Poker Icon Matt Savage Hospitalized: Nearly Crippled by Waterslide Head Injury

Poker personality Matt Savage is hoping to avoid paralysis by undergoing urgent cervical stenosis surgery Wednesday morning.

Savage suffered hit his head on a waterslide and for the past few weeks he started to feel pain in his back and chest along with numbness in his arm, according to his Facebook page.

Initial observations of Savage’s neck showed nothing wrong.  An MRI later revealed three severely pinched nerves.

“I had a flight scheduled for 7 a.m. (direct) to Florida,” Savage writes “For what could be my biggest tournament ever. The Seminole Hard Rock $10,000,000 Guarantee (22-28) and I will for sure miss the 1st day and have to convince Maryann and William Mason that I can still go.”

Cervical stenosis is a slowly progressive condition that pinches the spinal cord in the neck and could eventually result in paralysis if left untreated.

- Nagesh Rath, Gambling911.com