It’s no secret that a plethora of professional teams utilize chiropractic treatments for their players–and NFL teams are no exception. All but one of the 32 teams in the NFL utilize the services of a chiropractor as part of the triage in managing and preventing injuries. Teams want their players healthy; they want to get their money’s worth. Longevity on the playing field is paramount, because for every year a player remains competitive, millions of dollars may be earned. Today, athletes, their agents, athletic trainers, and medical doctors understand the consequences of disabling the pain mechanism and have come to align themselves with the chiropractic perspective — treat the cause of the pain. Players both past and present, such as Jerry Rice, Willie McGinest and Jerome Bettis, understand and experience first-hand the significance of chiropractic in a player’s career.
Below is an interview with one of the official NFL chiropractors–Dr. Michael Miller. Almost a quarter-century ago, Dr. Miller became the official chiropractor of the New England Patriots. Since that time, he’s treated hundreds of players, watched ownership of the team change hands three times, and seen the Patriots go from one of the worst franchises in the National Football League to a team for the ages, winning three of the past four Super Bowls – including a 24-21 victory over the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl XXXIX in February 2005.
Dr. Miller sat down with Michael Devitt of Dynamic Chiropractic to discuss his work with the NFL and personal insights on treating some of the country’s best atheletes.
Do you travel with the Patriots during road games, or do you just work at home games at Gillette Stadium?
My position with the Patriots involves me being present during mini-camps, training camp, preseason games, regular-season games (both home and away), and postseason games.
Did you get to go to the Super Bowl? What was that experience like?
The first Super Bowl win following the 2001 season was the most exhilarating and exciting one for me, only because I had been working with the team for many years, and I had experienced two championship seasons where we won the AFC [conference championship], but did not win the Super Bowl. [The first Super Bowl win] climaxed at the end, with Adam Vinatieri’s field goal winning it in the last few seconds.
It was very exciting. Emotionally, it’s something that can only be likened to the emotional feeling on my wedding day, or at the birth of my children. It brought tears to my eyes just to be able to jump up in the air and know we’d finally won the biggest event the NFL sponsors. Since then, we’ve won two other Super Bowl championships. The Kraft family [the team owners] has done everything in its power to offer the players any benefits they can as far as treatments or anything they feel would be beneficial to the players becoming successful on the field. [They] decided a chiropractor should go on road trips with the team. With the presence of chiropractic, in the case of someone who was having musculoskeletal problems, you could address the situation on the field, see the player in the locker room, before, during or after the game, and the rehabilitation process would allow the player to remain active and become a contributing force on the team.
As a matter of fact, as a result of that, Romeo Crennel, who was the defensive coordinator for the Patriots and just became head coach of the Cleveland Browns, informed the chiropractor on [the Browns] that he now expects him to go on road trips with the team, as the Patriots have done. [Romeo] felt that the Patriots’ head coach knew and understood that this is an important force to be dealt with, and that it gave an edge over other teams that didn’t use chiropractors on their away games.
When did you start going on road games with the team?
Approximately 10-11 years ago.
On average, how many players do you treat in a given week during the regular season? Do you also see any players between games?
During the games, I see an average of at least 40 players, coaches, and other personnel who are affiliated with the team. I would say just about 90 percent get chiropractic services, because the present coaching staff of the Patriots has almost mandated chiropractic care with the players. The coaches speak about it at team meetings, as the new players and rookies come into the team in the preseason. During mini-camps, they explain the significance of chiropractic, and that we have a chiropractor who has had phenomenal results in dealing with injuries and preventing them from occurring, and that they would like the players to proactively be treated [by] me and begin a chiropractic course of care.
So, you’re at the stadium several hours before kickoff, already working on players?
Yes. And then during the game, if anything were to occur other than something mild that we could correct on the field, we generally would bring the player into the locker room and see what we could do.
What types of conditions do you see most frequently with the football players? Do you have any success stories you could share about working on certain players?
We treat a myriad of different problems, from cervical spine injuries to “stingers” and “burners,” where the players have numbness and pain radiating into the upper extremities. We treat them for migraine headaches, shoulder and brachioradiculitis problems, where there’s some irritation from the cervical spine into the upper extremities. We treat them for thoracic problems, lumbar spine sprains and strains, sciatic nerve irritation, and different extremity problems that may occur during the season. We’ve had to do extremity adjustments on the temperomandibular joint in the jaw. We’ve done shoulders, ankles, toes, knees, fingers – you name it. Any part of the body that’s been exposed and injured, we check, and they do get significant results with it.
Georgia Clinic of Chiropractic successfully treats atheletes with a wide range of conditions, from sports injuries to more chronic conditions such as back pain, neck pain, and IT Band Syndrome. Georgia Clinic of Chiropractic is humbled to be the only chiropractic clinic in the Augusta area to offer treatments with real-time digital anaylsis that directly treats extremities, such as a wrist, a knee or a foot.
Georgia Clinic of Chiropractic is conveniently located off Furys Ferry Rd in Martinez, Georgia and provides quality chiropractic care to the Augusta, Martinez, and Evans communities. To schedule an appointment, call (706) 814-5053 or schedule an appointment online at www.georgia-clinic.com.
