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Friday, Nov. 06, 2009

James Burns: Erik's new headache is Atwater

The ball hit the turf, stopping near the linemen's feet, baiting quarterback Erik Martin.

He had only one option: pick up the fumble and run -- straight into the teeth of the Golden Valley defense.

Instincts took over.

Mom and Dad had to have cringed as Martin bolted forward, scooped up the ball and darted through a crease in the defense.

Within seconds, he was hit hard from all directions, his first such collision since being leveled by a blind-side blitzer from St. Mary's on Sept. 25.

Martin suffered a concussion that night. The injury, with its dizzy spells, headaches and nausea, called into question his football future.

"It's my brain," he said.

Eventually, the symptoms faded away and Martin was cleared to return to the football field against Golden Valley on Oct. 16.

Los Banos is 2-0 since his return, and can move one step closer to a Central California Conference championship tonight against Atwater.

The Burn List caught up with Martin to rap about the big game, the big hit and his big decision.

TBL: Let's start with the obvious question: Big game this week, huh?

EM: Oh, this is a really big game. In the preseason, over the summer, we thought the big teams were going to be Merced and Pitman, but Atwater went and beat both of them. So this becomes a bigger game than we ever imagined it would be. They're good. They just took out Merced, which had won 21 straight (CCC) games.

TBL: Be honest, were you a little bummed it wasn't you celebrating a conference victory over Merced? A little envious that moment went to Nate Sanchez and Atwater?

EM: Yeah ... I'd have to say yeah. I was out with a concussion (when Los Banos played Merced) and that made it even worse.

I wish I could have been the one to take them down, but...

I didn't play and Sanchez did -- and he played good.

TBL: What did you think of that final drive? Do you ever allow yourself to become a fan of the team you're scouting?

EM: He was good. He did what he had to do. That last pass was nice. It's fun for me to watch other people do good. I'm not jealous of anyone.

TBL: You mentioned the concussion. It's been three weeks since your return. How are you feeling?

EM: I'm feeling good. Really good, actually. Not dizzy. Not feeling any headaches. I'm back to 100 percent.

It was different than any other injury I've ever had, because you don't know what's going on up there. With a leg, you can judge it. You can say, "Oh, this hurts." With a head, you never really know. All you know is that it's serious and it could hurt you the rest of your life.

It's scary, but once I'm on the field I just play. It's not going to make me slide or anything. I'll still go heads-up with people.

TBL: You know your mom's going to cringe when she reads this, right?

EM: It's all good.

TBL: What do you remember from the hit against St. Mary's, if anything at all?

EM: I got hit in the head. I hit the floor. I kind of blacked out for a second. I was dizzy and didn't want to move. I guess I walked off the field sideways. I don't even remember the game. I don't even remember being there. For the next two weeks, I walked around dizzy.

TBL: Looking back, are you glad that you were patient with your recover? You could have lied to doctors and parents and returned to the field sooner.

EM: I'm happy.You're right, I could have lied to my parents and doctors -- and I thought about doing that. But this is my brain. I love football and everything, but this is my brain and I needed to take care of it.

If I wasn't 100 percent, I wasn't going to play. I made the decision.

TBL: Back to the game and Atwater.

EM: They work well as a team, but I think our team is getting there. We showed that against Pitman last week.

We haven't had the games we had last year. We're not averaging like 30 points per game or whatever, but we're still coming out with the wins. It's only a matter of time before our offense clicks.

James Burns is sports editor of the Sun-Star. He can be reached at jburns@mercedsun-star.com.