Can Football Ever Be Completely Safe?

Can Football Ever Be Completely Safe?

Introduction

            Jimmy has always been a big fan of football. He remembers watching it constantly with his brothers and father whenever time would allow. It was only natural that when it came to Jimmy being the right age that he would be ready to play some tackle football for himself. This had been the moment Jimmy dreamed of. He was actually going to play the sport that he watched for a long time. What Jimmy didn’t expect was the constant contact that he would experience is different than just watching the sport itself.

Sports has been part of our lives more than we realize. We have played multiple kinds of sport games throughout our life or supported someone who played a specific sport. Most all sports, if not all, require some kind of physical activity. Some can also include contact with a player with another. Isn’t it great that we have these great protective gear that protects us from all contact? Even though some sports require specific equipment to be worn so it may protect the player doesn’t fully prevent them from getting injured. The two that seem to be most common is football and hockey. These two sports have continuous hitting and contact with other players throughout the entire game. According to Head Case in 2012, the top two sports that have the highest concussion rate are football and boy’s ice hockey. What is a concussion? A concussion is, “an injury to the brain that results in temporary loss of normal brain function. It usually is caused by a blow to the head.”

            Who do we look to with these high concussion rates? How do we make the games we know and love less risky for our health? Is there a way where each sport can be completely safe with no risk of injury? Some have pointed that we can make equipment better and safer for all. Others understand the risk of each sport they play and need to accept this risk for it makes that specific sport the way it is. All in all, is there any specific way to make all sports safer for every player?

Dangers of Football Are a Price Worth Paying

            Athletes in all sports are paid quite a lot. The highest paid football player in the NFL currently is Drew Brees from the New Orleans Saints. His estimated yearly endorsement is said to be $11,000,000. To the rest of us who have played several different sports and not get paid a thing, that is a big number. Drew Brees isn’t the only player who earns a lot of money while playing his sport. There are a ton of athletes out there who get paid quite a bit. Do the athletes know what kind of risk they are taking while going into this sport?

            When I was trying out for football at my High School, we had to take a concussion test. Not only was it to test out whether or not we had experienced a concussion or not as well as whether we currently had a concussion right there and then, it also taught us what exactly a concussion is. If we as the players do not know the dangers of the certain sport we are playing, whether it be football, hockey, boxing, or any other contact sport, then the sport can be even more dangerous for us as we don’t know how to prevent ourselves from getting injured.

            Do the football players in the NFL feel the same way? Or do they want to be safe the entire time while on the field? In a Washington Post, Robert Nkemdiche, a defensive lineman, was quoted when teaching football camp of his opinion, “At the end of the day, the game is a dangerous game. It's a collision. You want to do everything you can do to protect yourself and be on the line at the same time. You want to still be aggressive and still be a monster, but there's ways to do it in a safer manner. It's kind of like a paradox.” This is a battle with the athlete on whether or not he wants to play in the certain moment that he is in aggressively and risk getting injured, or to play it safe so that he doesn’t have to go through the side effects of the injury he had caused on himself.

            However, Nkemdiche also did say this, “"I'll play till I can't play no more. You get to a point of loving the game, and you're like: 'This is me. This is what I have to do. And I know I'm going to do it for a long time." Nkemdiche is not alone. When we find out something that we love to do, we want to give our one hundred percent no matter what to it. This is also the case for these football players. The players know the risk they are getting into. They know they could affect their health later down the road with one critical decision that can lead to one critical injury, but they still play their hardest because it is the thing they love to do.

            With this in mind that players do know the risks of playing sports like the example here in football, there are some who do know these risks and leave pretty early in their football career. How could this be? If they know the risk of playing the sport that they love, why not just battle through it? One of the reasons could be that a certain study had the athletes choose to not continue their career in football. In the same article, it lists several examples of the feelings of certain players leaving the NFL league: “A study published in the Journal of Neurotrauma last month was even more troubling, finding that repeated blows to the head that fall short of concussions can be just as damaging, if not more so. That's largely why Borland chose to retire from the NFL after just one season, despite the fact that it meant forfeiting future earnings and repaying a portion of his signing bonus. After contacting the leading neurologists in the field, he concluded that there simply were no guarantees for his long-term health as an NFL player. Tarpley concluded the same, explaining on his Instagram feed that he was leaving a game he loved "to preserve my future health" after suffering the third and fourth concussions of his career in a single NFL season.”

            There is this comic that Steve Breen, from Creators News Service, created that explains, in a funny way, the reason why football players leave so early because of the fear of their future health being affective. The first square drawing shows a football player all dressed up for a game talking to a teammate who is not dressed up for the game in any way named Chris. The suited up football player asks Chris, “Hi Chris. Why aren’t you suited up for practice?” Chris replies, “I’m retiring from the NFL. I don’t want to risk head injury.” In the next square sequence Chris asks the suited up football player, “So how are you feeling these days?” to which the football player replies with a simple, “Good” answer. The next square sequence just shows the two standing there showing that time has gone by. Then the next square shows the football player asking the same question he asked in the first square sequence. This comic illustrates one of the reasons why the football players leave early for their future health.

            Another NFL player, a Louisiana defensive tackle named Vernon Butler, gives the best argument for this situation, "Your body knows when it's time to stop." The players in each competitive and contact sport know or should know their own body’s compatibility. The players overall have the choice to choose whether to continue playing the game and continue risking getting injured or to take leave and protect their long term health.

            Even though players constantly get concussions in football, whether big or small, one study shows that actually playing through the concussion helps it recover double the time. When players are found to have a concussion after a hit in football, they are taken off the field where trainers figure out how bad it is. Some are not even bad enough and they can come back into the game. If it is a severe concussion then the player is to be kept off the field and goes under further investigation on how long the player has to wait until he can come back and play.

            But imagine the possibility to just come out of the field and diagnosed with a concussion, but put right back in because it doubles your recovery time. According to small study involving sixty-nine teenagers at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, the claim that there is evidence that players symptoms of concussions recovered faster while playing the game than rather off the field of game. They say, “Sidelined players reported symptoms immediately, including dizziness, headaches, and mental fogginess and fatigue, and were diagnosed with concussions by trainers or team physicians. The others, who continued playing for 19 minutes on average, delayed reporting symptoms and were diagnosed later.”

            But this can also be dangerous! They also say, “Return-to-play policies are widespread, especially in youth athletics, and they typically recommend sidelining players after a suspected concussion until symptoms resolve. One of the main reasons is to prevent a rare condition called second-impact syndrome--potentially fatal brain swelling or bleeding that can occur when a player still recovering from a concussion gets hit again in the head.” There can be a huge risk in continuing to play with a concussion. If a player continues to play with a concussion, according to the study, they will have double the recovery time, but one fatal hit could make the concussion even worse. In fact it can turn into a second-impact syndrome which could be fatal. Again, this all is depended on the player on whether or not he wants to continue playing or not or whether the league should step in and disallow the player who have been diagnosed with concussion to come back into the game.

Changes in Sports Equipment and Rules of Game

Every sport has its own type of equipment. Whether it be for better performance play or only for protection, each and every sport requires a form of equipment to wear for the players. Most of the gear that athletes wear are for protection. This includes large upper body pads for football and hockey players, shin guards for soccer players, even helmets for baseball players. These are to protect the vital and most vulnerable parts of the body in the certain sports they are in. This is so the player if taken a blow can be protected to the best of the ability of the equipment they put on and come out with as little as injury as possible.

            Even with this “safe” equipment players put on, we still see multiple injuries in sports. Isn’t it the companies who make the equipment for other player’s job to make the absolute best equipment to protect every player from getting injuries? Does the league of the certain sport have to make certain rules or change of rules to make the game safer for athletes?

              It can be extremely scary to be one day totally and perfectly functional and then all of a sudden a single hit on the field could change that. It is also scary that this also escapes peoples mind. Tadd Haislop in his article states, “…players develop a sense of invincibility. Then they're told not to rely on their protection. Swartz compared the theory to every-day motor vehicles, pointing out that ‘once they started having anti-lock brakes, padded interiors and seat belts, accident rates went up … deaths went up.’" Just because we keep making cars better and safer, doesn’t mean they are completely safe. This same principle can be applied here. Just because football equipment has become better and safer doesn’t mean the actual sport is totally safe. Just because the rules and fundamentals of football have evolved doesn’t mean football is completely safe.

            According to Roman Oben, who was drafted by the New York Giants in 1996, said this, “I have seen--as a player and now an executive and advocate for football--how the NFL continues to improve player health and safety. NFL coaches and players use safer tackling techniques, and we've made 42 rule changes over the past decade to protect our players. The league and the NFL Players Association reduced the number of full-contact practices and improved field surfaces to help lower the likelihood of injuries.” Football has become a safer sport as time has moved along. We see here that certain changes of the rules protect the athletes better than without these rules.

There has even been some major consequences for those who break this rule. For example, the rule of targeting in college football by the NCAA states: “By rule, every targeting foul is reviewed by the instant replay official. Up to this point, the replay official's role has been to verify whether the forcible contact was with the crown of the helmet or was struck at the head or neck area of a defenseless player. Now as part of the review, the replay official is directed to examine all elements of the ruling made by the official on the field, not only the location of the forcible contact. In addition, the replay official is empowered to "create" a foul if he sees an obvious and egregious targeting action that the officials on the field miss. Because the action is so dangerous and the ejection penalty so severe, the committee has made these changes to increase the probability that targeting fouls are correctly ruled and administered.”

The players who break this rule are in serious risk of not only hurting the player they are in coming contact with, but also themselves as well. The player is later ejected from the game for breaking such a dangerous act. By even ejecting the players of the game it does make the field for the remainder of the game safer. This is one of many examples that different sport leagues have changed the rules of the game to make athletes safer.

Making the game safe for athletes doesn’t just include the players alone. The coaches and parents of the players are also effected.

            The founders of Evoshield, a company who makes protective under armor wear for multiple sports, had a story to share about how they were influenced to start such a company. Their son was a big fan of football. He was a sophomore in high school and was starting in a football game. He caught a pass in the game and got hit from the front and the back pretty hard. He was put into an ambulance where he lost conciseness and never regained it. Instead of pointing their finger and blaming it on people, the parents started to think, “What is the next step to make youth sports safer?”

            They now go around not only making gear that protects more of you internally in all sports, but also teach the reason why certain parts should be protected. They help the young athletes become more knowledgeable of the game itself and understanding the reason why certain equipment is available for them. It helps the athletes understand safety. If the athletes understand why the rules and equipment are there, then understand the why the league makes the certain rules to make the game a whole lot safer.

Conclusion

            The two arguments presented here both acknowledge that football is not a safe sport and perhaps can never be completely safe. The differences where the two arguments branch out at is how to make the game safer or whether or not the game can be any safer than it already is. One expresses that football players know how much football can injure them whether it be short term or long term, but also accept that is usually the case with most other sports. This is where they teach a safer way to play whether it be the player itself or the leagues rules.

            The other side of the argument expresses that the equipment can be and should be better for players. This will help minimalize or significantly lower the injury rate of the players on both sides of the field. There is another part that this side and also the other side of the argument agree on as well and that is the players should know the rules of the gameplay. This one just adds more than just the way the players play, but also the equipment that protects them. They aren’t pointing fingers at certain at certain companies. Rather, they are trying to fix the problem to the best of their ability. The argument isn’t really blaming the problem on others. It is to see what is the next step is to make it safer while still enjoying the sport.

            Football will always be a contact sport. We enjoy sports with contact too much to even disband it. However, we can make the game safer. There are other suggestions that could be applied here, but the two main steps to making the game safer or understanding the danger of the game are as spoken above. Both sides want the game to be still enjoyable. Both sides want the kids to do the thing they love while being the safest they can be while doing it.

Works Cited

1.     American Association of Neurological Surgeons. "The American Association of Neurological Surgeons." AANS, Web. 06 Nov. 2016. 

2.     Head Case. "Head Case - Complete Concussion Managements." Stats on Concussions & Sports -. N.p., 2012. Web. 06 Nov. 2016. 

3.     Webster, Samue. "Top 100 Highest-Paid Athlete Endorsers of 2015 | Opendorse." Opendorse, 29 June 2016. Web. 06 Nov. 2016.

4.     Clarke, Liz. "For NFL Draft Picks, the Dangers of Football Are a Price Worth Paying." Washington Post, 29 Apr. 2016:, SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 06 Nov. 2016.

5.     EvoSHIELD. "The Taylor Haugen Foundation on Youth Equipment for Sports Safety." YouTube. YouTube, 23 Aug. 2013. Web. 06 Nov. 2016.

6.     Oben, Roman. "We're Making Football Safer." USA TODAY. 29 Apr. 2016: A.7. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 06 Nov. 2016.

7.     National Football Foundation, "College Football: Need-to-know Rule Changes for 2016 Season." NCAA.com., 03 Aug. 2016. Web. 06 Nov. 2016.