[WilliamTheIrish]

Originally Posted by myselff77

This week will be the most amount of resources, $$$, technology, and medicine that has ever gone into rehabbing an ankle sprain. I hope it works out and, if so, would make for a great documentary down the road.

Reading this reminded me of the story behind the invention of the flak jacket. Oilers QB Dan Pastorini injured his ribs against the Steelers, missed several games and spent several days in the hospital.

During his inpatient stay:

Several days later, while lying in his hospital bed, someone unexpectedly knocked on the door. Pastorini said in walked two men—one carrying a medium-size brown paper bag and the other a baseball bat.

“I was thinking the two men had bet the ranch on the game and they were going to pummel me to death and take me out inside the bag,” he joked.

Instead, the man, Byron Donzis, took the never-before-seen flak jacket out of the paper bag and placed it up against his chest. The man with the bat then stepped up and proceeded to whack Donzis and his protected chest three or four times with no ill-effect.

Armed with military-grade protection, Pastorini returned to the Oilers lineup three weeks later and guided the team to a 17-9 victory over the Dolphins in the league’s first-ever Wild Card round. The following week the Oilers upended the New England Patriots advancing to the AFC Championship. In both contests, Pastorini said he knew the opposing defenses were targeting his ribs and testing out his new protective gear.

“They hit it. And then they looked at me and said, I guess it works,” he laughed.

The Oilers lost in the AFC Championship game to the same Steelers team that had injured Pastorini a month earlier. But in defeat, Pastorini had won. He achieved victory just in his ability to play despite three broken ribs. All quarterbacks that followed like Peyton Manning won as well.