Signature Service Professional Physical Therapy Made Easy

Initials professional physical therapy

we good yeah perfect awesome all right everybody welcome John Hernandez the physical therapist for the LA Rams hey guys doing just me in here but they're all waving they're all saying hi all right so we're super fortunate to have John on I've been really excited for this one all week even it's been a little bit more than a week since we started since we organized this but like I said John is the physical therapist for the Los Angeles Rams and John let's just start with how did you get here tell us just a little bit of background about you and where you are today cool so I'm originally Jersey I'm I started kind of my path to get here when I went to University of Delaware for athletic training school you know I always knew I wanted to do physical therapy and I thought pursuing athletic training would kind of be a means to do it in a more practical manner because usually with that curriculum you can you have a lot of hands-on experience you know work with athletes being in the training room and stuff like that so I decided to take that path you know when I was there I'd heard about NFL internships I'm through the school and a good amount of students from that program went to went on to do internships NFL summer internships so that was always something that interested me so one of the upperclassmen he worked for the Buffalo Bills first summer he actually invited me to come work a game for the Eagles or against the Eagles it was it was Eagles game so I drove up to Philly support the game I met with the bills staff and I kind of expressed my interest in to possibly doing an internship so they asked me to send my resume in I did but unfortunately it was too late they told me that they had to filled all the positions so they didn't have kind of a position for me but they knew someone with the Panthers that would that was looking for a summer intern so I got connected with the Panthers so that was my first NFL kind of experience is to being a summer intern for the Carolina Panthers in 2000 so that kind of sparked my interest in football and you know working in NFL um so when I was graduating Delaware I I kind of had two options it was out to pursue the NFL or go to PT school because the athletic trainer for the bills asked I want to do a seasonal internship when I was offered that um I said you know maybe I'll delay my acceptance to USC I you know I got into USC for PT school and I was kind of based on the decision but he pushed me told me no go to PT school I'm willing to stay in contact you know you never know what happened the future so throughout PT school I stayed in contact with him and at the end of PT school there's another opportunity to do a summer in a year-long internship and you know that actually fell through because I did a sports residency at USC and then when I did the sport residency a position opened up with the bills I kept in contact with the athletic trainer there and you know I interviewed and at the time you know was the NFL but I was pretty invested in in Southern California I had these plans you know go to Hermosa Beach and live by the beach work in a clinic but and I when I interviewed with the Buffalo Bills had a great staff they had great organizational kind of hierarchy there and you know it was pretty welcoming you know although it was in Buffalo you can't really can't let an opportunity like that slip away and you know it was a great opportunity great experience kind of got my foot in the door in the NFL but you know when I was there I figure you know be awesome to be able to do this in Southern California I've owned the USC and I haven't started Grossman Bruce here when I was here so then when I found out the Rams were movements at LA I reached out and crazy enough the head athletic trainer for the Rams was actually my boss Carolina with the Panthers in 2008 so you know kind of building that initial connection my first opportunity the NFL was with Carolina with Freddie Scott who's that ethic transfer the ferocity for the Rams I interviewed with him and you know even having that subtle connection and that small connection working with him for that summer and having a lot of experience with the Buffalo Bills I think help me with a position and you know I was fortunate enough and blessed I get off with the position with the Rams when they move out to LA and then kind of the rest is history here we are now lots of good things from that so a couple things we all laughs when we talked about the Eagles because I'm a huge Philadelphia Eagles fan yeah and John and I we've talked about this in the past or just talking about this earlier what's also interesting is you're from New Jersey I didn't know I'm also from New Jersey again and I also visited a University of Delaware and if I didn't hear back from Penn State I would have went to University of Delaware for my under alien you know you're a little bit older than me I think but close pass very interesting yeah and then you talked about the the networking which a lot of questions really rolled in the past couple weeks and we're gonna get into that later what I want to follow up all that width and I think it's a really hard question to ask because if you're the ask me I I don't know what I would say but have you met your own goal is this your dream job um you know I would say no but I'm very very happy and fortunate to where I'm at right now I think we have a really great staff a great organization to be a part of um it just makes work that much more fun to come to come to you've had an opportunity to work with a great performance staff strength conditioning staff coaching staff it really is cool and I'm really happy where I'm at right now for the future holds you know I don't know you know it's kind of hard to say right now but I just know that right now I'm really trying to focus on becoming a better exhibition I'm just trying to get better really holding the skills to be able to help these guys go out back on the field to maximize our potential and be able to kind of do what you know got them there and make sure they stay that way and you know turn maximize performance to I think one of the cool things I have the opportunity to do here is be able to collaborate with the strengthen auditioning staff they're awesome and I do I learn from them every day um so being able to kind of learn some of those things I think ultimately helps you know with some of the rehabs that I do and conversely you know they're very eager to learn and I try and swap ideas and swap knowledge with them as much as possible because at the end of the day you know we're both here for the players and we're both here to maximize their performance so being able to have one voice one message between our rooms and being able to you know convey the same message and speak the same language is really strong and I think the players have a lot of good buy-in when we're able to kind of have that one place in one message so I would say right now I'm really happy with where I'm at so I just try to be you know the best clinician I can't right now and then and whatever happens later on happens later on I love it and some questions rolled in like are you the only PT on staff we're gonna get into that because I know a lot of other questions all related to how it works how's the staff how's the communication lots of very interesting questions but you talked about working with pros and you talked about how that's the number one goal so a great question that rolled in was how long did it take after PT school until you felt confident enough to work with the pros um it's funny because you know half the PT school I felt like you know I still had a lot to learn I think I feel like a lot of the PT students feel that way when they're done with physical therapy school I think one big thing that really helped me was my sports residency at USC you know I had the opportunity to work in athletic training room built to work with a variety of athletes variety of sports and that also gave the opportunity to be able to kind of use my athletic training knowledge and skills and combine that with my newly-acquired PT skills and kind of combine them both and I guess mesh them so I could be more of a sports medicine clinician and being able to take an athlete you know from that acute initial injury all the way through the rehab - when they're back playing on them playing on the field so that was a very unique opportunity that at least kind of helped spur that on but you know when I got to Buffalo they were so learning curve and you know it was kind of one of those things where you learn on the fly and you know as long as you have a strong background strong foundational background on just what you know and stickin to the basics I'm not trying to do too much really just being an expert in what you know I think that resonates with the players a lot and I think I know one of the questions was you know kind of building buy-in it I'm having the players kind of listen to me I guess I think if you're just really good at what you do and be able to explain the wide everything that you do um you know you kind of build start to build rapport with the players I think that's really important so I would say like I get again I'm still learning you know every position on the field has a different demand on the body it's different movement so I would say just ours was watching practice our we're watching different movements that players go through and just learning from the coaches - I will ask coaches you know what are some drills you go through what are some things that you're looking for what kind of movements - they want to be your girl and proficient in efficient it and I think that kind of helps you know knowing that you're speaking the same language as a player you know taking a TV through some EDD drills and you know what the back panel WL how many steps how many yards and stuff like that I think that really resonates with the players so as the more you know and the common language that you speak I think definitely helps being I guess more comfortable working football players and then at Buffalo were you the only PT on staff I know so there was a PT who was there before me Chris Bocchetti he's still there um so again you know being able to work with pts who have been there for years being able to learn from them and pick their brain about certain things and what their paternal return-to-play progressions are and what their criteria is you know that was equally as important because nothing beats experience and being able to learn from guys who've been there through and through and kind of no positional demands as well and you were just learning the sport I think there's one really important thing just with athletics and sports just learning the movements of your sport whatever it may be lacrosse football baseball basketball like that is kind of entrenched yourself in that sport and speed that common language I think I actually met Chris we were talking about you once fun time oh yeah yeah chris is awesome and for the LA Rams are you the only PT so no um there's also another staff member byron Cunningham he's actually director of rehab in PT ATC as well so again amazing opportunity to be able to learn from him he's been in the game for a very long time so even more so learning some of those returning play progressions that they go through and on-field progressions that I didn't really had a lot of exposure to but they were able to take me under the wing and teach me so that it of itself is you know it that was invaluable to me and kind of just learning more more about football and I think that's the nature of our career is that you're never done learning you're always trying to push the needle and there needs to be this sort of level of like feeling uncomfortable because if you ever get comfortable then you can maybe get stagnant you I feel like you should never be comfortable with your job because if you're comfortable then you're not trying to push it so going into that how is it treating pro athletes is it different than the average patient what are some of the more common injuries you treat what is your biggest challenge treating professional football athletes I just threw like five questions that you have at your time tonight yeah I'll try my best to kind of hit all of them you know as a physical therapist athletic trainer I think the most important thing is just to realize at the end of the day you know these guys are you know pre the same way we breathe you know they have lives or you know human as well so you kind of treat them you know the same you don't give them any kind of special treatment because end of the day certain injuries are the same it's more so their goals are different so you know someone walks into your clinic or into athletic training room and to have a certain injury the principles and the overarching goals are the same in terms of function but based off their position based off what they need to do on the field or on the plane court I think that's what's gonna drive your return to play I think that's something again that you have to engulf yourself in is knowing the sport knowing the language knowing the movements so at the end of the day you know some of there's a lot of similarities with treating I would say the average person you see in a clinic and versus training an athlete but in the days it's very goal-driven you know what do you need to do to get them back to what they want to do um and I think that no stems from the principles of PT school and always being you know goal driven and also being a function driven as well so those are the things I kind of stick to a little bit obviously those are these are big guys you know maybe adjusting making sure you have really good biomechanics and leverage whatever you're doing stuff other than that you know treating them just like a normal person and you know not treating them with any special treatment I think also resonates with them because some of those guys are used to getting this special treatment and I used to kind of people telling them how it is and I think the real er you are with them they actually give you little bit more respect in that regard so I think that's very important regards to that I start what was the other question that's a good question I would say what would you see what would you say are some of the more common injuries that you treat and then what's the biggest challenge um comedy you know it's funny kind of goes in waves you know it's you know just like your normal critic it's like a normal clinic one year you can have a bunch of high ankle sprains one year heal a lot of turf toe one year you get a lot of shoulder injuries and no chronic labral pathology is that linger throughout the season that you need to manage conservatively throughout the season so it really just depends I know this year we had a good amount of ankle um conditions that we were imagining throughout the season so again I think it's more so just being ready for anything and that's the beauty of sports is anything can walk through the door anything can happen on the field when you're run out there so yeah just make sure you you're best prepared for all that stuff and you know I'm just very fortunate to have a great staff around me so you know you're never alone in the rehab so it could be a very unique situation and again you know Byron or Tyler or mark or Reggie can have experience working with that very rare case or diagnosis and you know obviously that helps me and you know I'll be able to shed some light on certain things as well so it really just depends you know on the wave of that year but I think the importance of being able to be ready for anything is real or great question rolled in let's say enter it so J crispy 24 how do you deal with the pressure from the athlete and the team / coach to return athlete to play when the athlete has a lot of money at stake and the team is looking to make a playoff run what a question yeah it's a loaded question I gotta be careful when I say nobody hey you answer it so before you say anything you you answer how you want don't feel pressured yeah yeah at the end of the day you know their health and their well-being as our most important priority regardless of anything else externally that's going on I'm at the end of the day it's all about players safety it's all about you know then being able to protect themselves so if they go through the progression they prove to us that they can't protect themselves they can go through a practice they can do certain things functionally on the house build the case but you know if that's not the case you know we I think we have a very understanding great coaching staff where you know they understand you know those things and you know they don't also don't want to put other players at risk I think one important thing to consider is they if one player is injured that puts other players at risk they're dealing with certain you know certain things that may inhibit their ability or function savory old linemen and you get 50 or 60% of oh no alignment and his task is to be able to protect our quarterback I'm not sure if you even want that and I think that's something that our coaching staff is really good about and you know it's its next man up you know it's being able to trust the other players on your roster to fill in when that's needed again that's you know not our job but I feel like it makes our job a little bit easier when there's a little more understanding of that so again the forefront of what we do and our job is to make sure players are safe and they can protect themselves and then you know if they can't go they can't go we're not gonna force them out there if they're not confident and you know we're not confident as well so we definitely don't push the envelope in that regard but we got some tough nuts on our our roster so some guys will be able to kind of you know lock in when needed but that's also our job to be able to pull in the reins if we don't feel that way as well so it definitely is a team effort and a team decision when it comes down to determining four players will come back regardless of external um kind of you know noise or external situations we try not some good at yeah yeah when that's going on on TV we make sure to mute it or turn it off but that definitely doesn't fog our decision-making you know our 1 priority is player health and we stick to that and it just goes back to you know house treating professional athletes different than your average patient safety I mean that's safety is always at the top with a lot of those things so group dancer I've seen this question roll in twice by the same person I do want to get into the medical staff stuff I know that's something there's a lot of interest there well let's see what you have to say for this person so I'm currently an undergrad and plans to either do pt or 80 this question is from Balaam Alex sorry if I messed anything up I work for the Astros organization and in the works to be an intern for their double-a team what tips do you have for a woman in the field this is interesting because we were talking about this before we got on call so you know what I think that my main thing is don't get fixated about you know being a female in the profession or in that organization I feel like you know you just go in and do your job so regardless if you're male or female I feel like your job speaks for you so regardless of that situation um being very confident in your skills and being able to maximize and learn from the opportunity I think is important regardless if you're a male or female you know I don't think there there should be any you know special treatment because you know that means there's inequality and I think that if you know equality is the goal just with everything in sports and you know anything like that um you know the standards are the same so I feel like you know you I be very proficient at your job so also do what got you there you know you know I don't think you got there because you're a female you got there because you're skilled clinician so as long as you keep that up I think that will definitely help you and your career path I love it so now let's talk about this we were you mentioned a couple things about the staff the line of communication how that streamlining optimal performance for the athletes let's talk about the staff so how do you maintain communication with the entire medical team if you want to elaborate who exactly is the medical team where do you see your seats and then maybe even you can touch on previous and previous experiences how you would compare maybe the Rams to the bills if you want to talk about that or maybe some of those internships in the past or what you know about the medical team in that communication board across the spectrum of the NFL um so yeah so Reggie ready Scott he's our head ethnic trainer and also co-director performance um so he kind of oversees our room as well as with strength conditioning there's also a co-director performance Ted Roth he's a head shrink conditioning coach so they you know kind of tag-team the performance staff and that's you know us strength conditioning Dietetics and player engagement and then you know with our staff directly with the medical staff we have myself PT ATC Iron County am director of rehab PTC Tyler Williams coordinator sport science athletic trainer market ASCO athletic trainer you know that that's kind of our main team we have to seasonal interns that we have throughout the season to kind of help out with day to day things as well there's also three other assistant strength conditioning coaches so you know our staff you know a lot of a lot of other teams I think the trend is to get more clinicians in the athletic training room I know some teams that we're treating all the with two or three people and some interns I think now the trend is to be able to improve the ratio of player to clinician and being able to make sure that they have the resources to you know have some hands-on care or something like that you know things of that manner so I think that's definitely what the pushes is going to be is to have a more clinicians on staff to be able to provide that care so you know I think that's across the board that's the trend we're seeing is that there are more clinicians you know all the staffs just to be able to provide you know more efficient care every team is different every team works differently I can okana least become what I've be able to work for I know Buffalo is you know pretty similar they've kind of changed a little bit in regards to numbers but when I was there was you know four of us or yeah it was four of us so again four of us with about three interns and to mentor two or three interns so it's also just a matter of efficiency you know regardless of who you have on your staff you know staffs are able to do this for years with you know three people so being able to just be efficient with your with your tasks and your duties isn't so much you can eat all these numbers to do your job I think you're just really efficient with your job you can find the most optimal ways get the player care that they need but also cover you'll practice and be able to do the day-to-day stuff in the training room as well so I think that's really kind of the thing that sets us apart some of that efficiency and you mentioned in turn strengthen conditioning interns as well as the 80 interns strength auditioning interns I believe they usually have one but you know I'm not exactly sure I know for us we definitely have to alter them yeah and then athletic trainer interns as well all you see I'm sorry I just add the neck training interns okay okay yeah yeah just add a fly so I was gonna dive into that because a lot of the questions were like do you take DPT interns you know are there NFL clinical rotations for PT students right I'm not yet you know that's something that's always been an interest for me and I think that's something that hopefully you know we be able to do down the road but right now though I think it's more so because you know we've been in them in the city for three years it feels like I've been here for a long time I think it's also giving our time giving us time to get our settle in a little bit and um you know what we do and once we get pretty comfortable with where we're at I think expanding that might be in the works but you know that's something that kind of goes year by year no can't say can't speak on anything but definitely something we'd like to do and then John I don't think we've mentioned this yet but you are a physical therapist do you also hold your athletic training license as well I do yeah yeah okay so I was able to do that Alma now is a Delaware when I was an undergrad but now I know now the licensure has changed to be a master's so for athletic training you have to do a master's to be able to sit to the test and to become certified so it just makes it a tad tougher to be able to be dual credentialed now because you'd have the from what I believe you have to go through undergrad and then you have to do your masters to get your athletic training degree and certification as well as PT school I know there are a lot of schools out there that are trying to combine those two fields and kind of have a kind of straight line through seven years and be able to get both um I don't know which programs those are I know those exists so that's not be something to look into you for um got people who are just interested in you know pursuing that now and do you feel like you have to be dual credential in or the work in the NFL or no do you know if he's in NFL that are that are not ATC's I do um I do and you know I think it's more so than being exposed and having experience with athletes and you know again being proficient and what they do and you know their their skills and their body of work speaks for themselves so I don't think it's necessarily a matter of you have to be dual identity when I fell I I think their body of work speaks for itself and I think that's what ultimately got them you know their positions in the NFL so no I wouldn't say it just leans on that a little bit but you know I think just having experience in the athletic training room and knowing how the athletic training room works is really important it's a whole different dynamic than a clinic and you know I urge those who are looking or interested in the field is just to get as much explosion as they can in the athletic trainer because you know it operates a little differently than the clinic it isn't hour-long or 30 minute long you know patient interaction sometimes it's cream three people at a time I miss hustle and bustle you have to work around a schedule get the work we're gonna practice so there's a lot of there's a lot of things that go into it that I feel like experience you wouldn't be able to experience unless you actually got your feet wet you know in that setting so you know being able to do that expose yourself to that I think is real important just even just figure out if it's really something you want to do the hours a lot different the grind is a little bit different so if you get your experience in there I think you can start to sort through a little bit of how you feel like you can fit in operate and just even figure out if this for you yeah I tell everyone because there's always students and observers that roll in into our clinic and you don't know until you get your feet wet you just have to get exposure because you may really think you like something until you get exposure you just don't know you probably were always some of the differences are there any similarities between the LA Rams let's say that flight training room as well as where you treat compared to your average orthopedic and sports clinic you know yeah um you know there there are certain times I think the one thing that might set it apart is sometimes some of the acuity of the injuries that you see I mean being able to manage those throughout the week and throughout the season it's a little different than some of those you know things that come in that are post surgical cases or chronic cases so I think that's the main difference I think the similarity is you know with cases that are long term say someone I know it does have a surgical procedure done and rehabbing them and now you do there are no times during the year and during the day but you do have dedicated time you know with a player for 45 minutes to an hour so I think in that regard the similarity is you know it is you know there are aspects that are like a clinic so just depending on the situation on who's injured at the time so I think you know there is a similarity in regard so you will see similar cases I mean you know you're gonna you know you're gonna see a post surgical ACL repair as well you would see that in the clinic - so um you know that those cases don't change I think it's more so if some of the acuity of some of the injuries that you have to manage throughout the throughout the week to get the sunday is probably a little different um but you do see similar cases when it comes to rehabilitation you know that's the same stuff I was seeing you know when I was working as a PT soo and I was like Kaiser in Glendale so you know some of those cases and some of those you know even exercise yessuh some of those things your stuff I still use so it's not a completely foreign um field or area to be in our similarities but it's something that's different I think you definitely exposure to so this is a great question that rolled in and how closely do you work with the team Doc's I'm curious because you talk about maybe some of these really acute cases right and it's it happened on the past some day you have maybe a week to try to get that lis ready for the game on Sunday so they're working with you but I'm curious how involved is the team doc with some of these acute cases maybe some of those chronic cases - tell us a little bit about maybe an experience you've had or you could give an example of you have one week or less to try and get an athlete you ready for a game it's in season this example of course but how much are you talking to the team doc who's all involved as athletic trainers involved are the strength coaches involved the coach themselves tell us a little bit you know say say you know a typical you know not typical injury but just eight injury occurs usually evaluation be done you know on the field then when the dust settles and after the game it'd be another evaluation and then on the next day there'd be another evaluation the team Doc's are involved and reg is involved as well and you know they determine the severity they determined you know is this something that you can come back you in a week and if not um you know they kind of provide that a little bit of Intel on that it's kind of our job to you know meet those things and you know a lot of it to throughout the week is to kind of prove again to us that they're safe and they can protect themselves while on the field so although we're treating some of the symptoms and their pain and making sure they can get to Sunday also you want to make sure their function is good as well so be able to track that throughout the week being able to take them through unnecessarily testing but just take them through some dynamic activities they're very position specific just to make sure that they can do that even participating in practice um I think is real important for us to see as well and then you know depending on the case I mean there's so many different cases you know that the sound can be you know that Friday this you can be down Saturday because this decision can be made on Sunday it just really depends on the situation but you know it's it definitely a team effort and a group effort everyone's involved everyone's in the loop and you know the strengths that isn't directly you know in the room but we also have to disseminate that information to them to make sure they know what's going on what the player can do they still don't need to get some lifts in and kind of focus on what they can do as opposed to what they can't do so if they can do certain things you want to get them moving throughout the week so that that's something that you know everyone's really a part of and again it really is a team effort when it comes to managing the players especially during the week making sure everyone on the same page and I think I think that the players it'll kind of realize that there when or they realize when everyone's on the same page so we make sure that we are on the same page and that's of chief importance is to make sure that we can convey that to the player so again there's a lot of variants in it but at the end of the day it is a matter of safety and you know if they feel confident and safe that that's kind of the two things that we go off of I love it I think the safety pushing the safety everyone can relate to that that's important much more important than ESPN and fantasy football yeah good one though though is currently the offseason a lot of questions came in about what's what's life like as a NFL physical therapist during the offseason what about preseason what about in season if you could just give a little insight as to those three different scenarios how they're similar how they're different we would love to hear it almost right now during the offseason we have guys coming in who you know how to sublinear issues or some postseason surgeries what kind of to take them through their rehab in a couple weeks players will come back and start doing workouts a couple weeks from then around May then we start doing some activities with coaches and they start going through some drills and do some practices and then in tune when many camp starts those are a little more kind of organized practices there's a little bit of a break and then training camp training camp is basically when the season starts that's basically that's when seven days a week starts you know starting in mid-july and it goes until you know hopefully you'd hope February but you kind of prepare yourself for a week by week I'm search during training camp you know you have practices for the most part every given two or three straight practices a little day off but again you know the days our guys come in for treatment they go to meetings we take care of guys that have you know longer term conditions get ready for practice so you do prehab you do on taping you do all sorts of things it kinda breaks practice and then you go cover practice you know that's just more so for coverage of you know acuity of injuries making sure there's hydration for the players and just kind of covering the field just to make sure that you know you're staying in tune with some players who might be you know might be hurt but you just want to keep tabs on them and make sure that they do it okay and making sure no one has heat illness or you know being the kept set early on on between cramping and checking hydration levels that's real important especially during training camp during those hot months um or hot weeks and then after that you know we get into the season seasons a little bit more you know organized obviously week by week you have practice days you have practice days and then you have a day off for player day off book that's more important more so just a treatment day for us so it's not really a day off and you know kind of goes to the week until Sunday so like I said once training camp it's it's kind of a seven seven day grind throughout the week but you know it's something that doesn't even really I guess phase me because again you know you're working to Sunday and it just a lot of fun and he kind of keep engaged and I'm blessed to have a really great staff that I work with so it doesn't feel like work whenever I come into that athletic training room it's just fun and I think that's one thing I'm very grateful for is that every day is fun and you know every day is it's a challenged in regards to you know being able to challenge myself to be you know better clinician and learn every day whether it's from work or the player or you know be able to collaborate with other staff members or strings interesting members yeah I think that's a really cool thing that makes those seven days feel like not too much of a crime even though it isn't around it makes it real enjoyable I think sometimes when people hear that or see that it's pretty daunting but um I think if it's something that you love definite doesn't feel that way that's awesome so I think we have about 15 minutes 20 minutes or so and a lot of other questions rolled in let's just hit these as quick as we can and then I think the question that I want to finish off with is some words of wisdom because there's definitely people that are tuned in now there's people that one - tune in later and it's all about how how did they try to steal your job because people won but no honestly we're gonna get into some words of wisdom how can someone get into your shoes but let's hit some of these questions okay and then like I said you can answer them as honestly as you want you can also save the fur what's your favorite or most common modality to use I think it's your favorite modality yet you love the bfr Oh drew the games the be a fireman nice that's the Delphi system yeah yeah yeah so we're real big fans of that I you know we see great progressions and great results from it I definitely think it's something that you could use the Eddie phase of the real Ernie phase of rehab rather than to post-surgical whether it's a cue whether it's a chronic issue whether it's more power range of motion or strength or activation I think it's so multifaceted in excuses that it's definitely you know a mainstay in a lot of our rehabs and just be able to incorporate some of that stuff so I would definitely say that's you know one big thing that we like and you like to kind of push the limit a little bit as well and just to see how we use it especially it comes to recovery um recovery is a big thing in sports athletics also payments and maximize that I think is definitely important um so I need any modality that and you know kind of enhances recovery we're also kind of big into as well so whatever we can do to help the turnover um for players to be able to get to Sunday and be able to get to the links back and um getting back to kind of kind of neutral before they play in your kind of that that wear and tear takes its toll on their body I also - it's you know a long season I you know we were fortunate enough to have a really long season I'm up until the Super Bowl so that's uncharted territory for a lot of players I mean that's something rare probably Brady and Gronk and all those doing them guys are used to you know they're probably only ones used to it because they do it almost every year so I think you know being able to provide those options to provide those things for our players is definitely important I love bfr and like you said about the recovery lots of really cool stuff coming out about it with recovery and it's just that perfect modality for in season I mean you're talking about a grueling sport when it comes to what it does to the body but you have to keep your body in shape for the sport so to use something you can try to maintain and help recovery without taking extra hits to your joints to your ligaments yes to connective tissue I mean it's I'm sure it's open the door and how professional sports teams are training in season so I love it I'm all for it yeah yeah we answered a couple of these okay this was a good one and I'm curious because you said a photo of you actually running on the field it was at the Super Bowl so if I were you I'd be running out on the field every chance I got but who how and what determines if you treat a player or the 80 does um so I think the great thing you know with our staff is everyone's very capable and able to you know provide the best care and very efficient care so I don't think it's more so a matter of one's more qualified than the other I think it's more so you know the rapport with the player do you feel comfortable they feel comfortable with I think that's more important and also to we you know will collaborate with each other and you know just come okay and something comes up but you know we don't pigeonhole ourselves and you know the PT does this a T does that it's very equally spread out between our staff members which is great because you know everyone is more is overqualified to be able to do on what we do in regards to rehab you know the treatment of players so you know if they don't like the segment on each other it's a you know you only do this you only do that um you know I again we have a great staff that can do it all um or do most of it so you know we trust each other to be able to do that stuff I love it it's a team sport a question rolled up earlier in here and it was asking do you or maybe have you in the past had the work with players that like to see their their personal guy and do players to actually follow your recommendations I think any PT or PT student that's is a listening in right now or that will listen in later you can always tell who's listening and who's not who's who's actually doing what you want them to do so I'm sure you can tell but do you have any funny stories about that um you know not someone I think I think in general you know what that sort of thing I think it's again you kind of get down to the buy-in and I think you get down to again treating them like a normal person having normal conversations with them if you talk down to them and try and use this big language and try and do all this extra stuff that it makes you seem smart or makes you seem you know like you know all this stuff you know sometimes you can lose some of the attention of your players I think if you just converse with your players and build rapport from up you know just a personal level and be able to have normal conversations with them I think is real important because building that rapport helps with buying it isn't so much you know how much you know it's more so how much can you kind of convey the message to them in a relatable sense it isn't so much that oh no I have experiments you know I have experienced doing this I've experienced doing that it's like now how can you convey that message to them but they understand and they also explain the why I said I think that's real important because you know players are inquisitive they'll ask me that real me all the time why am I doing this want me doing that I think being able to explain why you're doing something I mean always having a reason for everything that you're doing also again fortify some of that rapport with your player because then they don't even you're not biessing them I think that they can sniff out BS pretty well you know as long as you're pretty confident what you're doing and also having the humility to be able to admit you know you don't know certain things I think that's also something that goes a long way and you know being able to defer to other people when you don't know something you know what I earn if I don't know something about a certain progression on the field I'll go to Tyler when it comes to not knowing something with sports science or some other player tracking that we do so again it's it's more so just being real and upfront and straight and straightforward with the players I think that definitely helps with some of the buy-in and and some of the you know foundational blocks you can stack up to help build a rapport with players so I think that's that's definitely important and that goes back to it's a team effort when it comes to the medical staff who who works with who it's almost like giving giving some control to the players as well because they may get better by in working with a certain individual I mean the SIBO effector whether you want to call it or that call it that or not it is strong here's a good question I'm curious any outside certifications or experiences you have done that you would recommend or that you would say have helped prepare you for your current position I think really the most the biggest thing was really my sports residency I think anyone who has interest in athletics who was pursuing a physical therapy degree or physical therapy certification or what have you I think that was real important is just to get you know specialized education in what you're trying to get into you know I have really great mentors John Mayer to marco's they do it Russ Romano Paul D as a PDS they all really helped my development as you know someone pursuing sports and athletics they have more experience than me they have experience working with different sports so wasn't just apologists even being able to break down athletic movement I mean that's a whole come that's a completely different thing than you know normal adls you know so even just knowing those things and learning from them I think was really important so if anything I think you know looking into residency's or fellowships just getting more specialized education in that and you know finding great mentors that are doing what you're doing you know you want to do X you have to know someone is doing X and shadow them and observe and do all sorts of things that you can do just to learn as much as you can because that stuff is invaluable and again I don't want to stress that this enough is just having experience and being able to learn from other people that are just you know better than you I think that's something that ultimately helps you and surrounding yourself with people like that will ultimately help you in your career but again you just have to be just be entrenched and just be around it because that's you'll kind of get your mind working and you know seeing certain things that you may not be able to be exposed to I'm in other settings I think is really helpful and it really helped me just being able to observe I'm just be able to see what my mentors are able to do and you know then again asking questions one to thought process of this then again putting it together I think was really important for my development it definitely something that um I know for sure that I'll never forget regards to how much it helped me um pursuing you know athletics and just be a sport sponge yeah I would say so building off of that you talked a little bit about I mean you just you just tapped into someone that wants to aspire to be in your shoes you've talked a little bit about that we talked about in the beginning some of those networking things if you had say that you're in an elevator someone walks in you're wearing a Rams ollo and they're like oh you work for the Rams they find out you're a physical therapist your floors coming up and they want to know what's what's your advice how do they get there how do you keep it short and concise I'm sure this comes up all the time yeah yeah yeah um I think it just kind of goes to finding ways to just be around it and finding ways to be in the environment that you want to be in just being familiar with that and also just you know even if it's not observing I think some people might get caught up in you know I want to go and observe and I want this that well sometimes just get your foot in the door you just have to be able to offer you know hey it'll all work or all you know do whatever you need me to do just to be around it I think being willing and having the ability just to be able to do that in order to expose yourself to that is something that you know I think is real you know important you know when I when I was in PT school I didn't want to lose some of my athletic training knowledge or skill set you know so after class I would take the bus main campus and I would volunteer with a recreational sports athletic training program and just see students at USC and just treat them eval them and just kind of use those skills while I was in my neuro rotation so although I was in minor rotation I was still trying to keep up with my athletic training knowledge and skills and just kind of again immersing myself in that environment I'm just so I didn't you know lose some of that you know that knowledge or just being again being around it so I again I think that's just real important and just being able to know volunteer when you can and you know being able to do some of that you know work that you know other people aren't willing to do just to be able to pose yourself that that I think is real or and then someone asks a question earlier and I feel like you've answered it it's how do you balance normal life with PT life as an NFL physical therapist and I think when you when you love what you do and you're surrounded by it all the time I think it's an easy balance you know it's all perspective you know it's someone on the outside may not be able to relate to how does he do that pre-season but to you it's it may be the best time of the year absolutely again just kind of reiterating the fact that I'm just so fortunate and blessed to be able to do what I do because it doesn't feel like work it just feels like you know yeah it doesn't feel like work you know I come into work every day I never dread it and I think that something is a more so a testament to the culture that we have you know around here I think it's just so important to you know if you are PT you know looking for you know something um you know just making sure you in a good environment making sure the culture is right making sure that um those thing are in place before you pick where you want to work I think is real important it just makes work that much easier and like you said perspective it's all about perspective and you know I just very grateful for the opportunity that I have to be able to work here so I try my hardest I work my hardest field to make sure I stay here so that's definitely something I don't take great and just to wrap everything up it's it goes back to that networking and I think being a squeaky wheel we talked a little bit about it before we got online but you know for someone in your in your position a physical therapist in the National Football League someone may think like wow you know I can't believe he's there I wonder how he did it but for someone so successful at a young age I'm sure there's times where you've been where you know someone told you said and someone told you no or you didn't get what you wanted where it wasn't always ideal any and then you even mentioned right like you had to turn down some of those opportunities and some of those internships would what kept you motivated um I think what really kept me motivated is just you know having an urge to continue to be a or the pursuit of trying to be a proficient clinician I kind of I love the process of you know just trying to get better you know I I don't think I'm a great clinician I think I'm always striving to be a great great clinician I think that kind of helps me keep motivated it's something that internally motivates me is just to make sure I'm putting out the best product for our players because our players rely a lot on us so I think it's you know only right then it's up to us to be able to be the best conditions we can be for these players because they do rely a lot on us so that internal motivation to you know almost not let them down you know we want to make sure that we provide the best care we give them the resources to maximize their performance and maximize their rehab so I think the internal motivation of just not laying them down and making sure we're the best version of ourselves is really an important driver you know for all of us I think we're all internally motivated to be able to do that and you know I think our players appreciate that as well as you know ultimately and you know as a physical therapist I like trainer we're there for our patients we're there for them you always put them above ourselves so I think as long as you have that kind of that servant mentality we're here to serve you we're here for you you'll always be internally motivated because when someone is kind of relying on you you don't want to let them down so you just want to make sure that you provide the best care that you can I think that's why we got into the profession you know I don't think anyone would go to become a health professional and PT 80 unless they want to serve other people and take care of other people and I think that's you know one common theme you know for anyone healthcare anyone who's pursuing that field is you know you're here to serve other people in here to take care of other people so as long as you have the internal motivation and that internal drive you know you'll keep going for a long time and like we talked about in the beginning I asked you if this was your dream job and you said no so I think that's yeah yeah John how can people find you if anyone is interested in chatting with you I'm sorry if you get tons of messages and emails but how can I own you now it's all good um you know you're more than welcome to I know my um my Instagram handle is on here hold and welcome to you know send me messages or you know I'll try and get back to them as best I can um that probably the best way really um you know any questions I can I can answer I worlds the best of my ability so you know I'm here as a again servant I'm here I'm here for you guys you know I want to make sure that um kind of kind of help whoever's watching and hopefully I can help one person they can do whatever so I don't mean for you guys awesome well thank you so much for everyone who joined in for all the great questions maybe have some friends in here that are asking how you get AB shot some good questions coming in I came in from before they asked if he was still always a blue hand what's up lu han lu han that is Delaware's mascot Kelly Stafford thank you for that question yes I am still Blue Hen at heart I'm blue hand and in Trojan I can do I can be both cannon absolutely if I don't all right John thank you so much this is awesome cool things guys yeah