Back in football’s early days it was an unorganized, rag-tag, and very dangerous event. The sport began to gain some ground in the early 20th century. During its early days, football was a very dangerous game that many people were seriously hurt by. In 1905 at least, most likely more, 18 high school football players died and over 150 were seriously injured (Majerol par. 2). All of the injuries and deaths back then were most likely caused by the lack of rules protecting players from the unnecessary, late hits during the game. There were also no rules that required players to wear protective gear, so most did not (Majerol par. 2). A study done in 2009 showed that nearly one-third of all retired NFL veterans had some sort of permanent brain damage from their years of football. In another study done, 92 NFL players donated their brains for research. In the research it was found that 88 of the 92 players had a CTE. A CTE is Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, which has known links to depression, impulsiveness, memory loss, and dementia (Tyler par 7). All of this shows that football was truly a dangerous game. Then when compared to todays game, the two eras of football are nearly two different games.
Now that it is 2016, the game has evolved so much that football now and football then barely resemble each other. With all of the new technology and research to treat injured players, an athlete can nearly always expect a full recovery in no time at all. In addition, the new advances in protective wear helped the player injury rate drop significantly. The major cause of player injury in years passed is the culture of resistance, this is when players are encouraged to play through the pain and to truly give a perfect effort for the team. Now coaches, players, and parents understand that playing through the pain is just a way to injure the athlete even worse (Tyler par. 11). I agree that it is dangerous to continue playing while injured because my experience through playing football confirms it. One of the reasons players have stopped playing through the pain is most coaches have realized that if an injured player is taken out of the game, he can most likely make a quicker recovery because the injury was not as strained. It is common logic that taking a player out for the last 20 minutes of the game to save him another few days of recovery is worth it. To help show its support for football players, the NFL donated over $30 million to research to better the understanding of concussions in younger athletes (Tayler par. 4). Even though people are making advances in football, it is still a somewhat dangerous game. In 2015 eight high school football players died, most of those cases happened due to other medical reasons other than football (Tyler par. 10). This goes to show that football is still potentially dangerous, the progress science has made may one day make football a truly safe game.
Now that it is 2016, the game has evolved so much that football now and football then barely resemble each other. With all of the new technology and research to treat injured players, an athlete can nearly always expect a full recovery in no time at all. In addition, the new advances in protective wear helped the player injury rate drop significantly. The major cause of player injury in years passed is the culture of resistance, this is when players are encouraged to play through the pain and to truly give a perfect effort for the team. Now coaches, players, and parents understand that playing through the pain is just a way to injure the athlete even worse (Tyler par. 11). I agree that it is dangerous to continue playing while injured because my experience through playing football confirms it. One of the reasons players have stopped playing through the pain is most coaches have realized that if an injured player is taken out of the game, he can most likely make a quicker recovery because the injury was not as strained. It is common logic that taking a player out for the last 20 minutes of the game to save him another few days of recovery is worth it. To help show its support for football players, the NFL donated over $30 million to research to better the understanding of concussions in younger athletes (Tayler par. 4). Even though people are making advances in football, it is still a somewhat dangerous game. In 2015 eight high school football players died, most of those cases happened due to other medical reasons other than football (Tyler par. 10). This goes to show that football is still potentially dangerous, the progress science has made may one day make football a truly safe game.