The Popularity Of Professional American Football

It is time to ignore the voices of those who oppose change and grasp on to the manner in which traditional football was played. Don makes it very clear that

Thesis- I want you to better understand concussions, why they’re a problem in the NFL and what measures are being taken to prevent them.

The NFL was founded on September 17, 1920 and was known as the American Professional Football Association (APFA). It was renamed in 1922 as the National Football League or NFL. In 1920 there were eleven football franchises to form the first professional football league compared to the 32 teams that form the league now. The original teams are: Canton Bulldogs, Cleveland Tigers, Dayton Triangles, Akron Professionals, Rochester (N.Y.) Jeffersons, Rock Island Independents, Muncie Flyers, Decatur Staleys, Chicago Cardinals, and Hammond Pros. Jim Thorpe was elected as the league's first president. In 1970 NFL's rival league AFL merged their schedules and formed two conferences in which the AFL became AFC and NFL became NFC.

Steve Almond’s story “You Knock my Brains out This Sunday and I Knock Your Brains out the Next Time we Meet” speaks to the underlying truth about America’s Sunday pastime and how concussions can be prevented not only by the industry, but by its viewers as well. Football is well known after having been brought to the public’s eye as study after study was released proving that there was a link from football to head injuries. Although in our modern society we have already subconsciously made the connection between football and concussions. The fact that this problem is not decreasing, could be surprising, as the lack of understanding about who has control and the ability to influence change. We hear that football helmets and pads, are getting better, but that does not stop concussions. We do not hear how helmets make players feel and change their play style based on the feeling of invincibility that people feel while wearing a helmet. Pads and helmets do help protect the players but false senses of security due to lack of knowledge on what

The first ever NFL draft was held in 1936. The first televised NFL game was on November 22nd, 1939 in a game between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Brooklyn Dodgers. The

Although the National Football League (NFL) seems to provide a source of entertainment for Americans, it is slowly but surely brainwashing our population. Starting in September, a great majority of the American population gathers around TV screens and crowds into stadiums across the country to watch men ram into each other in hopes of getting a leather ball to the end of a field. This occurs every Sunday, as well as the occasional Saturday and Monday night. Fans spend hundreds of dollars on game tickets, and NFL Ticket TV subscriptions to ensure that they never miss a game. If we were to take a step back and look at it, these weekly occurrences seem to become ritualistic. What was supposed to be a source of entertainment has become a routine

American football originated with its earlier form of play that derived from a variation of

While the NFL is currently a very entertaining and popular American past time, there is one issue that threatens the future of the game-concussions. Concussions affect 1.6 to 3.8 million athletes and children annually in the United States. Among athletes, football is the most common sport involving risks of concussions for males, and soccer is the most common sports with concussion risks for females. The NFL has admitted that brain trauma effects a third of all NFL players (Knowles.) Concussions have been part of the game since the very beginning, but it 's only in the past 50 years or so that medical science and the public has become aware of the serious long term effects of concussions. The NFL is spending money on researching the problem, because they have been sued from hundreds of players that have suffered long-term damage from concussions. The NFL needs to dedicate more money and research into increasing helmet safety, implementing rules and policies to protect players, and utilizing the best response treatment to prevent and protect players from concussions.

In September, all around the country, football fans are preparing for the tailgating, football parties and eating, but none are looking forward to head injuries. As time goes on fans, officials, and players are becoming aware of the elevated numbers of head injuries that happen every day in the NFL. Football has been America’s sport for almost 100 years, but the overall statistics and continuous arguments involving concussion rates do not seem to agree. An increasing number of NFL players have shown signs of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), indicating that the NFL’s inconsistency in enforcing regulations to prevent concussions is resulting in a significant risk to players’ long term physical and psychological health issues.

The lack of knowledge that the majority of athletes enter the league with causes experts on the NFL’s policies to believe that the front office does not see the injury as a serious problem in the game today. “With the subsequent deaths of several relatively young retired NFL players, the autopsies of their brains, and the newly minted diagnosis chronic traumatic encephalopathy, we know the problem is real” (Carroll). This quotation intensifies the emphasis on the true problem the National Football League seems to be avoiding. Every injury, no matter how small or seemingly unimportant, needs to be addressed. “Even the only game that matters doesn't matter as much as your brain” (Flynn). There is nothing wrong with a person participating in the sport he loves, but when a blow to the head occurs, quick and efficient action must be taken to address the situation at hand. The National Football League and its policies do not suffice in relation to this area of concern. The fact of the matter is that no game, activity, or sport is worth a person’s

The NFL is big part of many Americans life during the fall and the off season. It’s a multi-billion dollar industry that hosts the most watched 4 hours of television in America. As an athlete who played football for many years, I wanted to ask the question; is the NFL’s new rules and penalties preventing concussions? During the first two weeks of April, I have compiled six different resources relating to this topic. Some, such as Trevor Horn’s article "Tackling seminar teaches new methods, inspires faith in safer football” cover the aspects of how youth and high schoolers are effected by concussions and what role the NFL plays. Other articles talk about research being put towards helping diagnose brain trauma in athletes, and also whether or

The safety of young football players for years has been a long growing concern and controversy for parents, players, high school coaches and school officials, and as well as NFL coaches and medical professionals in America. Parents worry about their children getting injured or concussions during the game. Furthermore, many parents believe that football can be safer and that the organization of football is not doing enough to protect players and their safety. However, to some football players concussions are not a big issue. Some players are too worried about their playing time to realize the consequences of getting concussions repeatedly. Therefore, some football players do not tell the coaches about their concussions. In addition, coaches also have a problem with the safety of football affecting their programs. Some coaches fear that football programs will shut down because of the controversy of how football can lead to brain damage. Besides parents, players, and coaches, doctors have a big say in the controversy. Neurologists, who are specialists in the disorders of nerves and the nervous system, have recently studied the link between football and brain damage. According to Jacob Vanlandingham, who is the founder and president of Prevacus Incorporated, a company who primarily studies concussions, said that “Doctors diagnose approximately 67,000 concussions in high school football players every year” (Vanlandingham, p.1). Nevertheless, some stakeholders, including ex-football players, believe that everything has already been done to make football as safe as possible. Football organizations have made new rules and placed new programs in order to keep young players healthy and to keep football programs from shutting down. The big controversial question that all stakeholders are asking is, “Is football doing enough to protect young children?”

Science says concussions are inevitable; 96 percent of all NFL players and 79 percent of all football players test positive for brain disease (Source: Frontline League of Denial 9/18/15 Concussion Watch Article). Prior to 2002, the NFL’s approach to preventing, treating, and managing concussions and CTE was very different than it is today. My essay will explore what some of those differences were and whether or not changes in the NFL are improving the outcomes and quality of life for current and former NFL players.

As a nation that loves competition, the United States has become obsessed with sports. This obsession has allowed professional sports leagues to generate billions of dollars of revenue each year. The one sport that stands on top is football generating around 13 billion dollars a year. This even surpasses “America’s Pastime,” baseball. One of the reasons the sport has been able to succeed so much is from the sport’s violent nature, which attracts many fans looking for big hits. But unfortunately with big hits come injuries, one of the most common injuries being a concussion (injury to the brain caused by a hard hit on the head). In the United States alone over 300,000 concussions occur annually. That includes high school and college athletes.

Football is a sport that evolved from many different games. Football is mainly known as a different form of rugby or soccer, but there is more to the origin of the game than just those two sports. Football games were played around the world before the game was actually called football. " Football is believed to have descended from a Greek game called Harpaston " (Source C). The rules in Harpaston were not very strict. Running, kicking, or passing the ball across the goal line could earn points. " It