Will you let your son play football?

[AngryAmish]

So I am standing on the fourth tee this afternoon and I am talking with my buddy about our kids various athletic endeavors.


My buddy mentioned he decided not to enrole his 5 year old in football. Tackle football. My buddy is a professional with an advanced degree. Wtf?

My boy is 3 and is never going to play. But 5 year old football is nuts.

I played football and was undersized and the only way I could play way stupidly and recklessly. I got a concussion a week. I speared a lot of people.

There is no way my boy is playing football, ever. Will you let tour kid play?

[Adam051188]

1. no

brain damage is bad.

[morningfog]

2. Absolutely not.

[RagAss]

4. My sons both played in high school..

pretty good athletes....they played before my issues(arthritis in the neck) showed up. If it came earlier, I would not have let them play.....live and learn...we all agree the next generation plays soccer.

[AngryAmish]

6. Also a concussion problem in soccer

Golf and tennis. Maybe crew.

[Brickbat]

13. Girls' soccer is second behind football as the cause of sport-related concusssions in youth sports.

sports.

[Adam051188]

31. how close of a second?

and high school football concussions are WAY under diagnosed.

[ScreamingMeemie]

5. My son does play football, but he also respects women.

His father (my husband) passed away when he was 9. His coaches have taught them respect and are, quite simply, wonderful male role models for my soon-to-be-man who doesn't have a lot of men in the family nearby. I don't like a lot of the booster stuff that goes along with Texas football (like wishing they spent as much on education as they do on a new stadium), but my son enjoys playing. And, it is his life after all. We forget that sometimes.

[woolldog]

49. Well said.

[alp227]

7. A better question: Will football even exist in your community in the future?

Rising insurance costs and increased awareness of traumatic brain injury may have lots of places in the nation dismissing football. By the time I'd get married, I think my old high school could drop football.

[Ex Lurker]

25. I don't think it will ever disappear. I see it becoming like boxing

A disreputable niche sport played by people without other options. But I could be wrong. Football faced a similar crisis in the early 20th century and came through it.

[underpants]

30. About 10 years ago the NFL was very worried about this

There were several articles written and I believe an exploratory committee investigation of a possible NFL minor league system to replace high school football programs. Participation was way down. I don't know that it increased, I think the industry just adjusted to the new level.

[Go Vols]

8. Both of mine played

in Junior High and High School,they loved it.

[Blue_In_AK]

9. I don't have sons

but one grandson plays HS football, one plays flag football in middle school, and the other one's mother says he will NEVER play football, although he's been playing soccer for a couple of years (he's five) and he may end up playing rugby like his dad, uncle and grandpa.

I'm not a big fan of football, but the two older boys really wanted to play.

[Taitertots]

16. I think people are starting to question whether they want institutionalized violence...

to be a part of their child's development.

[City Lights]

11. Mine didn't.

He played soccer when he was young, and then switched to cross country and track in middle school. Never really showed any interest in football, and we didn't encourage it.

[Brickbat]

12. Both of my kids play. A son and a daughter.

[KamaAina]

14. No.

I don't have one. Nor am I planning to any time soon.

[Boom Sound 416]

15. Probably not

How was your round?

[AngryAmish]

18. Almost had a hole in one

80. Best round of the year. Chamber of Commerce day, clouds strictly for decoration. Drove a par 4.

[Boom Sound 416]

24. 80, yeah, you're done.

Enjoy that one for a winter.

[AngryAmish]

32. For the first time in a month played a course I could handle

I've been a gypsy for three months but the last four I played before today were Medinah 1 twice (new Doak, go buy his new Confidential Guide) then Medinah 3 (mother of balls) then Dubsdread (I hate that course).

[Boom Sound 416]

33. I'll have to look those up

I play all over Brooklyn, queens and Bronx and a number on Long Island, but maybe all in all about once every 8 weeks or so.

You're way ahead of me. A good day is 110. A great day is lower

[1StrongBlackMan]

35. Ahhh ...

You're making me jealous!

I took up golf shortly after moving to Arizona ... I could play all year long; but, I have touched my clubs twice in the last 8 months ... once, to look for something in my trunk and the second time was to remove them from my trunk ... I just had to physically acknowledge that I just don't have the time, anymore.

An 80, huh? Good round ... my best round has been a 84 ... with 4, 3-putt bogeys!

[AngryAmish]

43. Make time, my friend

Soon will be the time we can't play anymore. Working sucks anyway.

[LittleBlue]

17. Yes

I hope he does play. It was fun for me.

[Maedhros]

19. Proper tackling form greatly reduces the risk of head injury.

I played football and was undersized and the only way I could play way stupidly and recklessly. I got a concussion a week. I speared a lot of people.

In other words, don't do what you did.

[Brickbat]

20. Exactly.

[notadmblnd]

21. Aftermy husband died, one of our neighbors who was coaching asked if my son (10) was interested

He went the first day, came home, said it hurt and wasn't going back.

[TBF]

22. You know I love football & my kid's big -

but no. My partner does not want him to play so that's a no. Pushing soccer and individual sports instead.

[Ex Lurker]

23. I played in HS, as did my brother. His son is 12 and playing on the middle school team.

Do I have qualms? Yes. But it's something he's wanted to do all his life. After his first game, he said, "that's the most fun I've ever had!" There's a certain amount of risk, and I hope it's not a mistake. I understand people who choose not to let their kids play. But there are lots of hazardous activities-motocross, riding horses, the list goes on endlessly. A lot of the most rewarding things in life carry some danger.

[Arcanetrance]

26. I'm not a parent but if I was I'd be torn

I had a lot of fun playing football and wanted to do it pro but during my last year if high school I suffered a knee injury and my knee still isn't right 10 years later it still hurts it's always full of fluid and cracks and pops a lot. So I'm not sure if I'd want my kid to go through that.

[KittyWampus]

27. If I had a son of age I'd probably encourage volleyball, baseball or wrestling or track depending on

his physique and interests.

[bluestateguy]

28. I'd allow it, but discourage it

At a certain age, you are not going to stop children from doing what they want to do, and if you are not careful they will do it just to be a rebel and spite you.

[underpants]

29. 5 is way to young

I started at 12. Got 5 years in. Walked at college and quit when the girls got to campus.

[jen63]

34. Mine only showed interest for one season.

Thank gawd. He just doesn't have the build for it, but I knew if I said "no" that it might push him for more than that one season. Soccer ended up being his sport and he ran track for a year in high school.

[Dirty Socialist]

36. Not A Chance

Too violent. Any sport but football or boxing.

[SheilaT]

37. I'm still trying to get past the concept of

TACKLE football for five year olds. Have all the flags they used to use been rounded up and burned???

Both of my sons were very small for their age growing up. The older son had zero interest in sport, but the younger son would say, when he was in grade school, that he wanted to be a football player when he grew up, and then was honestly puzzled when the other kids would laugh at him.

Both sons are young men now, and the older one runs a bit, sometimes does a 5K. The younger one plays Ultimate Frisbee which is not a real contact sport, although injuries can occur. They can occur in any sport.

Back around the time my oldest was a baby, I recall watching something on PBS which profiled two retired NFL players. Neither one was 30 yet, and they'd had what is actually about the typical short NFL career. And now, these men could barely walk. They couldn't really play with their young children, and were in pain all the time. The show had a profound effect on me, and I vowed then that I wouldn't ever want any sons of mine to play football at that level.

I realize that there are lots of sports out there, and that many people love playing, including football. But there's a movement to professional level play at a younger and younger age -- 5 year old tackle football -- that I think is a very bad thing. You see it in the travel leagues for lots of sports at least as early as junior high/middle school. Parents will spend thousands of dollars for their kids to play in these leagues, blithely confident that it will get the kid a serious athletic scholarship to college, when maybe they'd have been better off saving that money directly for college.

I mean, go ahead and play whatever sport you actually like. But keep it at an appropriate level.

[longship]

38. A bully sport for bullies? Nope!

US football, the worst so-called sport on the planet. No wonder football fans need so much pre-game (tailgate) and half-time entertainment. It is a crushingly boring enterprise, where what is called a play lasts mere seconds punctuated by minutes of Budweiser commercials. Plus, the whole purpose seems to be violence.

Is anybody really surprised that there's a spouse violence problem?

For me. Nope. I despise US football. Always have. It is a sport that lauds violence. It's no wonder they have this problem.

[ileus]

39. Not until tomorrows 3:30 game.

This is my sons 3ed year....(he's only in 5th grade)

Of course right now he's at the high school game with the neighbors.

[Arugula Latte]

40. Hell no. My son is big & athletic and has been recruited since he was very young and

we always say NO. I hate the culture of American football, I hate the misogyny, I hate the concussions, I hate the spinal injuries, I hate the knee blow outs, and I just I hate that stupid-ass sport as a game. May it wither and die out.

[shanti]

41. The eldest

my four sons played in hs, as did my bro. I was strongly against it, but DS lived with the ex, and he was all for it, so.....my other 3 sons did not play. Second and third sons had no interest in playing any sports.

My last son was harangued daily to play fb by the hs coaches, but I said no. He ended up playing basketball instead. He had several ortho injuries playing basketball though, and actually got a bad concussion after hs playing a game of pickup ball at the gym. That was scary, he couldn't recognize me for several days.

All sports have a risk of injury, but football seems the highest risk. I'm glad I put my foot down.

[Ilsa]

42. Right now, football is what is keeping our son

interested in school. He's done other extracurricular things, but only loves football. Yeah, it makes me nervous. But he needs to have something besides academics.

Football keeps him very busy and very disciplined. He wouldn't study as much if he didn't have academic expectations on him from coaches.

[SheilaT]

44. I sincerely hope the coaches are expecting him

to at the very least be passing all his classes.

Back in the early Paleolithic when I was in school, all athletes had to maintain a C average to be eligible to play. In recent years I've come across schools or school districts that don't even require the student to be passing all classes, and the excuse given is invariably, "Oh, without the sport the kid would drop out!"

The way you expressed it, expectations from the coaches, sounds like they are requiring decent academics, and I hope so.

[Ilsa]

45. He has to pass to be eligible. However, the coaches

expect good grades. The varsity football team has the highest GPA of any of the sports teams at the high school.

[SheilaT]

48. I am very, very glad to hear this.

I was in high school in the 1960's. In Tucson, AZ. Twenty-something years later I was back living in AZ, in Phoenix now. As I said before, back when I was in h.s. there were reasonable minimal academic standards for any student in a sport. But now, in the mid-1980's, there was this huge uproar over whether or not kids in sport needed to be passing their classes. I was horrified, and wondered just when things had changed that much.

As you can tell from my earlier posts, I'm not a huge fan of most sports, but I also understand that it's different for everyone, and playing a sport can be precisely what will keep a particular kid in school. ESPECIALLY if the kid has to meet decent academic standards.

Thanks for your reply and clarification.

[LWolf]

46. I did.

Back in the late 80s, early 90s.

They had a good time. But in hindsight, I wouldn't let them and they wouldn't want to.

[Oktober]

47. We are more of an individual accomplishment family...

... So we lean towards accomplishments related to running or weight lifting etc...

When he gets to that age and desperately wants to play football then we'll have that conversation and it will be his choice with a full understanding of the potential consequences.