2017 Blog Posts

April 30, 2017

On Aaron Hernandez:

Recent events that were red flags, or should have been, regarding his suicide: He gave away many of his things to fellow inmates, and experienced an abrupt personality change. Also, Tuesdays with Morrie may not have been the best book for officials to have recommended.  

--Dr. Kamm

January 24, 2017:

Regarding Grayson Allen’s latest unnecessary dust up with the NC State bench last night, clearly, the one game suspension served no purpose regarding Grayson Allen having control of his emotions and respect for his opponents.

Just as obviously, Duke is incapable of stepping in and taking control of the situation- namely removing Allen from all competition until he gets the sports psychological/psychiatric help he needs.

As a sports psychiatrist, it would seem to me that he has, at the very least, an anger control and impulse control problem.

As Duke has been so slow to address this, the ACC needs to. Duke is their flagship program and has tried to stand for “what is good in basketball.” Grayson Allen’s actions tarnish not only Duke's but the ACC's image as a conference that promotes those values. 

​--Dr. Kamm

Additional article here.

May 3, 2017

Sad day when, 70 years after Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in baseball, Adam Jones gets called the n-word by fans. Shows that bigotry and racism never die, they just go underground only to resurface again and again. 

​Dr. Kamm

​February 18, 2017

On the Peekskill High School Girl's Basketball fight:This had all the makings of a volcano about to explode; and adults share some of the blame.

If confrontations of Peekskill players had been "happening for a long time," where was the coach?? Violence and animosity between high schools UH has to be nipped in the bud, and the root cause(s) talked through at team meetings. 

A Peekskill parent had been verbally abusive most of the game. When parents go over the line, what should the athletes do? Incidentally, other Peekskill parents should have reigned the abusive parent in. In addition, the Peekskills and Tappan Zee coaches should have talked to the officials about having the abusive parents removed when they became aware of the abuse. 

If one of these steps had been taken by adults "in charge," this fight would probably not have occurred. 

--Dr. Kamm

​​Fight covered here

Click here and scroll down for Dr. Kamm's take on other adult mishaps in youth sports spawning from the birth of Little League

June 13th, 2016:

When Draymond Green gets into very close physical proximity with an opponent, he does not always exhibit the best impulse control. What is of particular worry is that he is so strong and when he physically lashes out, he can do real damage to an opponent, either in that game or for the rest of that opponent’s career. What he is alleged to of said to LeBron James, if true, is mind boggling, and now an instance of not just physically crossing the line, but verbally.

Yes there is trash talk in the NBA all the time, but players know that there is a line that cannot be crossed, and they know where that line is with every player, or should know, where that line is with every opponent.

Green should have been ejected in Game 4 after hitting LeBron in the groin and taking another swipe as well. Perhaps only harsh penalties, particularly in the finals, will help this man control his dangerous impulses. 

--Dr. Kamm

March 31, 2017

Regarding North Carolina men’s basketball: I think Coach Roy is giving a clinic on how the react to a devastating loss. After all it’s how you react to the inevitable losses in life as a person, as an athlete, as a team- that defines you. I like that the team has adopted the vision of ‘redemption.’ This is a great builder of cohesion. As I said yesterday, I’m predicting that the Heels rise like a Phoenix in the land of the phoenix and will be champs.

 ALSO:  Kudos to Brock Stassi of the Phillies for letting his emotions freely flow when he found out he made the big club after years of the minors. Sometimes we see our elite athletes as superman or superwoman and forget that they are people just like us, who suffer the same emotional disorders as we do at approximately the same frequency (with a few exceptions). Why, then, should someone who has finally made it fill up with tears whether they are a man or a woman when the quest has been so long. 

--Dr. Kamm

April 17, 2017

About the 70th anniversary of Jackie Robinson's breaking the color line in baseball: Few others could have done it with such class, self-control, dignity, and brilliance. Your entrance into baseball, and the African Americans who followed fundamentally changed the game and the social fabric of America. 

I was honored to have met you several times and always came away impressed and touched by your greatness. 

--Dr. Kamm

May 30th, 2016:

Regarding Odor Fracas and Noah Syndergaard’s 99 mph pitch behind Chase Utley:

The events underline the fact that baseball can be a rough game played by tough men, no matter how much the rule makers want to soften it.

Many will debate whether Major League Baseball should “police itself,” beyond the rules, but the negative message that these incidents give to high school and youth sports players are of concern.

Parents need to tell their children that this is what major leaguers do but not what I expect you or your teammates to do. When you get to the major leagues, that’s a different story - but you’re not there yet so act in a respectful way when it comes to your opponent, without whom you would not have a game, and let the umpires hand out discipline when needed. 

--Dr. Kamm

May 30th, 2016:

Golden State winning the West is illustrative of a generally understood maxim in Sports Psychiatry.

When you’re playing the champion, and you have them on the ropes, you have to finish them. When OKC let the Warriors escape Oklahoma with a Game 6 win, the result of Game 7 was a foregone conclusion.

The underdog really, psychologically, never gets over letting the championship team win on the challenger’s home court, when the challenger could have closed them out. 

--Dr. Kamm

HOMESPORT PSYCHIATRYEXPERIENCECONTACTBLOGARTICLESPRE-SEASON CHECK LISTS

​​​January 24, 2017

Kudos to Erin Andrews for going public about having had cervical cancer, just months after winning that lawsuit.

The important takeaway here is thst almost immediately after the lawsuit was settled, Andrews jumped into her job at Dancing With The Stars.

Now we learn that shortly after being operated on in October, she was back on the sidelines doing football games on ​FOX.

Assuming that her doctor had not strictly limited her activities and she was not grossly going against doctor’s orders and risking her health, Andrews is to be commended for not playing the victim role in either of these circumstances.

She found solace and distraction in her work on Dancing With The Stars after the lawsuit and purpose and release in being with her crew during the football season.

It is important for cancer survivors to know that work can be a tonic and that getting back to what you are passionate about can be very helpful in recovery from cancer. Sometimes taking too much time off is the worst thing. 

​--Dr. Kamm

March 25th, 2016: 

Regarding the Adam/Drake LaRoche issue:

Though I am not employed by the White Sox and am not treating Adam LaRoche, the two things that stand out to me as a sports psychiatrist regarding this sad affair is that, as USA Today reported, Adam was “called out” by Ken Williams who “lost it” when he saw Drake still coming to practice regularly after he had thought he and LaRoche had reached an agreement to limit Drake’s clubhouse time. I must say this is one of the drawbacks of players having their children in the clubhouse. It can inhibit the manager or executive from “yelling at them,” or they can be embarrassed in front of their son and teammates when management publicly dresses them down.  The clubhouse has to be a sacrosanct area when players feel comfortable and it is possible (though not directly reported) that Drake was felt to inhibit the body and free interaction that often occurs in a clubhouse. With Drake reaching adolescence, players might have felt often more reluctant to curse in front of him, and there is always a danger, as a player’s child gets bigger that a Matt Mantei/Matt Williams will occur, where a player runs into another player’s son who is shagging flies.  From my reading of various articles, it does not sound like Ken Williams was the best person to talk to LaRoche about this issue. It might have come better from the manager or the captain of the team.  As usual, better communication would have helped. If management had gotten the feeling from some players that they were uncomfortable with Drake's presence, they should have reached out to the team captain who then could have reached out to selective players to see what their grievance was. These grievances could have been presented by the captain or manager over the winter to LaRoche who would have then had a chance to process things and a reasonable dialogue could have ensued. Though I have no knowledge of whether such specialists were in place, having a Sport Psychologist and Sport Psychiatrist as part of the White Sox Sports Medicine Team, making frequent locker and training room visits, may have resulted in much earlier awareness of resentful feelings about Drake's presence, and with those feelings being dealt with in a manner that didn't threaten team cohesion. As Jerry Reinsdorf said in an article on ESPN, “ much of this was a result of miscommunication and misunderstanding.” That can happen between upper management and players much more easily than when it is a player to player or manager to player.

--Dr. Kamm

February 21, 2017

Great to hear that pitchers and catchers are finally reporting. A sure sign of spring. For the general manager and manager, the task is to create a cohesive team.

The article Group Dynamics and Athletic Success gives some great pointers on the all too important subject of cohesion.

In more local sports... Congratulations to Monmouth University’s Women’s Track on winning the MAAC this year. Go Hawks!

With March quickly approaching, Monmouth U Men’s Basketball has to keep a ‘one game at a time’ approach. It would be too easy for the team to look past the rest of the season and towards the tournament. Once in the tournament, one game at a time is essential. 

--Dr. Kamm

January 6, 2017:

On Grayson Allen's "indefinite suspension"

The appearance here is that with Coach K's back surgery coming up, with Duke having lost its ACC opener to Virginia Tech, without Allen, it was in Duke's interest to reinsert Allen as a player. That way Duke would not be without its head coach and best player at the same time. 

While I would like to give Coach K the benefit of the doubt when he talks about the public not knowing everything that's going on, there are very few reasons I can think of for making an indefinite suspension this short. Grayson, it appears, shows poor sportsmanship- not something Duke wants to be known for. He intensely wants to win, but seems to put that above ethical play. 

Allen's repeated tripping of opponents shows a lack of compassion, along with a limited sense of fairness and integrity, all of which form the 'character' that Duke and intercollegiate sports purports to build. 

​--Dr. Kamm

March 7th, 2016:

In response to Peyton Manning:

A professional athlete dies twice: once when he or she retires and once when it is his or her time. Having played at such a high level for such a long period of time, it is going to be difficult for Peyton Manning to adjust to life other than being a top-notch quarterback. I hope that the Broncos, like some other teams, have a career termination specialist to help ease his transition.

--Dr. Kamm

February 29th, 2016:

Check out this NYTimes article: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/28/sports/hockey/a-top-nhl-rookie-skates-in-from-the-heat.html?_r=1

And my take on it:

Shane Gostisbehere’s story illustrates a healthy way that parents can negotiate spending “equal” time with siblings when one is a burgeoning star. Taking Shane to the hockey rink while his sister trained in figure skating not only helped Shane appreciate the beauty of that sport and the importance of skating, but also gave him an opportunity from a very young age to pursue his own, allied sport: ice hockey. From a psychological developmental perspective, attention must be paid to the siblings of high performing athletes.

--Dr. Kamm

April 10, 2017

Sergio Garcia's winning the Master's is a lesson to all athletes regarding the values of perseverance and indomitable spirit.

 (Took him 72 tries to win a major!)

​--Dr. Kamm

April 19, 2017

Aaron Hernandez suicide: Another shocking and strange turn in this already sad and shocking case. More later from a sport psychiatrist's perspective as more details come out.

​--Dr. Kamm