ESPN’s Ryan Clark Did a Wonderful Job Handling the Damar Hamlin Injury
Damar Hamlin’s injury on Monday night sent shockwaves throughout the sports world. Ryan Clark did an excellent job in an impossible situation.
After the injury, ESPN’s studio team was given a near impossible task of filling screen time during a situation with very few details available in the moment. Afterwards, it was thrown to Scott Van Pelt, who was joined by Clark.
During his playing career, Clark suffered a splenic infarction while at Mile High Stadium due to hereditary sickle cell anemia. Clark had his spleen and gall bladder removed, then missed the rest of the 2007 NFL season and rejoined the Steelers in 2008. Clark began by reminding everyone of the most important part of the Hamlin situation: focusing on his well-being.
“I think the first thing: This is about Damar Hamlin,” Clark said on SportsCenter with Scott Van Pelt. “It’s about a young man at 24 years old that was living his dream. That, a few hours ago, was getting ready to play the biggest game of his NFL career. And there’s probably nowhere else in the world he wanted to be. And now, he fights for his life.“
Nothing else matters but the health of Damar Hamlin. The game? Not at all. The standings? Something will get figured out, they don’t matter now. Betting on the game? Your wager will get refunded. Hamlin is fighting for his life right now; nothing is more important than that.
Clark also talks about his injury, being hospitalized, fighting for his own life, and having teammates thinking that he might not have made it. He talked about his teammates coming to his hospital bed and just crying.
“I dealt with this before, and I watched my teammates, for days, come to my hospital bed and just cry,” Clark said. “I had them call me and tell me that they didn’t think I was gonna make it. And now this team has to deal with that, and they have no answers.” – Ryan Clark on SC with SVP.
Finally, Clark brings up the most important point about how these athletes are humans and are taking massive risks to live their dreams.
“And so the next time that we get upset at our favorite fantasy player, or we’re upset that the guy on our team doesn’t make the play, and we’re saying he’s worthless and we’re saying, ‘You get to make all this money,’ we should remember that these guys are putting their lives on the line to live this dream,” Clark said.
Ryan Clark was phenomenal in covering Damar Hamlin’s injury. As of now, according to Josh Reed, Hamlin was originally on 100% oxygen and is now down to 50%. Praying for a speedy recovery.
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