In 1905, President Theodore Roosevelt saved the game of modern football. The game has roots that go back to the 1300’s, and over its immense life it has been attacked and thrashed by those who believe that the brutality of the game lacks civility. But the game has stood the test of time, surviving up until one of its biggest reforms came in the form of a governmental reform by the president of a young and thriving United States. When Roosevelt confronted the issue footballs existence in the modern era hung by a thread. Harvard, Yale ,and Princeton, the biggest names in the game at the time, had decided that they were going to remove the football programs from their Universities. The reason they left: 18 players had died playing football …show more content…
For years the NFL has claimed that concussions on the field and brain impairment after retirement aren’t related, that a hit on the field didn’t lead to a loss in brain cells. Mike Webster played as a center for the Pittsburgh Steelers for 15 years. Nicknamed “Iron Mike” he pushed the Steelers through three super bowl wins and sits at number 75 on the The Sporting News ' list of the 100 Greatest Football Players. With his wife and four kids, Mike retired from football with a full pension and a reputation as one of the greatest football players of all time. From there his retirement took a drastic turn. By his last month on earth Mike was living out of his pick-up truck under an overpass. His friends in football offered to buy him places to stay, but he refused to live anywhere but his small 2 seat truck. His wife had divorced him 4 months previous, and his youngest son, Garrett, had to act as a Father figure for his Dad. Mike, after one of the most incredible careers the game of football had ever seen passed away at the age of …show more content…
Chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, is a neurodegenerative disease that can only be spotted after death. Yes that 's right, it cannot be seen or diagnosed until the individual ailed has passed, making this one of the hardest diseases to cure. The cause of this silent killer? Concussive blows to the head. Doctors stated after the autopsy that the blows he suffered were equivalent to roughly 25,000 automobile crashes. The amount of concussions he suffered from is unknown, but it is guessed to be more than 10. Now these were major concussions, which means they lasted more than a day. The worst thing about these accumulating injuries was that they were never treated. Not once did Iron Mike Webster admit to having a concussion. Not once did he ask anyone for help, or question whether or not he should continue to play. This opened the floodgates for concussive research in the NFL, leading to a major investment of 30 million dollars to make the game more safe and protect the people that
Mike Webster was a center for the Pittsburgh Steelers. Mike Webster had many injuries as a result of playing football. He had broken bones, torn tendons, heart malfunctions, and his teeth were falling out. However, his worst one of all was the injury to his head. In 2003, after Webster passed away, Dr. Bennet Omalu did an examination of his brain.
He was never told blows to the head could cause long term damage nor has he asked for compensation for injuries sustained. One of last questions asked at the end of frontline’s interview asks the pathologist who has studied the brains of deceased football players and the findings. “Would you allow your child to play football knowing what you know now”? Her answer,
There have been many NFL players that have had serious issues due to concussions. Postmortem X-rays Hernandez suffered the worst case of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) ever in a 27 year old, this likely affected his memory and control over his actions (“Aaron Hernandez’s”). While in prison Hernandez committed suicide using his bedsheets. Once a person dies, they can have an autopsy scan. Autopsy scans can take from sixty minutes to five hours (concussion [page 12]).
Daniel Goldberg wrote in his essay "Concussions, Professional Sports, And Conflicts Of Interest: Why The National Football League’s Current Policies Are Bad For Its (Players’) Health” about how players' brains are affected by these injuries, but since the NFL’s policy was more relaxed players were sometimes forced to go back into the game even though they were injured. Goldberg brought up in one claim that since the NFL had no set process dealing with concussions there was no limit for when player’s could return to action, and since that was true NFL coaches would rather have their players out on the field rather than letting them sit out and fully recover from the damage due to the impact that they can have on the game. (pg 4, paragraph 3 and 4) Effects of this could be seen in Ted Johnson’s case (pg 4-5) where he suffered numerous concussions when he was forced to participate in games and full contact practices before being fully healed due to the lack of regulations on concussions. And before the previously mentioned claim, Goldberg brought up the case of former player Mike Webster.
Intense sports like football are very famous, but might be too dangerous. Football has the largest percentage of all sports that have injured members almost every time. Football is an American sport known for tackles, but it causes injuries from head to head impact and causes medical care. Football is a very famous sport, causes damage like concussions and C.T.E. (Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy). Football and other intense sports causes concussions to happen, which causes brain damage.
Brian’s Song Essay (Football Concussions) Imagine you just hit the turf really hard in a football game. This is one way of getting a severe concussion which could lead to 2 weeks with no light. Concussions are a major problem in football and it needs to be fixed.
The President’s Thoughts on the Proper Place of Sports In 1903, Theodore Roosevelt’s son, Ted, made the second football team at Harvard University, instead of the varsity team. Ted reacts to the situation by sending a letter to the White House pleading for his father, the president, to come and persuade the coach into allowing him to play varsity. Roosevelt replies in a letter to his son parenting him on the dangers of putting too much emphasis on sports. Roosevelt starts his persuasive parenting letter by revealing to his son that he “greatly admires football” and that he never had the ability play football because his athletic ability was closer to “resembling Kermit’s” rather than Ted’s.
In the true story based movie and the documentary, the dangers of head injuries in football are laid out for the viewer. Dr. Bennet Omalu discovered the brain injury chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE; however, the NFL was in denial about the effects football had on the brain and had on causing CTE. I believe that the NFL’s denial to the accusations were detrimental to many football players and that serious consideration should be taken into the way football is played overall. When Dr. Omalu originally diagnosed CTE on Mike Webster and the NFL denied that football was the cause for his death and disease.
Some of the tests revealed damage to the amygdala which controls mood. Additionally the NFL players scored much lower on memory tests, and had worse verbal skills (Hedin, 2015) 5. Due to the recent number of suicides & violent crimes committed by former players, there is more of a need to research the correlation between the head injuries in the NFL and brain disease even more C. Thesis Point 3: What steps the National Football league has taken to protect players long term health and safety 1. With the scrutiny the NFL has come under, they have developed a new protocol for the diagnoses and treatment of players with concussions 2. Under the new protocol, any player who exhibits sings of a concussion, even the most remote sign, must come out of the game and be checked out by the medical staff, they may not return to the same game if they undergo tests for concussion.
Football is a very popular sport not only in American high schools and colleges, but also in the entire country of the United States. Is playing high school football worth the risk and harm inflicted to high school football players? This is the main question raised by the author, Raymond Schroth, in the article “Abolish High School Football.” In this article, Schroth talked about the disadvantages and harms of playing high school football to the players. Schroth argued that high school football should be abolished because it had contributed more harmful effects than benefits to football players.
Carson Simpson Mrs. Gallos English 3 Honors 24 April 2017 Concussions in Football Although football is a very popular sport, changes need to be made. There is a lot of research and data showing head injuries in football and how they hurt the players. The NFL tries to just sweep these cases away because they know it would hurt the popularity and economical support of the sport. Head injuries and concussions are the most popular injuries in football because of the fact that they are one of the most dangerous injuries a player could have.
American football has many different aspects that helped change America today. Football has earned millions of fans to the game every year. The sport has changed and helped various people strive through life. At the same time, football has caused many downsides that have changed people’s lives forever. Through the beginning to now, football has been filled with many impacts and injuries that have changed the game.
The long-term side effects of these traumatic injuries have led spectators and doctors to speculate the dangers of head on collision in sports. Furthermore, concussions lead to TBI which leads to depression and problems with their functioning. Brain injuries have led to famous NFL players committing suicide and losing their families and
In "When Theodore Roosevelt Saved Football", Bruce Watson enlightens us on how President Roosevelt saved the violent game of football by making it safer for the players. In the early 1900s football was a deadly sport. The players wore little protective gear, running backs could tackle before the ball was even hiked, and linemen could not pass the ball causing them to sometimes sustain fatal injuries. Many people wanted the game banned because of its fatality to the players. Harvard did but had to reinstate it because the students loved and wanted it back.
Concussion Movie with Will Smith Based on real live events, the Concussion movie is a perfect drama for sports fans to watch. Will Smith plays the role of Dr. Omalu Bennet (Dr. discoverer) who is a forensic pathologist with a Nigerian decent; he pioneers a challenge against the National Football League (NFL). Dr. Omalu brought to light the brain damage issue that was evident in retired NFL players, an issue he challenges the management to speak the truth on. The initial unfolding of the brain damage issue occurred in September 2002 when he, Dr. Omalu was called upon to conduct an autopsy on Mike Webster’s body.