It is time to wean Minnesota high schools and colleges from sports that damage the brains of the students that they are trying to educate. Tackle football and rugby should be phased out. Varsity soccer might be preserved if heading is barred and reserved for professional play.
The evidence is compelling and disturbing. The risk of traumatic brain injury from full frontal contact sports is unavoidable, even though it can be somewhat reduced by headgear, rule changes or even electronic sensors that measure head slams as they happen.
The Illinois High School Association faces a class-action suit for concussions. (Young brains are more, not less, likely to be injured.) The number of high school students showing up for these sports has fallen by half, because parents are steering kids to safer activities. National Football League (NFL) players have sued their league for concealing the injuries. The tragic suicides and disabilities among pro and school athletes mount.
Even Mike Ditka, who could fairly be called America's "Mr. Football," says he would not let his own son play. "I think the risk is worse than the reward," Ditka said. "I really do."
School football culture is in deep denial. Coaches and administrators know that the risk of severe brain injury is unavoidable. They know it is uninsurable. They know that the conflict of interest of team physicians is entrenched and that the sport will send players with concussions back into play with impaired judgment and therefore increased risk.
A pro career is largely a mirage that lures students. College athletes from the National Collegiate Athletic Association's Division II and III rarely go pro. Fewer than 2 percent of the players on Division I teams like the University of Minnesota Gophers are offered a first-year pro contract. Only a few of those get a second year. The average pro career is less than three and a half seasons.
The arguments in favor of retaining football and rugby do not stand up to scrutiny. We can make better helmets and better rules, but these don't change the fact that football and rugby players bang heads frequently — and hard. It is arbitrary to draw a line separating out football and rugby, but lines are always being drawn. The NFL does depend on universities to find and develop new talent, but schools do not have an obligation to attract, subsidize and sift through a large number of varsity football players to find the one in 70 who goes pro for a couple of years. The $10 billion NFL should finance its own farm teams.
Everyone can participate in phasing out these sports.
