Sports Field Guide

Time magazine published a must-read story for any sports journalist, young athlete, or parent of a child playing contact sports like football, where the inherent head trauma can eventually cause CTE and other brain disorders that kick in years after a professional football player retires. Later in life, even high school and college players are susceptible to these ailments that can result in physical and mental disabilities, sometimes prompting suicidal acts. Check out this story and video.

Football has been a rough sport since the leather-helmet days, but today’s version raises the violence to an art form. No other contact sport gives rise to as many serious brain injuries as football does. High school football players alone suffer 43,000 to 67,000 concussions per year, though the true incidence is likely much higher, as more than 50% of concussed athletes are suspected of failing to report their symptoms.

The human brain, although encased by a heavy-duty cranium, isn’t designed for football. Helmets do a nice job of protecting the exterior of the head and preventing deadly skull fractures. But concussions occur within the cranium, when the brain bangs against the skull. When helmets clash, the head decelerates instantly, yet the brain can lurch forward, like a driver who jams the brakes on. The bruising and stretching of tissue can result in something as minimal as “seeing stars” and a momentary separation from consciousness.

Repeated blows to the head, which are routine in football, can have lifelong repercussions. A study commissioned by the NFL found that ex–pro players over age 50 were five times as likely as the national population to receive a memory-related-disease diagnosis. Players 30 to 49 were 19 times as likely to be debilitated. Of the dozen brains of CTE victims McKee has examined, 10 were from either linemen or linebackers; some scientists now fear that the thousands of lower-impact, or “subconcussive,” blows these players receive, even if they don’t result in documented concussions, can be just as damaging as — if not more so than — the dramatic head injuries that tend to receive more attention and intensive treatment.

The New York Times also addressed this problem in a recent story, revealing that Tom McHale, an NFL lineman from 1987-95, suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy, the sixth former NFL player under age 50 to suffer from this dementia.

So the next time you write about a player not being ‘tough enough’ because he sat out again after a concussive hit, know that you are contributing to the problem.