Football has become our national sport

By Mark Hopkins

It is almost that time of year when the fanatic football fan can be lost in the tumult of college and professional football. Husbands say goodbye to their wives, teenagers wear jerseys with favorite numbers on them, male and female alike begin to bleed orange, blue, red or black, or whatever their favorite team's color is. Corporate America has a lucrative place to advertise, colleges invite their big donors to sit in the president's box, and Joe Average gets his set of $100 tickets and begins his trek to Row 72 on the sunny side of the stadium.

Football is played at the professional, college, high school, junior high and even pee-wee levels. At every level coaches are reliving their glory days through their willing charges, and young people are having a great time winning one for old Sywash. All the time we are watching this unfold, we are watching the mental health of our youth unravel.

According to a published study in the medical journal JAMA, studies performed on the donated brains from deceased NFL players have shown 99 percent suffered from Chronic Traumatic Encephalophy (CTE). And there are many more retired NFL players demonstrating symptoms, which include memory loss, depression and dementia. Some cannot remember their friends and family from day to day. The study also revealed that CTE was diagnosed in nearly 88 percent of 202 deceased former players -- high school, college and professional -- examined. Unfortunately, we have learned over the years that the best predictor of the future is the past, and the past results of football are devastating.

Yes, I know. Now I have begun to meddle. Football has become our national game. High school, college and NFL stadiums are filled each weekend through the fall, and those who don't attend are generally glued to their TV sets. Yet, medical research casts a shadow over the entire structure of football as it is played at all levels. Each fall we read again about the brain injuries of professional football players. The National Football League admitted responsibility for past head injuries to a level of more than $765 million. And there are only about 2,000 active NFL players on 32 teams.

The problem at lower levels dwarfs the liability admitted by the NFL. There are more than 70,000 college players on approximately 1,500 teams in the U.S., and the number of high school, junior high and youth teams are impossible to count. Tragically, the research shows that the younger the brain the more susceptible it is to injury. Suffice it to say that the number of young people we have involved in school- and college-sanctioned jeopardy is in the millions. The potential financial cost of such jeopardy may well be into the trillions. And, who can measure the human tragedy of a non-functioning brain?

Worse, we know the problem exists because of the published research and still we continue to create opportunities for brain mayhem at younger and younger ages. We trust coaches who are well-schooled in the fundamentals of the sport. They spend, literally, years learning how to move a football down the field. Unfortunately, most high school and college coaches will admit to having no more than one or two courses that teach them how to protect the health of the young people in their charge. And, youth coaches? What orientation/training program gets them ready to handle possible concussion problems? Just as bad, the technology of the equipment today has proven incapable of preventing the constant jarring that causes long-term brain injuries.

It is well past time to think of safer football alternatives, at least for youth players. Flag football perhaps? How about the 7-on-7 summer passing leagues that seem to have caught fire at high schools across the country.

From a personal perspective, I lament the state of what has become our national game.

I played football, coached it at both the high school and college levels and still love to watch the weekly pageantry each fall. Would I play it and coach it today considering all that is known about jeopardy to our young people? In a word, "No."