For many years, it has been hard to believe that the school that gave us Earl Campbell and Ricky Williams has been so deficient on the running back front. Surely there would be some phenomenal high school running back or a dozen in the state of Texas that would be ready to throw on the burnt orange, wouldn’t there?

The last notable Longhorn in the backfield was Jamaal Charles in 2007. Since then, the Longhorn backfield has remained pretty anemic. One hundred yard games were a thing of the past. It has been a long time since I have been able to report that the University Of Texas Longhorns have a running game.

Until now.

No, really. It isn’t an aberration of some sort. It’s not a mirage that happens to exist in the center of DKR Memorial Stadium these days. It is a true, smash-mouth, running game.

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You’ve probably heard the phrase used many times. “Take what the day gives you”. Or there is also the infamous “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade”. Or any of countless variations on a theme.

It gets to the point where at times, these phrases sound a little old or cliche. But I can tell you that it is one of the most common discussions I have with the athletes that I coach.

Sport is a microcosm of life as we know. In sport, much as in life, you never really never know what the day holds for you. You will be faced with many challenges and many joys. This could take place over the span of a 5K or an Ironman triathlon.

Ironman Cozumel recently reminded that “take what the day gives you” is a good mantra for athletes.

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Stop. Take a look around you. Breathe it all in. Reflect on the meaning of it.

I think there are times when we don’t do enough of this. It is easy to get distracted by the plethora of “critical” daily issues we face as time just ticks away on us.

Then there are those moments that we all share when we stop and wonder about our place in the cosmos. It will oftentimes creep up on us when we are faced with an event like a birth, a wedding, a graduation, or a death. It could be something that causes us to take stock of our lives, our family, our friends, or our journey. It might even provoke us to ponder our existence or the very essence of our meaning. It might shake the very foundations upon which we build – or have built.

Imagine you only had one day left on the planet – today. What would you do? And if you were writing your own eulogy for tomorrow, how would you want to be remembered? What would they say if you left here today?

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There are many issues in which the perceived problem isn’t really the same as the mechanism underlying the issue. Oftentimes it will require peeling away a few layers of the onion to get to the core issue at stake. Joint mobilization – be it performed by a physical therapist or physical therapist assistant – illustrates one of these issues.

As I mentioned in my previous post, “Joint Mobilization And The PTA: Much Ado Over Nothing?”, there are plenty of reasons to indicate that PTAs are, or certainly have the capacity to be, qualified to perform joint mobilization. Let’s face it - patients take their joints to end range daily, oftentimes with sustained loading and frequently with greater maximal end range loading than a PT or PTA will ever utilize. So why be concerned about the PTA?

With that said, there is an emotional debate brewing. Why? Time to peel away a few layers of the onion to find the source. Unfortunately, while debating the minutiae of kinematics, educational degrees, and manual skills, the critical importance of autonomy is overlooked – to the detriment of the profession as a whole.

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