Posted on 11/27/2004 10:51:16 AM PST by neverdem
I used to play hockey, I've heard that line so many times it drives me insane.
I even got a lecture about being a good example when somone brought there family to a game, and his mother saw me stripping padding out of my helmet and several of my teamates (they asked me to, it makes the helmet fit better).
Considering the fact that we were all over 21, I thought she was a wee bit of a nut.
Girls who play soccer wear comfortable shoes...
A couple more seasons she should be ready to pass on the family genes.
Okay, I have been watching this thread creep across FR for two days. First of all, who cares? Second, no. Your head will not be damaged by a soccer ball. If it could be you should play baseball.
By the way. Soccer is some European sport that makes everyone equal in their failings. We should ban it.
No. Next Question: Diana's Deathly confession -- Good for England or a spanner in the works?
I like your analysis. I played for Cal and adult league after that and coached for ten years in High School. We had only one head injury in that time, it was a head to head collision while both players went for a header. One kid had to sit out the rest of the match and I had him check in with a doctor when his partents picked him up.
I have never had a kid receive in injury from heading the ball. (I have heard that some people are asserting that there could be cumulative brain injury, but have not seen any data on this. As for wearing head gear, if it is not hazardous to other players, I don't mind a kid wearing it if he/she (a) thinks it helps heading accuracy or (b) thinks it helps keep injuries from occurring while keeping the hair out of the way.
(TO ME) Seems pretty easy to avoid posts and oter heads. By the time you're in middle school you should be good wenough to avoid them. In ther years i've played soccer on a team (since 6 years old) I haven't run into any posts or the ground. I've only run into a person once because he went and stopped and I ran into him before I could stop. I could understand it for goaly though.
I split my head wide open on a goal post back in the early 80s, shooting for a close up goal, slipped and rammed headlong into the post - conked out for a few seconds, I'm told, but I was fine, just a few stitches and a surprising amount of blood, but it was right on the top of my head - these things wouldn't have helped at all.
In retrospect, I have no idea if I scored or not. Never thought about it before.
Although this might explain my later-in-life conversion to conservativism, I think on balance it didn't have any significant impact. I don't feel it's good to nerf the world, and it's not like this is going to stop broken necks or blown knees - soccer's popularity would decrease significantly if soccer players ended up having to don a similar head-gear as our more moronic and self-destructive cousins in the human family (cyclists, I mean...).
Seems to be a slippery slope - some kid gets hurt while wearing one of these, and they compensate for that, adding more and more protection. Eventually, soccer players will be wearing airbags (pre-deployed, for your protection) and waddling around the field after the nerfed out ball.
Anyway, if you want to fix a sport with a high rate of injuries, those curling guys are off the hook: http://bjsm.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/abstract/38/5/e29
:-)
i have a big question, why not? If it protects your kid without hindering the game why wouldn't you? we protect our shins but not our heads...kind of weird. Having suffered numerous concussions while playing at UC-Berkeley and briefly in the MLS I still have lingering effects from all those concussions. if this was around when i was playing in college it would have saved myself a lot of pain and hardship not to mention the vast amount of $$$ thousands spent by the University on MRI's, CT Scans etc... out of 27 players on our team i can gurantee you that each one us had at least 1 concussion if not more each year. the fact is soccer is the only sport where we use our head and expose our head to other heads without any protection... kind of silly. Last question why would some of the best players and teams in the world use this if it did not help especially in the World Cup and 2004 Olympics? Pro-athletes never want to hinder their performance and i know i would never wear something like this if it didn't help. I guess what i am saying is that it is novel that some of the best players in the world are wearing head protection but too many parents are concerned kids might look weird or not want to wear it at first. just look at women's lacrosse and eye goggles at first no one wanted to wear them and now everyone is...just makes sense
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