I just watched Oliver Stone’s Any Given Sunday, which I thought was pretty good until somebody’s eye got knocked out of their head. Literally. Has this ever really happened in football? If not, it seems gratuitous to have put this scene in the film. If so–GRROOOOOSSSSSS!!! –Morbidly Curious in Maine
Certain parties are now thinking: This is one realm of knowledge in which I’m content to leave my ignorance intact. Buck up, muchachos–at least I’m going to spare you the color photos. Although I couldn’t find an instance of an eye knocked out while its owner was playing football, accidents of this sort do happen, sometimes resulting from surprisingly little force. In Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine (1897), George Gould and Walter Pyle report several cases of what they call exophthalmos, protrusion of the eye from the orbit, or socket:
Maybe folks were tougher in the old days. Or maybe Gould and Pyle didn’t fully understand the injury they were describing. Whatever the case, the chances of full recovery after having an eye knocked out nowadays are slim–and I bet they weren’t so hot in 1897, either. Doctors distinguish several conditions, some offering markedly better prospects than others: In traumatic globe luxation the eye is jolted far enough out of its socket for the eyelids to close behind it, but the eye muscles and optic nerve generally remain intact. This injury is plenty serious, but often skillful medical treatment can restore normal sight. By contrast, in traumatic avulsion of the globe the muscles and optic nerve are partially or totally severed, usually because the eye has been knocked completely out of the socket–your classic eyeball-hanging-by-a-thread horror story. More cases:
Some people are more prone to problems like this than others, mainly those having shallow eye sockets, loose eye ligaments, and so on; being a bit pop-eyed can’t help, either. Folks of African descent are said to be at greater risk. Incidentally, Gould and Pyle go on to relate that “in former days there was an old-fashioned manner of fighting called ‘gouging.’ In this brutal contest the combatant was successful who could, with his thumb, press his opponent’s eyeball out.” Imagine what Oliver Stone could do with that.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): illustration/Slug Signorino.