49ers investigating wild conspiracy theory that could be contributing to injuries
This is crazy to read.
The San Francisco 49ers’ season is over, but this offseason will go slightly different than those in the past.
Per ESPN’s Nick Wagoner, the 49ers are investigating a conspiracy theory that has really gained traction over the last couple of weeks: The team is investigating whether or not the electrical substation near the facility is contributing to the extreme rash of injuries over the years.
“Because it deals with allegedly the health and safety of our players, I think you have to look into everything,” John Lynch told reporters in his end-of-year presser. “We’ve been reaching out to anyone and everyone to see [if] a study exists other than a guy sticking an apparatus underneath the fence and coming up with a number that I have no idea what that means? That’s what we know exists.
“We’ve heard that debunked. … The health and safety of our players is of the utmost priority. We pore into it. Our ownership, Jed [York] is tremendous in terms of resources, and we’ll always be cognizant of things. I know that a lot of games have been won at this facility since it opened, but yeah, we aren’t going to turn a blind eye.”
It’s worth noting scientists have dismissed this theory, but there’s one small connection that is probably giving way to the 49ers’ investigation, no matter how preposterous it may be.
How in the world could a substation contribute to injuries?
This is wild, but it’s definitely a realistic scenario for the 49ers after Kendrick Bourne mentioned it when discussing George Kittle’s Achilles tear after the Eagles loss.
It’s highly, highly unlikely the substation is contributing, but that didn’t stop me from doing some digging. I found a study from the National Library of Medicine stating the EMF (electromotive force) produced from the substation can cause oxidative stress by increasing a reactive oxygen species (ROS).
This essentially overwhelms the body’s antioxidant defenses and can cause inflammation, hamper recovery, and a lot of other things, but it’s the first two that stand out when talking about the 49ers.
Inflammation and disrupted recovery can certainly lead to more injuries due to the fact both elements obviously play a large role in how a player’s body reacts to injury. If a player doesn’t recover properly they’re obviously set up to either re-aggravate an initial injury or develop a whole new one, altogether.
And then chronic inflammation attacks healthy cells instead of fighting off sickness and repairing injuries.
So, while this is pretty absurd in totality and very unlikely anything comes from it, there is some science behind the whole investigation that leads to an ounce of reason for the 49ers to look into the situation.
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