Just how big is the Sidney Crosby concussion/neck story?
It came up at Super Bowl Media Day.
The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review caught up with Patriots QB Tom Brady on Tuesday and asked him about Alex Guerrero, a Utah-based physical therapist he recommended to Crosby through a mutual friend.
(The Trib also reports Brady and Crosby are buddies, which is equal parts awesome and adorable. It’s like a modern-day ProStars!)
“I trust him,” Brady said of Guerrero, who helped the reigning NFL MVP recover from a knee injury three years ago. “I know I wouldn’t be here today without him.”
Crosby made an unannounced trip to Utah to see Guerrero in between visits to Atlanta to see Dr. Ted Carrick (a chiropractic specialist) and Los Angeles to see Dr. Robert S. Bray (a neurological spine specialist that revealed Crosby had fractured vertebrae in his neck.)
In a 2009 Boston Globe article, Guerrero is described as Brady’s personal trainer who “spent the winter months [of 2008] in Southern California directing the quarterback’s rehab.”
Part of Brady’s trust in Guerrero is probably because, after tearing the ACL and MCL in October, the knee was back at full strength by February.
More, from the Globe:
[Brady] also did plenty of core work. And he continued with an innovative shoulder program that he and Guerrero devised, something that’s off the board enough that Guerrero politely declined to describe it. What he would say was that Brady’s diligence with that work is a big reason the quarterback says he no longer gets the arm soreness he did earlier in his career.
To Guerrero, Brady’s ability to sustain the kind of hit Albert Haynesworth laid on him in the preseason - crumpling the quarterback under 350 pounds - was proof positive that the quarterback’s hard work was paying off. If he’d just worried about rehabbing his knee, the result might’ve been uglier. Because he worked his shoulder and core, it wasn’t.
What Guerrero called “the transformation’’ came in Week 4, when the Ravens visited Foxborough, and Brady completed 66 percent of his passes for 258 yards, a touchdown, and no picks.
“His confidence with his body was back, you could see it,’’ Guerrero said. “He’s totally confident with the program, how the knee feels, how his arm feels, how he’s going to feel after the game.”
That season, Brady was named the NFL’s Comeback Player of the Year.