Kids flee football in light of NFL violence, Pop Warner participation plummeting

The Washington Times ^ | Thursday, November 28, 2013 | Nathan Fenno

[MinorityRepublican]

For Eddie Mason, the decision wasn’t difficult. The NFL veteran’s 10-year-old son, Tyler, won’t play tackle football until high school.

Mr. Mason’s decision wasn’t a result of the burgeoning national discussion about football’s role in brain injuries. Instead, he believes children should learn the game’s fundamentals without tackling. Mr. Mason, who played three seasons at linebacker for the Redskins before retiring in 2003, sees a problematic culture infecting football’s lowest levels that’s inextricably connected to the safety concerns.

“This brash kind of mindset, the underdog mindset,” Mr. Mason said, “this hard-core attitude kind of deal about who hits the hardest [is part of the issue]. If you look back over the last eight to 10 years, players showing up in the NFL are technically unsound. We’re eight to 10 years behind developing fundamentals for how to play the sport.

[EEGator]

That’s a cool tech present. I’m sure he’ll enjoy it.

[Ransomed]

“The game used to be much more sportsmanlike and gentlemanly. Now you have a large number of trash-talking gangsters who either have or will do a stretch in prison.”

It’s a sport where the vast majority of fans don’t really care about the fruity gyrating celebration dances and self-congratulatory chest pounding after a 300+ dude falls on a loose ball. But what is worse, at least in my opinion, is that the other players at least give the appearance of tolerating that type of garbage, because there’s no way to have any self policing or retaliation for acting like a jerk with todays million camera angles and modern officiating and penalties. So the jerks have free reign in football.

As far as super fast 300+ pound behemoths that recover from injury super fast, train super hard and speedily recover week after week of the NFL, just look to rampant and untested HGH usage. Another thing that no one really cares about when it comes to football.

FReegards

[wku man]

"...and wanting to star in Glee."

Just like that model of the perfect Obammunist soldier, Bradley Manning. I bet the Chicoms and the Russians are just pi**ing their pants in fear over the possibility of facing divisions of Manning clones.

Scouts Out! Cavalry Ho!

[sean327]

I do agree that the basic fundamentals of the game are lacking and have been for the last decade or so. I don’t agree that keeping kids from tackling is going to fix it.
There are some good programs being put in place. Pop Warner coaches must be “Heads up” tackling certified now. I’ve noticed that many HS coaches in my area are stressing hit and wrap up techniques. I think the days of blasting the ball carrier as hard as you can without wrapping up are over. I blame ESPN for much of this. They started highlighting big hits in the mid 90’s to the point that it became a detriment to the game.

[mikrofon]

“Back in the day” we would play sandlot *everything* (well, almost — that would be tough on the skates ;). Find an open field, self-organize w/o adult interference, everyone played...

Now with the lack of available space, more things for kids to do & the nanny state ready to pounce if Johnny gets so much as a scratch, sadly those times are probably gone.

[blueunicorn6]

I don’t mind some hard hits if the kids are learning something valuable. Here’s some of the things I learned. The sponsor’s kid plays. The coach’s kid plays. Bobby only has one more year of football left, so they’ll play him (union seniority). Steve might get a scholarship and scholarships make the coach look good so we’ll get the ball to Steve regardless of the rest of the team. The coach’s job is to make the other team’s kids look bad so his kids will be on the high school team so maybe he can be an assistant high school coach.
Football is a physical sport. There needs to be a significant Return On Investment to put a kid into it. Take a good, hard look at the coaches. Are they teaching your kid life lessons or do they have another motive for coaching? My friend’s older brother, Tommy, was killed in football practice. That took the shine off of the game for me. Make sure there’s a good Return On Investment for your kid by playing football and not that he’s just a warm-blooded tackling dummy.

[LS]

Exactly what Rush predicted. The libs and media are destroying a great game.

[Alberta's Child]

If you think putting kids are going to be prepared to function as adults by putting them out on a field to play a competitive sport, surrounded by adult spectators and adult officials, than you're wrong.

Ironically, this sort of nonsense invariably trains our adults to function as kids.

[Yorlik803]

you must be watching the Steelers play.

[Alberta's Child]

My rule of thumb is that if a parent has enough time to watch his child play a game of football or baseball, then the games aren't nearly long enough and the kids aren't getting enough exposure to the sport.

Ken Dryden, the legendary goaltender for the Montreal Canadiens back in the 1970s, had some remarkable insight about this in his book The Game (side note: this is probably the best sports book I've ever read, and I'd recommend it even to those who are not hockey fans). He attributed a long-term decline in skills among top hockey players in that era to the growth of organized sports among children. I'll paraphrase one particularly astute observation:

"When a child plays on an organized team, he's probably on the ice for no more than 15 minutes of a 45-minute game. And that 15 minutes he plays in a game is several hours he doesn't play on a pond or in a backyard."

[HangnJudge]

My son played soccer all through grade school,

And it is a game one can play well into their 50’s
Yeah, OK, the girls may not be at the highschool games
But the more thoughtful girls will realize that
the Soccer Boys make better Husbands

Intelligent, Cooperative, Athletic
Used to Give-and-Take, Adaptive, not as Violent

Good Husband Material

[discostu]

There’s no guarantee of having enough people, most importantly there’s no guarantee of having enough of the TOP athletes. Look what’s happened to baseball, kids aren’t playing it as kids so they aren’t playing it as adults either, it’s the reason for the big Latin invasion. In spite of all their efforts the NFL still isn’t big internationally, if they lose the kids they don’t have replacements lined up, the talent pool drops in both size and quality.

[Alberta's Child]

A local baseball scout for the Chicago White Sox once told me that back in the "good old days," the best athletes in almost any high school with a sports program played baseball. He said the biggest factor in the decline of baseball participation among American kids is that sometime around the early 1970s football surpassed baseball as the sport that attracted these top athletes.

Football is likely to face a similar decline as top athletes migrate away from the sport. Some of them go to basketball, some go to soccer, some go to what used to be marginal sports in high school (volleyball, lacrosse, etc.), and some lose interest in athletics entirely.

[Kip Russell]

i'd say it's the parents, NOT the kids, making the decision...

Speaking of which...

Back when I was in school, I had zero interest in sports of any kind. As I recall, PE class was mandatory through 7th grade. After that, I never participated in sports in any way, and had the full support of my parents in that choice (to which I am grateful to this day), which let me concentrate on academics.

To this day, I get very puzzled looks from co-workers and customers when they ask what I thought of the latest Bronco game, and I reply that I have no opinion since I don't watch sports.

[discostu]

Yep. Most sports don’t really have a necessary body type, anybody gifted with the fast twitch muscles and the hand eye coordination could play pretty much any sport, the big question is which one do they enjoy. And they can’t enjoy playing a game they don’t watch, and don’t play. Baseball lost the youth as fans, football is losing them as players. If I had a kid I wouldn’t let them play football, the data coming in on head injuries is just too scary, you just can’t sign your kid up for permanent brain damage. In the end the NFL has only themselves to blame, they’re the ones that pushed the fiction that head injuries didn’t leave permanent damage, and subsequently didn’t push helmet makers for improved designs.

[Poison Pill]

fans of football should take a long look at the concussion problem, and find a way to solve it.

Return to leather helmets and pads.

[MinorityRepublican]

There is no helmet that protects your brain against a concussion. As simple as that.

[JimRed]

The Kids are not fleeing football; their parents are in control and are discouraging or forbidding their participation.

[Roccus]

I blame ESPN for much of this. They started highlighting big hits in the mid 90’s to the point that it became a detriment to the game.

Mmmmmmm...no. It didn't start with ESPN at all. Go back to the 60's, or perhaps the early 70's. During the season, the first segment of Johnny Carson's Monday night "Tonight Show" (after the monologue) was called "Bell Ringers." In it would be shown clips of the biggest hits of the previous day's games.

[Kip Russell]

Return to leather helmets and pads.

Speaking as a non-fan, that puzzles me. Wouldn't leather helmets and pads offer less protection than the type currently worn?