For decades, the American society has been entertained by the sport of football. Baseball may be “America’s pastime,” but football, especially today, is America’s sport. Every weekend in the fall is filled with an ample amount of excitement that comes with the game. The entertainment, the passion, the thrill – there’s just something about football that gets people going. I believe the sport of football is in trouble for the future because of how dangerous the game can be.

Football is a grown man’s sport. The images of a football player are generally a tough, unresisting, and determined human being, and because of the resiliency in a football game, players often receive an injury. Anywhere from a bruised elbow, to leg cramp, or maybe even a concussion, barring the fact that it was an unbearable injury, a player would be told to “suck it up” and get back on the field. The injury that has been recently highlighted not only in football, but also in every contact sport imaginable is a concussion. A concussion is a damaging effect to the brain after a hard blow to the head. Side effects can be dizziness, dilated pupils, blurred vision, or nausea.

Today, players, coaches, parents, and trainers are slapping themselves over the way the treatment of concussions was handled in the past. Twenty years ago, if someone acquired a concussion they were told to get back in the game. People were inadequate; they didn’t realize the true long-term threats that could come with a concussion. Concussions are being taken far more seriously today because researchers have found that concussions can lead to memory loss, dementia, depression, and suicide. Famous and former NFL players such as, Junior Seau, and Ray Easterling have recently committed suicide for reasons doctors believe were caused because of  “brain injuries sustained while playing football.”

Seau and Easterling were not the only players suffering from vicious injuries. During the past couple years, a near 4,500 former NFL players filed a lawsuit against the NFL saying that the NFL wrongly treated and advised concussions. In late August, a court decided the NFL would pay 765-million dollars to the players to pay for medical expenses obtained from the treatment of concussions.

Former Super Bowl winning quarterback Kurt Warner has came out publicly

to say that he will “discourage” his children from ever playing the sport of football because the game is too violent. He does not want his children to go through what he believes they will go through if they play football. It’s a violent game, and it has to be or it’s just not football, it’s not what we’re used to seeing.

The NFL and NCAA, along with high school sports administrations are attempting to lower the number of concussion. For example, the NFL has a system where if they see a player purposely trying to make helmet-to-helmet contact with another player, could be fined thousands of dollars. The NCAA and high school administrations have enforced a law that if you make helmet-to-helmet contact with another player, you will be immediately ejected from the game and possibly suspended for the next game or multiple games.

I have never experienced a concussion, so I can’t say what it feels like, how to deal with it, or whether or not it really impedes with the playing process of a football player. I can say whatever the NFL, NCAA, or another administration rules, and treatment they make for concussions; they can’t stop them. They’re always going to be there and more so than in any other sport in the world.

I can’t help but think about what Warner said, and how there are probably more people like that out there. If a former NFL player will tell his kids, “No, you are not playing football,” then, probably, a good portion of the public will tell their children the same because they all fear for the worst.

I have always revered football. I always look forward to weekend mornings in the fall and watching football games on television, but I can’t help but think that one day, the game I’ve come love, may one day disappear from the mainstream of American sports because of how violent this game can be in causing concussion and the long term effect it can have on a human being.