Re: High School Football 2016
Posted by:
Football is Overrated!
()
Date: August 03, 2016 09:55AM
757 Wrote:
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> The game of football is under attack. (Juvenile
> Troll)
>
> We see it every day in the headlines and on the
> news. The medical concerns are pressing. The game
> has taken its share of criticism. President Barack
> Obama said that if he had boys he wouldn’t let
> them play football. Even LeBron James has publicly
> said no football in his house.
>
> The question is asked over and over: Why would
> anyone want to play football? And why would anyone
> let their kids play?
>
> Here’s my answer: I believe there’s
> practically no other place where a young man is
> held to a higher standard.
What about young women?
>
> Football is hard. It’s tough. It demands
> discipline. It teaches obedience. It builds
> character.
>
> Football is a metaphor for life.
>
If that's true, explain how life managed to go on for millennia before football was invented, how life goes on in most of the world-where football is not played.
> This game asks a young man to push himself further
> than he ever thought he could go. It literally
> challenges his physical courage. It shows him what
> it means to sacrifice. It teaches him the
> importance of doing his job well. We learn to put
> others first, to be part of something bigger than
> ourselves. And we learn to lift our team mates –
> and ourselves – up together.
>
> These are rare lessons nowadays.
>
> Football has faced challenges like this before.
>
> In 1905, there were 19 player deaths and at least
> 137 serious injuries. Many of these occurred at
> the high school and college levels. Major colleges
> said they were going to drop football because the
> game had become too violent.
>
> That’s when President Teddy Roosevelt stepped in
> to call a meeting with coaches and athletic
> advisers from Harvard, Princeton and Yale. He
> wanted to find a way to make the game safer. They
> made significant changes, introducing new rules
> like the forward pass and the wide receiver
> position. Those changes turned football more into
> the game we know it as today.
>
> We made progress. Rules changed. Society evolved.
> The game advanced.
>
> We’re at another turning point in our sport. The
> concussion issue is real and we have to face it.
>
> We have to continue to get players in better
> helmets. We have to teach tackling the right way,
> and that starts at the NFL level. Change the
> rules. Take certain things out of the game. It’s
> all the right thing to do.
>
> But even with all of that, the importance of
> football hasn’t changed. In some ways, it’s
> more important than ever.
>
> And I believe the most critical place for football
> is at the youth and high school levels. For 97
> percent of football players, the pinnacle of their
> careers is the high school game. Few players ever
> go on to the college level. Even less make it to
> the pros.
>
> For a lot of these kids, it’s not until it’s
> all said and done, and they look back on it
> several years later, that they realize the
> difference the sport made in their lives. They are
> proud of playing the game. Have you ever met
> anybody who accomplished playing four years of
> high school football, and at the end of that run
> said, ‘Man, I wish I wouldn’t have played’?
> It doesn’t get said.
>
Have there been empirical studies done to support this claim.
> We know that football players aren’t perfect.
> Nobody is. But millions of former players, one by
> one, can recount the life-altering principles they
> learned from football.
>
> They know the value of football is the values in
> football.
>
> That’s why high school football – and
> particularly high school coaches – play such a
> vital role in our society. Our football coaches
> are on the front lines of the battle for the
> hearts and minds of the young men in our society.
> The culture war is on and we see it every day.
> These young men are more vulnerable than ever.
>
Once again-young men-the gender-exclusionary nature of football is a problem!
> How many youth and high school coaches serve as a
> father figure to their players? How many mothers
> look to the coaches of their son’s football team
> as the last best hope to show their son what it
> means to become a man – a real man? More than
> we’ll ever know.
>
> Coaches teach our young people the lessons of life
> that very often they learn from no one else.
> Coaches have the kind of influence in our schools,
> and with our young people, that is difficult to
> come by.
>
> Billy Graham once said, “One coach will
> influence more people in one year than the average
> person will do in a lifetime.” My dad also says
> all the time that it just takes one person to
> believe in a young man or young woman to change
> their lives. I couldn’t agree more.
It is nice, I guess, that he said that, but is there support for this claim? One might argue that the same claim could be made for teachers-and they help BOTH boys and girls!
>
> Our culture teaches us to judge an activity by how
> it’s going to make us feel right now. But
> football doesn’t work that way. The game
> challenges and pushes us. It’s often
> uncomfortable. It requires us to be at our best.
>
> Isn’t that what we want in our society?
>
> Football is a great sport. Football teams can be,
> and very often are, the catalyst for good in our
> schools and our communities. Millions of young men
> have learned lessons in football that they could
> only learn through playing this game. Football has
> saved lives.
>
> That is why football matters.
Football excludes girls. Football is expensive. Football has engendered a pernicious rape culture.
If you want your kids to play football, sign them up for an athletic club.