Baghdad Hob: Antwan Odom Health Addition

The Bengals defense is good.  Some are hoping they will be great.  Which probably depends on the pass rush improving.  Which probably depends on Antwam Odom.  Which clearly depends on his health.  Which conveniently Hob dedicated a whole article to on bengals.com.  Let's take a look:

The comeback trail for Antwan Odom hasn’t been exactly a walk in the park. It’s been more like a marathon through a minefield.

Fraught with peril!

The latest glitch came against Denver Aug. 15 when he reaggravated an old meniscus injury in his knee and he’s been shelved since.

Hmmm, that is somewhat disconcerting. 

That came after he sat out about a week of training camp when he got sick and lost enough weight to drop him to about 250 pounds.

Let's just hope that's water weight mostly.

The bout got Odom a little concerned because that’s not far off where he played in 2008, a season that was disappointing enough that he vowed to show up at about 280 pounds the next year. And it worked. The added weight didn’t hurt his speed but gave him enough strength that he was able to work inside at tackle and cause a bevy of matchup problems.

Am I the only one who thinks maybe Hob shouldn't say, let alone repeat endlessly, how Odom massively increased his weight without losing speed?  Move along folks, nothing to see here.

It helps that he’s sleeping better, too.  One of the reasons that Odom showed up in such great shape last season is he had his sleep apnea diagnosed.

Hob:  sleeping adds muscle.  Fact.

He goes onto say the apnea also triggers occasional narcolepsy, which occurred once while he drove.  Should potential car crash injury be listed as a health concern?

Odom says he’s been able to control it with medication and the machine he uses during the night has also been a big help to monitor the sleep apnea. He says the machine played a role in his sickness because he went for a few weeks not using it because of his travel schedule and it developed bacteria.  “You wake up 10 times an hour, how much sleep are you going to get?” Odom asked.

Sleep apnea sounds fucking awful.

The big question remains the Achilles. This is a guy whose game is built on speed and first-step quickness and they say this type of injury is like an ACL. It will be better in Year Two rather than the first year of rehab.

(cringing)

“So far, so good,” he said.

Recovering achilles.  Aggravated knee.  Sleep apnea.  Driving hazard.  I'm not sure what I found good about any of this. 

Regardless, here's hoping.  No matter Odom's condition the defense will be reliable, which as a Bengals fan I still having trouble adjusting to.

Comments

[JM]

I'm hoping Odom is out of there in 2 years because I am really excited about a Johnson-Dunlap-Atkins-Peko-Sims D-Line rotation.

Are the Bengals finally young and talented at the D-Line position?

Dunlap is a big athletic guy and even though I hate Gators, has talent. Dunlap and Michael Johnson are the kind of guys that you could have imagined the Giants taking. Talented pass rushers who can develop and come in during certain situations at first.

A 3rd down D-Line with Atkins Dunlap and Johnson is good stuff.

Pat Sims is part of a good situation too.

Very good deal for the Bengals on the D-Line in my opinion.

[Dr. Nick]

1. You either have Narcolepsy, or you don't. It's never 'occasional', its the physiological inability to progress from REM sleep into the 'deep' sleep cycle. He should ask Sergio Kindle about it. Fix the apnea and Odom'll no longer be tired.

2. Sleep apnea is most easily dealt with by sleeping on your stomach, and usually a better holistic option - because being hooked up to a darth vader mask every night makes you oh so attractive to whomever you share a bed with.

3. Not cleaning your machine is just plain stupidity on his part - like when my little brother neglected to clean his little electric machine for treating cold sores and after four or five uses it had spread across the entire left half of his lips.

[Wyatt]

Dr. Nick,

Are you retarded? Or 14?

1. Narcolepsy isn't the inability to progress from REM sleep into the "deep" sleep cycle, it's just randomly falling asleep in the middle of a conversation, or while eating, or at some other completely inappropriate time (and by "inappropriate", I mean "when you're not trying to fall asleep). Also, for the record, REM is generally the last step of the sleep cycle, coming *after* delta/deep sleep, and the condition you're talking about is called rapid eye movement behavior disorder. Narcolepsy results because the brain/body slip into REM sleep too soon and disrupt the normal sleep pattern - delta sleep still occurs, but it happens out of sequence, and this wreaks havoc with the affected individual's restfulness. So sleep apnea, which also severely limits a person's ability to reach the delta sleep stage, would create narcolepsy-like symptoms.

2. Sleeping on your stomach is *not* a cure for sleep apnea, nor is it a good holistic option - it misaligns your spine and can cause subluxation (the last 8 weeks of chiropractic treatments convinced me to start sleeping on my back after a subluxated disc in my neck caused me to lose feeling in my left arm). There are several ways to reduce the effects of sleep apnea, from losing weight to having a deviated septum (if present) surgically repaired to using the breathing machine that both Odom and my father (and countless other people) use. And, just for the record, you don't have to wear a "darth vader mask" - my father was having severe claustrophobic bouts with the face mask, so then instead fitted him with a small tube that goes into his nostrils. It's much less conspicuous, and even if it weren't, I'm sure my mother prefers my dad not snoring like a chainsaw in her ear to him not having anything on his face. There's only one "cure" for sleep apnea, and it's neither been proven to be completely effective or disproven to be complete nonsense, and it involves several surgeries on your nasal cavity and both jaws to improve the flow of air throughout your airways. I believe it's a three-step process that takes 18 months or more to complete, so I think the average person is going to wear the mask. My father was actually way worse off than Odom, as he would wake up between 50 and 60 times per hour, making it impossible for him to get any delta sleep (I had to drive him to and pick him up from his sleep study and follow-up, so I got all the dirty details).

3. I actually agree on this point. But you still shouldn't be passing off bad information as good advice.

[king]

you guys are idiots if you think odom is the key to our passrush..i love the guy but he was overrated last season 5 sacks against the packers....hes not a pashrusher but a 3down hard worker ala Justin Smith,Most of his sacks came from not giving up on a play where cornerbacks had great coverage vs just blowing up a tackle...

[Mike H]

On Narcolepsy - Dude's right, you either have it or you dont. And Odom doesnt. I suspect he fell asleep at the wheel because hadnt slept or booze.

On Odom's "Sleep Apnea"- Whether he actually had a sleep study with a diagnosis of sleep apnea, my bet is that it's a convenient diagnosis to help him with any possible legal ramifications. When NFL teams pay a player millions of dollars, and have several doc physicals, wouldnt chronic fatigue to the point of passing out while driving be worked up? I dont buy some chronic sleep apnea story. Oh, and people dont use CPAP (Constant positive airway pressure) machines at night unless they have significant sleep apnea symptoms (which Im sure Odom doesnt) because it's annoying. Perhaps more annoying than Wyatt's post. Not because of some bacteria BS story. Geoff's an dummy.

On Odom being any good - Dont hold your breath. (bad pun intended)