Children and Football

 

Your kid is playing in a football and goes unconscious after taking a smash to the skull.Would you let your kids play football? This has been a question that over 40 percent of parents have responded by saying they would steer their kids away from football. Parents believe it is not necessary for children as young as 7 years old to sustain the injuries that are commonly experienced in the average football game. The most frequent traumas occurring in this high contact sport is the infamous concussion. Getting your head whacked one too many times can result in the development of slurred speech, difficulty concentrating, and other crippling disabilities. These skills are a necessity to succeed in school and later in life. Even NFL players with children of their own agree that playing football is not worth the risk. Hall of Fame linebacker Harry Carson commented on this ongoing argument, ” But knowing what I know, I don’t want him to play. He’s got golf clubs; I take him swimming; we do all kinds of stuff. But I don’t want him to play football, because I think this young, smart black kid, I want him to be intelligent; I want him to be brilliant; I want him to be able to use his brain and not his brawn. And I want him to be the best that he can be”. This quote shows that Harry Carson want his kids to be smart, and do the best he can intelligently rather than play football. Coming from a Hall of Fame football player this means a lot considering the fact that he played football for a long time and enjoyed the game. As well as this quote, Henry at his Hall of Fame inductee speech stated that the NFL needs to do a better job of helping ex-players who now have problems from repeated blows to the skull. He includes that these concussion can lead to head trauma and CTE (Chronic traumatic encephalopathy). However, those who would let their kids participate football believe that the kids are well protected and won’t get any concussions. Although it may be safe, even in football at a younger age children can still take shots to the cranium, these can add up leading to problems even more fatal. Football leagues should not let kids play until they are in at least 8th grade where they are more aware of this hard hitting game. This is because they are going in to high school the following year and will be able to protect themselves better. As an alternative for younger kids they could play in flag football leagues to improve their football skills for the future while staying safe.

 

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2 thoughts on “Children and Football

  1. Although there is no way to regulate which age is right for football, it really comes down just to personal preference. I do disagree since starting in 8th grade means that athletes wont have time to get better by then, so it will be their first year and the players won’t be good.

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