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United States24701 Posts
When I say contact sports I really mean the ones that are most notorious for injuring players' heads. The ones that come closest to home for me are hockey and american football. I'm not a big fan of either, nor do I like the amount of stress they can place on your body. I've heard more recently about new statistics showing that even professionals are showing significant signs of long-term brain-related ailments due to playing the sport for several years. I didn't give it much more thought than that until I read this opinion piece today:
http://vitals.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/04/13/11183481-opinion-youth-hockey-injuries-border-on-child-abuse?lite
It really resonates with me. I think hockey and american football are amazing games, but something should be done in each case to make them take less of a toll on the cranium. I wish I had suggestions for exactly how to do this, but I don't. In the meantime, don't expect any kid of mine to be spending much of his/her time getting hit in hockey or tackled in football (I was one of the soccer players who refused to head the ball!).
Here are a few highlights for those who don't read the whole opinion piece (linked above):
The rates of injury in youth hockey, especially concussions, are frightening. Among some 9,000 11- and 12-year-old players in Alberta, Canada, there are some 700 concussions in a season, as the New York Times reported in 2010.
With high-profile stars such as Sidney Crosby, Chris Pronger, Claude Giroux, Zbynek Michalek, Jeff Skinner and Mike Richards all sidelined this season for long stints because of concussions, what is a parent to think about encouraging a child to play?
If you listen to sports talk radio, the airwaves are full of hosts and callers decrying the "wussification" of hockey -- and football, too. "You cannot take the big hits out of these games without destroying them," the lamentation goes.
Not so long ago, I had a chance to talk to former NFL pro middle linebacker Harry Carson, who played with distinction for the New York Giants. I asked him if he would want his son to play college or pro football. He said no, that the game is far too dangerous.
Should youth sports emulate the pros? Should the pros be protected more from this, or perhaps do you think games like contact lacrosse or hockey can be made safer for kids?
A couple of statistics from http://www.headinjury.com/sports.htm
An estimated 300,000 sports related traumatic brain injuries, TBIs, of mild to moderate severity , most of which can be classified as concussions, (i.e., conditions of temporary altered mental status as a result of head trauma, occur in the United States each year.
Repeated mild brain injuries occurring over an extended period (i.e., months or years can result in cumulative neurologic and cognitive deficits, but repeated mild brain injuries occurring within a short period (i.e., hours, days, weeks) can be catastrophic or fatal.
 
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I got out of american football with no long lasting injuries, (Sprained ankles, cuts here and there obviously but no broken bones or torn things) besides potential wear which I can't tell if it did occur or not. A really high percentage of people I played with did not, with many having to get surgery or multiple surgeries, more so than head injury to be honest. I only knew about three or four people who had serious concussions (Not from our team alone, that would be quite a lot) and not a lot of others who had reported concussions as well. We were taught very well to use proper technique in order to hit correctly and avoid concussions so the rate of concussions was similar to the rate of other injuries which can't be readily controlled. I know of a couple of serious ones from people not paying attention and getting run into for example.
On the other hand I had a buddy lose a testicle from not wearing a cup in lacrosse.
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It's true. I hear stories about a lot of football players (mostly the ones who are involved in the most part of the contact, i.e offensive and defensive lineman, linebackers etc.) suffering from dementia when they get into their fifties. Both games can be incredibly taxing upon the body and more importantly the head because of the facts that you've listed.
At the youth level, the only real solution I see is improving protection by making the players where extra padding or something of that nature. Checking and hitting are part of the game, and I really don't see a way around that.
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I guess seeing the pain is what partly draws people to these sports, as there are similar sports without contact or interest.
Otherwise they could just have better protection I think. The technology is there to make it lightweight enough.
Then again if you change the rules those sports lose to more exciting challengers.
I don't really care about the professionals, they know all the risks and are willing to take them(and get well paid for that)
But do kids still keep the interest if their sport is fundamentally different from the professionals? I think not.
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i'm an amateur boxer, should i be concerned? i sort of feel that my mental processing speed has somewhat diminished lately (esp. it feels longer to recall things from my long-term memory). during sparring, i've had a few mild concussions (never been knocked out). i've only been sparring for 3 months.
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On April 17 2012 20:31 TechnoZerg wrote:
i'm an amateur boxer, should i be concerned? i sort of feel that my mental processing speed has somewhat diminished lately (esp. it feels longer to recall things from my long-term memory). during sparring, i've had a few mild concussions (never been knocked out). i've only been sparring for 3 months.
I think if you make it a career you should be concerned. Sustained blows to the head like that catch up with you later in life.
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I'm honestly surprised because I would have thought the helmets people wear in thos sports would do a lot to solving this problem, but obviously not...
As for boxing, I heard that bare fist fighting is actually less dangerous than using gloves because far from protecting the head the gloves just allow you to hit harder by protecting the hands.
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Honestly I'm no doctor, but a few mild concussions within 3 months sounds like a lot. I know I've played football with individuals who were prone to getting concussions and were forced to stop their activity in certain sports, but I'm not sure if you can readily test for your risk of concussion before finding out the hard way, except for maybe a lot of MRI scanning or something similar.
On April 17 2012 21:10 deathly rat wrote:
I'm honestly surprised because I would have thought the helmets people wear in thos sports would do a lot to solving this problem, but obviously not...
As for boxing, I heard that bare fist fighting is actually less dangerous than using gloves because far from protecting the head the gloves just allow you to hit harder by protecting the hands.
Yeah funny thing, on every American football helmet there's a sticker that tells you how the helmet can not prevent or protect against concussions/head trauma. In reality it does more to protect you from cuts or external injury than to protect you from concussions afaik. I'm actually pretty sure that the mouth guard you have to wear in football reduces the severity of concussions more than the helmet. It is also a head trauma severity issue as each blow moves the brain inside the skull, the protection is just an issue of how violently/far the brain moves and if it hits anything.
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51482 Posts
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At the high school and below level football is actually more frightening to me than at the college-pro level why? Half the kids who play high school football don't know how to properly tackle which is where most concussion come up form. I played football from my 6th grade all the way to graduating high school.
A lot of the newer players who tried out for the football team didn't tackle properly, people get concussion when you just lower your head and essentially "spear", meaning they lead with their head first when tackling. This will get you injured, the reasons (besides skill) why a coach is reluctant to send a obviously less athletic and less experience player to the field is because they have a much higher chance of injuring themselves or others.
One thing i noticed a lot of coaches now do though is to practice form tackling, before we even gett full pads we spend about 2-3 weeks just practicing tackling. When i was a little kid in the 6th grade i think i remember they told us how NOT to tackle so i guess i was just lucky to never injure myself.
I was a decent football player who started for all my 6 years and i have only ever gotten 1 concussion, yea a lot of bump and cuts but thats all part of the sport.
But trying to get better protection is difficult, you have to look at it like this try creating something to protect 200-300lb men of mostly muscle running full speed at each other. Its difficult, the sport demands speed and muscle so obviously the forces are very very powerful. I'm not saying what we have is good but it better than the leath helmets football started with
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I'll use Rugby as my sport to analyse as... I'm not American and American sports are such a minority in most other countries. Rugby went professional in the late 90's and since then the size increase of the athletes has been staggering. A quick look at Jonny Wilkinson circa 2003 and now is a perfect example. The pinnacle of skill in 2003 had to put on a hell of a lot of weight to continue to compete as all Rugby players have.
The force of impact the modern Rugby player hits is now at a level which cannot continue to increment without American Football style pads, helmets etc. This huge impact sport has not however led to a large amount of brain damaged players - comparative to Hockey and American football.
I'd go so far as to say that it is the protection equipment in A. Football and Hockey that is responsible for the statistics you link. The equipment is clearly having a detrimental effect on the player's psyche, making them think of themselves as invincible.
Much like in bare knuckle boxing, compared to gloved, no one ever died of head injuries as no one punched the head, it hurt the hand too much. The era of safety equipment has brought unexpected consequences in the form of over sized, over hyped, careless professionals.
Whether this should be changed at all is questionable; as long as people are aware of the risks when entering the sport, I see no reason to change it. Laissez Faire.
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On April 17 2012 22:28 DKR wrote:
I'd go so far as to say that it is the protection equipment in A. Football and Hockey that is responsible for the statistics you link. The equipment is clearly having a detrimental effect on the player's psyche, making them think of themselves as invincible.
Much like in bare knuckle boxing, compared to gloved, no one ever died of head injuries as no one punched the head, it hurt the hand too much. The era of safety equipment has brought unexpected consequences in the form of over sized, over hyped, careless professionals.
It is probably true that bare knuckle boxing results in less brain injuries. But it's certainly untrue to say that no one ever died of head injuries in bare knuckle boxing, and also untrue to say that people were never hit in the head. Here are just a couple of examples:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Byrne
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_Bowen
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I can relate to this blog. Am in the process of recovering from one of the most severe injuries I've ever incurred 
Tore my left hamstring playing soccer... there was no contact persay though, I am amazing enough to seriously injure myself... Might not be able to run for a month or more. And right now I'm walking with a bit of a limp, seeing the doctor later today hopefully.
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I don't understand the obsession Americans have with fighting in Hockey. The sport is very big here in Sweden but we have perhaps one or two fights a year in the rink and then they always lead to very serious punishments.
Anyway, all sports are bad for your body if practiced at a higher level, if you are a professional athlete you sacrifice being able to walk past the age of 70. There does need to be very strict guidelines in place so that casual players don't get harmed though. Boxing is an atrocity and should be banned below the age of 20 (repeated blows to the head while the brain is still developing is very, very damaging).
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On April 17 2012 23:29 whatthefat wrote:Show nested quote +On April 17 2012 22:28 DKR wrote:
I'd go so far as to say that it is the protection equipment in A. Football and Hockey that is responsible for the statistics you link. The equipment is clearly having a detrimental effect on the player's psyche, making them think of themselves as invincible.
Much like in bare knuckle boxing, compared to gloved, no one ever died of head injuries as no one punched the head, it hurt the hand too much. The era of safety equipment has brought unexpected consequences in the form of over sized, over hyped, careless professionals.
It is probably true that bare knuckle boxing results in less brain injuries. But it's certainly untrue to say that no one ever died of head injuries in bare knuckle boxing, and also untrue to say that people were never hit in the head. Here are just a couple of examples: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Byrnehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_Bowen
My apologies, whilst I said never, I should have said rarely, or hardly ever; was said for effect more than anything else.
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