One of the few good things to come out of the COVID-19 crisis is the delay and perhaps cancellation of football season for many participants. Let me explain.

I keep a brain on a shelf in my home office. It's plastic, comes apart in sagittal section to view the interior, and is meticulously labeled with 80 or 90 parts — from big ones like the cerebrum to little ones like the pathetic nerve.

I used this brain with neurologists testifying on video for cases involving TBIs, or traumatic brain injuries. It helped jury members see things the doctors talked about.

Our brain, of course, is far from solid plastic in consistency. Docs describe it as Jell-O-like. It sits in a hard case called the skull, and trouble starts when acceleration and/or deceleration cause the brain to move and stop.

How does this relate to football? When I played, coaches used to say, "Let's go out and knock heads" as we headed out to the field. All too often, that's what we did. In the fall of 1969, I was sometimes the outside man or "headhunter" covering kickoffs at Camp Randall Stadium at the University of Wisconsin. I think it was a game against Indiana. We were supposed to race downfield, evade blockers and tackle the returner, who was usually speedy but not too big. In the incident I'm thinking about, some of us converged on the runner and hit him, then the ground. But the runner didn't get up right away. He lay there and twitched, maybe having a seizure. A trainer ran out from the sidelines. After a while the player got up and wobbled off the field. The term for this at the time was "having your bell rung."

Later that school year, in practice, I zoomed up from the ironically named position of safety and tackled a large running back. The technique was to plant your face on the numbers of the runner and wrap your arms around him to bring him down. Attempt this on a powerful young man weighing more than 200 pounds who is trying to run you over. In this case, my head snapped back, my arms became numb and dropped to my sides. This time I was the guy losing it. Things were kind of foggy, but I made it through the showers and locker room and got back to my dorm. I vaguely remembered I had two exams the next day. Trouble was, I couldn't remember what classes they were in, so the following morning I got a note from the team physician saying, "Dear Professors X and Y, Jim doesn't remember what exams he has today due to a head injury. Please allow him to take your test later."

The ethic at all levels of the game was to "play while hurt." The player who, say, broke his collarbone yet stayed in the game was a hero. Also, injuring a good player on the other side and knocking him out of the game was considered an achievement. After other injuries and a desire to spend my time doing more interesting things, I quit. Room, board and tuition was not enough pay for destroying my brain and joints. I thought I might need these parts later on.

Football advocates argue that technique, equipment and protocols are better today than in the old days, but that's putting a very thin coat of lipstick on this pig. The purpose of the game is to hit people and knock them down. Of course, when you hit someone, you are also being hit, and smacking hard ground isn't that nice, either.

For those who say there are lessons to be learned regarding teamwork, discipline, etc., I say you can get these from band, theater, and myriad other sports and activities that are less likely to cause disability. Chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, resulting in early onset Alzheimer's, ALS and Parkinson's, await too many players. Also, it's kind of nice to be able to jog or swing a golf club in middle age without pain.

Then there's the racial issue at universities that profit from the underpaid labor of athletes. According to an article by Jemele Hill in the October 2019 issue of the Atlantic:

"Almost all of these schools are majority white — in fact, Black men make up only 2.4% of the total undergraduate population of the 65 schools in the so-called Power Five athletic conferences. Yet Black men make up 55% of the football players in those conferences, and 56% of basketball players."

Finally, the upper middle class has figured all this out. Three expensive private schools — Blake, Minnehaha Academy and St. Paul Academy — consolidated to make one squad in 2015, lacking enough bodies individually. It's time that schools, which are supposed to enhance health, get out of football. Arguments in favor of football are, frankly, pathetic.

James Dunn, of Edina, is a retired attorney and Minneapolis school volunteer.