MLB's Ryan Freels suffers outrageous collision

I am going crazy here looking for a video of Ryan Freel’s collision today. Did you see that?

Freel collided strepitously against teammate Norris Hopper after trying to catch a “fly” by Humberto Cota at the start of the inning. Unbelievebably enough he did catch it and the Reds did win this game against the Pittsburg Pirates after all. Even Hopper was able to continue playing. But Freel knocked himself unconscious, crumbled down strepitously and laid on the field for 13 scary minutes.

Paramedics took Ryan Freel out the field in stretcher after examining him and left everyone speechless and fearing the worst. Luckily, according to recent news, the team announced he regained the feeling in his legs and was able to speak coherently discarding any important brain damage that might have impaired him permanently.

This 31 yr. old fielder could’ve died today in such a nasty collision. He is still hospitalized and obviously suffered contusions to his head and neck and I might add myself it is a true miracle how he’s not seriously injured. It would’ve been definitely a dreadful moment in sports.

But this comes as no surprise: Ryan Freel has been dubbed as ‘reckless and dangerous’ in the field. He’s outdone himself before on the catches: Quoting Mark Sheldon from Reds.com here’s a description of one of his famous crazy catches …“Mind-bending catch: Not surprisingly, right fielder Ryan Freel's spectacular diving catch on the warning track Tuesday night vs. St. Louis remained a buzzworthy topic Wednesday. It was also prominently featured on television highlight shows”...

It is ironic to think that Freel himself was the go-to-guy whenever the injury-ridden Reds in 2004 needed him as an emergency backup catcher and he was always up to the task. It is now Ken Griffey Jr.’s turn to replace him, while Freel recovers.

Not a very lucky guy I’d say. Or maybe he is. If this scares him enough it might even be a life turning event. Remember Ryan Freel is the same guy who was arrested twice for DUI charges in 1 year and told the police he was ‘unemployed’ when pulled over. He got away by paying a $250.00 bond. Maybe he’ll quit drinking or quit sports. I wouldn’t do either, but it was just a suggestion.

Sources:

http://redlegnation.com/2005/03/03/ryan-freel-is-a-sub/feed/

http://espndeportes.espn.go.com/news/story?id=562973&s=bei&type=story

http://cincinnati.reds.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20060809&content_id=1601043&vkey=news_cin&fext=.jsp&c_id=cin

http://www.red-hot-mama.com/humanleague.php?id=C0_23_3