In One Breathtaking Leap, Jahvid Best Finds Heartbreak

This season has not gone as it could have, maybe should have, for Cal’s Jahvid Best. He was a fringe Heisman candidate on a top-five team early in the season, flying high heading into the Pac-10 schedule. Then he and the Golden Bears crashed against Oregon and USC, dropping two straight by a 72-6 tally as Best could only muster 102 yards in those two outings combined.Still, with three straight wins against the dregs of the conference and two 100+ days, Best and the Bears had righted the ship, and his touchdown in the second quarter against Oregon State cut the Beavers’ lead to 14-6 and had the added bonus of being a spectacular five-foot hurdle over the goal line. The importance of the score -- and the game -- vanished seconds afterward, as Best’s awkward, helmet-jettisoning landing and instant signs of concussion sucked the air out of the Strawberry Canyon.

Best stayed down for about 13 minutes, had his jersey removed on the field, and was carted out of the stadium on oxygen and without any obvious response; fears that Best was paralyzed or had other catastrophic spinal trauma were as valid as anything in a vacuum of information. Then came word, fortunately, that Best had movement in all of his extremities and was only diagnosed with a concussion -- his second in two weeks -- and would be kept in a hospital for observation and examination. (Update: Best is out of the hospital.)

It was a narrow escape from a harrowing moment. It may well give pause to the next player who considers leaping over a line. And it is worth pausing to think a good thought or two for Best today.

The video is hard to watch, and embedded below the jump.

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