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In defense of High School football and younger, most of the players aren't physically developed enough to cause and long term damage to themselves or anyone els
by skizm 13y ago
In defense of High School football and younger, most of the players aren't physically developed enough to cause and long term damage to themselves or anyone else (in terms of head related injuries). College and pros is another story. That's why as you get farther along in your football career the less you have full contact practices. In college (and I would bet my hat that it is the same for pros) sometime around week 2 you are pretty much done with full contact hitting in practices (their might still be some hitting at 75% speed to work on form).
I played football in college and I think they managed the players' health pretty well. Granted I was at a smaller less competitive D3 school but, all the same, I never felt fear that I was going to suffer any long term head injuries (also I never got a concussion in 8 years of playing).
- scoofy 13y ago>In defense of High School football and younger, most of the players aren't physically developed enough to cause and long term damage to themselves or anyone else (in terms of head related injuries). Do you have any evidence to back up this speculation?
- anigbrowl 13y agoIn fairness I'm speculating about the damage. For all I know I am overestimating the severity of the collisions I see; I just have a strong intuition motivated teens play hard and that repeated impacts add up to eventual damage.
- skizm 13y agoNope none at all except personal experience playing at both high school and college level. That was total speculation on my part. Head injury data is really tough to gather accurately since the farther along in your career you get the more pressure you have to "play through it". So I would estimate (again total speculation on my part) that less than 1/2 of the concussions that actually happen get reported on a collegiate level (no idea about the NFL). More personal notes: In college I knew a few guys who would have headaches for days but refuse to go to the doctor or trainer for fear of getting benched. That was the exact opposite in High school for me. Players would go to the trainer for every little bump and bruise.
- selmnoo 13y ago> In defense of High School football and younger, most of the players aren't physically developed enough to cause and long term damage to themselves or anyone else (in terms of head related injuries). That's yet unclear, see research by Dr. McKee: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sports/league-of-denial/high-school-football-players-face-bigger-concussion-risk/ http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sports/league-of-den...
- skizm 13y agoAs I mentioned in another comment, everything I said was speculation based on playing in high school and college. I don't have any strong evidence to back up my claims. That said, I'm skeptical of the numbers in the article you linked. I could be wrong, but in my experience players in high school were much more likely to report injuries than in college. Especially head injuries. Friends of mine in college, on multiple occasions, had headaches that lasted more than a week and refused to report them for fear of being benched or missing playing time. High school was the opposite, players would go to the trainers all the time for every little thing. I can't argue with numbers, but I am just not convinced the method of data collection is accurate.