When I was back there in Seminary School, there was a person there who put forth the proposition that you can petition the Lord with Prayer, Petition the Lord with Prayer? You cannot petition the lord with prayer.............can you give me Sanctuary I must find a place to hide, a place for me to hide.
Yes Spine Nation, TSB is a place to hide, and contrary to the one person that is continually calling out for the old TSB, TSB is still here. Our Wednesday Editorial comes in response to the few comments that have called Alex Lukianov brilliant because Mitt "Vanilla Ice" Romney made a guest appearance at the Moscow of the West, NuVasive. The accolades are just starting to roll in. Does anyone actually believe that having Vanilla Ice appearing under a banner is a brilliant move? I could just hear Alex turn around to Vanilla Ice and declare, "Yo VIP, Let's Kick It!" Brilliance is watching Yo-Yo Ma or Slash play their instruments, let's not elevate people like Alex to Sainthood...... just yet. Besides, the Russian Orthodox Church frowns upon sainthood for mere mortals.
But what does it say about Alex if he promotes Vanilla Ice? Maybe he isn't as out-of-the box as he was once perceived, that change is really not that good, especially if you have to adapt and change yourselves. Corporate people hate to change, and unless someone truly has leadership and an open mind, they detest and eliminate anyone that threatens their mere existence, their way of doing things like Einstein's definition of insanity. Years ago this industry was innovative, then success and believing your own press clippings makes you and your company rigid and conservative, unlike a Cheetah. Just ask Andy Cappuccino. One day you wake up in your Ralph Lauren pajamas in Rancho Sante Fe and realize that you have become everything that you detested, a big slow elephant, incapable of moving quickly anymore. Or is this nothing more than a charade at this juncture in someone's career?
Sure there will be backlash in response to this post because there are those poor souls that need to believe something rather than believing in themselves. The Cheetahs are no different than the people that perished in November 1978 in Guyana drinking the kool-aid of the Mad Messiah. So as our readers throw barbs at one another TSB could hear Vanilla Ice and the Bear singing,
Will it ever stop? (Mitt) Yo I don't know? (Alex)
Turn off the lights, I will glow (Mitt)
To the XLiF extreme I rock a mic like a vandal (Alex)
Light up a stage and wax a chump like a candle (Mitt and Alex)
Hopefully for those of you that find the time between cases and sales call to read our posts, this evokes a smile and some levity in your day.
"We need someone or something new, to get us through, yeah, c'mon.
Let me be the first--Thank you!
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteThis material may not be published etc., etc., etc., POOF! Magic
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of brilliant....I just read that Omni Surgical (AKA Spine 360) completed at $27 MILLION leveraged recapitalization deal with JP Morgan Chase Bank.
ReplyDeletewow, I knew him back when he was a punk kid working for the local depuy dist (BW) in Houston...ripping off people then. You'd think an outfit the size of Chase would take a peak into his past. ..."only the good die young"
DeleteHe's BACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteCarol Anne (Poltergeist)
Alex Lukianov in Ralph Lauren pajamas LMAO!!!!!!! Hey Alex, Mitt leave you an etch-a-sketch?
ReplyDeleteBravo, bravo. Although, TSB, you did forget to mention whether or not Mitt was offered a free viewing of "Memphis" the musical during his time in San Diego? After all, Alex is the best at shameless self promotion.
ReplyDeletebrilliant post, best in months. i am still laughing.
ReplyDeleteHey, if a past president at the NSM doesn't help inspire the Cheetahs and move the stock price, why not bring in the next hopeful Republican candidate to see if he can?
ReplyDeleteWho's next,, Rush Limbaugh?
Does Alex wear his purple velvet slippers with his smoking jacket and Ralph Lauren PJ's? Couldn't be a bigger pin cushion in the industry, love the blog TSB
ReplyDeleteAlex are you actually pledgeing your millions to Mitt the Nit Wit? You should've thought about keeping Cappy Happy, $8-9 million in sales right down the tooyalet
ReplyDeleteword out of San Diego is that Alex is fuming over this post and is coming to get you MM.
ReplyDeleteWooooooooooooo, just like he got Medtronic?
DeleteI'm sensing a lot of jealousy in this thread! Looks like 'leadership envy' to me.
ReplyDeletePlease define Leadership principles? Ruling with an iron fist? Firing people if they come under quota? Burning people out? Treating your distributors and sales people like what? Come on old wise one fill us in.
DeleteRomney was speaking on Obamacare and the device tax. Would NuVa even have to pay this tax or are they below the threshold?
ReplyDeleteThere is no threshold, and you pay even if you're not profitable.
DeleteI like that NuVa claims to be innovative. From my perspective, except for the XLIF, they create products that either:
ReplyDeleteA) allow surgeons to bill more
-ILIF, they tell surgeons they can do a decompression but bill for a fusion = fraud.
- NeuroVision - surgeons in different hospitals billing for each other
B) claim their widgets are proprietary to push hospitals to give them list price or get around contracts
MIS TLIF - MAS heads that pop off. Nothing earth shattering, but they want $1800 a screw.
XLIF - there are now 10 other lateral systems. Yes, XLIF is nice and has marketshare, but doesnt deserve a single level price of $13500($6500 cage, $3000 NIM disposables,$4000 Osteocel)when it can be done for $7-8k.
I don't think this is what Romney, Obamacare, or America needs. They have such high SG&A, surgeon consulting contracts, and distributor agreements, this cannot be a long term success in the current market.
Nice try 4:47pm (aka Medtronic coverage rep)!! Those prices are way above list, which of course is nowhere near what the hospitals end-up paying due to the huge discounts that we are all forced to give.
DeleteSpeaking of "list price", let's talk about your little O-Arm scam that forces a hospital to pay list price for your screws ($2000/screw) PLUS a 90% compliance policy in exchange for the use of an O-Arm that can only be used in a few cases each day due to its inability to time-warp from room to room. Sounds like a pretty good deal, right? Medtronic gets $12-15 million in biz per year from just one account, and the hospital gets an O-Arm that only costs you a couple hundred G's to build.
With brilliant strategies like that I don't see how they are down 9% in spine implant sales? It certainly isn't their completely incompetent sales force. Why anyone with half a brain or a relationship works for MDT is beyond me. I think the distributor in OK figured that out. Amiright Amendia? eh? eh? eh??!!?!?!
DeleteHow about at this years NASS meeting rather than having a guest speaker the Society stage a Ultimate Fight Championship between Alex and TSB, I'm betting on TSB LMAO Lukianov is definitely not a cheetah, he's carrying too much baggage
ReplyDeleteWatch out nuva! Lanx is coming after you. After we hire all your disgruntled employees well take over the world! That is until our docs figure out how crappy our products really are. Anyways, we're coming for ya!
ReplyDeleteFurther proof that this blog has become irrelevant. Now that Globus is going public, all that's left is NUVA bashing.
ReplyDeleteMust be either Lukianov or his shine box boy Robin Young posting ridiculous comments, Robin actually tucks Alex in every night
ReplyDelete6,000 Viewers today, thanks for your observation, how irrelevant
ReplyDelete