Pain in Neck Forces Green to Think About Retirement

A constant pain in his neck and the memory of numbness in his neck and arms are telling Gary Green, a four-time Pro Bowl cornerback, that his football career is over, but he isn’t ready to listen.

As the Rams ran onto the field for their first exhibition game at Anaheim on Tuesday night, Green lingered in the tunnel and talked about his problem: a herniated disc between the sixth and seventh cervical vertebrae.

“It hurts all the time,” he said. “Mentally, I’m not ready to quit football, but looking at it realistically, it looks very doubtful.”

Doctors have told Green, 30, that surgery could repair the problem, but he wouldn’t be able to play football again, anyway. And since he can’t play the way he is, and the condition shows no signs of improving, he is at an impasse.

“It hurts all the time,” he said, “especially when I try to do any lifting. I’ve become accustomed to the dull and sometimes sharp pains, but the real pain would come if I took a lick.”

Green said that last year he had to change the way he tackled and the way he slept or “my neck would spasm--tremendous spasms in my neck and upper back. At times I couldn’t move my head forward or back more than an inch. I’d be backpedaling and try to turn real quick--no contact--and I’d get a burning pain down my arm.

“I had to alter the way I tackled. I had to make sure I never hit anybody with my head. Anytime I hit somebody with my head I had numbness in my neck and left arm. It got progressively worse as the season went along.”

He had a test performed by his own doctor in San Antonio before last season and said the test showed “irritation of the sixth cervical vertebra on the left side.

When the pain hadn’t diminished by April, Green had a second test, which showed “a lot more damage. The area of involvement had increased substantially (from) an accumulation of hits.”

Finally, in June, Green had a test that shows more detail of the nerves and vertebrae. The test showed the disc to be protruding and herniating.

Green ponders his next move, but surgery, he said, is out.

“The only reason I’d have surgery is if I was having abnormal motor functions, which I’m not. Without playing, I can function normally.”

“I’ve been going through rehab. I’ve been resting it, which is the best thing for it, and I still can’t play. . . . I dodged a bullet last year, a bullet that I didn’t know was after me. I was definitely playing at risk. I was lucky.”