A 5-Concussion Pee Wee Game Leads to Penalties for the Adults

[miami_fan]

Pee Wee Football Game With Concussions Brings Penalties for Adults - NYTimes.com

A 5-Concussion Pee Wee Game Leads to Penalties for the Adults
By KEN BELSON

It took just one play on Sept. 15 to suggest the game between the Southbridge Pop Warner pee wees and their rivals, the Tantasqua Braves, could mean trouble. Two Tantasqua players were hit so hard that their coach pulled them off the field. An emergency medical technician on the sidelines evaluated the boys, grew worried that they might have concussions, and had them take their pads off.

The boys on the teams were as young as 10, and, because of rules about safety, none could weigh more than 120 pounds. Shortly after 3 p.m. at McMahon Field in Southbridge, though, things quickly became worse. Six plays into the game, another Brave was removed after a hard hit. An official with the Tantasqua team said the eyes of one of the boys were rolling back in his head.

But the game, an obvious mismatch between teams from neighboring towns in central Massachusetts, went on, with Southbridge building a 28-0 lead in the first quarter. The game went on without the officials intervening. It went on despite the fact that the Braves, with three of their players already knocked out of the game, no longer had the required number of players to participate.

Even with what are known as “mercy rules” — regulations designed to limit a dominant team’s ability to run up scores — the touchdowns kept coming, and so did the concussions. When the game ended, the final score was 52-0, and five preadolescent boys had head injuries, the last hurt on the final play of the game.

The coaches, at the game’s conclusion, shook hands, and then the Southbridge team, with a military flourish, marched off the field in pairs.

Like almost all Pop Warner games, this one played a little more than an hour’s drive west of Boston gained little attention. But since then, it has emerged as one of the more disturbing episodes in the ever more controversial world of youth football. In the days after the game, the injured boys were determined to have sustained concussions. Some parents accused Southbridge’s players of deliberately trying to hurt their sons. Scott Lazo, Southbridge’s coach, accused the Tantasqua coach of not properly training his team and jeopardizing them by not forfeiting.

“If you lost that many players, you should have called a timeout and come seen me,” Lazo said in an interview this week. “My team is not dirty. All the issues were on their side of the field. This is a football game, not a Hallmark moment.”

Late last week, league officials suspended the coaches for both teams for the rest of the season. The referees who oversaw the game were barred from officiating any more contests in the Central Massachusetts Pop Warner league, and the presidents of both programs were put on probation.

But the debate the game has further fueled is not likely to calm any time soon. Head injuries in the National Football League remain the league’s greatest safety concern, and the league’s greatest legal liability. Ivy League universities have ordered limits on contact in practice, to reduce the risk of brain injuries. And Pop Warner, the national organization made up of hundreds of thousands of children, some as young as 5, has adopted its own safety guidelines, based in part on the medical wisdom that the brains of young boys are particularly vulnerable.

Still, as the Massachusetts game suggests, rules are only as effective as the adults charged with enforcing them. Four of the five injured boys have resumed playing football for Tantasqua.

The football programs in Southbridge and Tantasqua are from neighboring communities, and in rivalries, passion and pride can interfere with common sense. A banner on Southbridge’s Web site asks, “Are You Tough Enough?” Lazo has coached in Southbridge for 18 years, and says he idolizes Vince Lombardi, the Hall of Fame pro coach who was once said to declare, “Winning isn’t everything; it’s the only thing.” Yet even as the Southbridge team pummeled Tantasqua that day, parents on the losing side of the field wanted their sons to soldier on.

“We were trying to play a football game,” one parent of a Tantasqua player wrote in an e-mail. “Every kid who was out there wanted to play and not give up.”

Pop Warner has done more than perhaps any other organization to try to protect young players from head injuries. In 2010, the league told its coaches that if there was any doubt about a child’s health, the player was to be removed from play. Coaches receive training in how to recognize concussions, and once a player is removed because of a concussion, he needs a doctor’s note to return to games. In June, Pop Warner told its coaches to limit player contact in practices and to eliminate full-speed head-on blocking and tackling drills.

Yet on any given Saturday, the rules may be bent or ignored, even by referees under pressure from parents and coaches.

“Having been there and coached, the game officials should have been more cognizant with this many kids going down and seeing the sidelines and the same kids going out there,” said Kevin Guskiewicz, the founding director of the Matthew Gfeller Sport-Related Traumatic Brain Injury Research Center at the University of North Carolina, who advises the N.C.A.A. and N.F.L. “What in the world was the coach thinking?”

Erik Iller, Tantasqua’s coach, could not be reached for comment.

Guskiewicz, whose three sons played Pop Warner football, said that it is often difficult to diagnose concussions in younger players because the injuries are invisible and the player must describe how he feels. Because teams are coached and organized by volunteers, the quality of care on the sidelines varies widely. Few leagues require that a physician be present, he said.

Officials with the Central Massachusetts Pop Warner league did not seek to inquire into the Southbridge-Tantasqua game until parents began to complain a week later. Even then, it took several weeks to hear from the coaches and officials.

The hearing took place last Thursday at a hotel in Worcester. The coaches and the team presidents were there, and parents milled around outside the hearing room. The meeting lasted about four hours and ended around midnight.

In a statement after the meeting, Patrick Inderwish, the president of the Central Massachusetts Pop Warner league, said, “Nothing is more important to Pop Warner than the safety and well-being of our players.”

Lazo, the Southbridge coach, said the league committee that conducted the hearing told him he should have taken his team off the field. He insisted, though, that he was not aware of the accumulating injuries on the other sideline.

He said the coach of Tantasqua, Iller, told the committee he had his team continue because he wanted the boys to score, and thus “leave with something.”

“It’s shocking there were five concussions diagnosed because it means there were probably many more,” said Chris Nowinski, president of the Sports Legacy Institute, a nonprofit organization involved in research on brain trauma among athletes and members of the military. “And with a roster that small, the kids might have felt pressure to keep playing.”

Speaking generally about youth coaches, he said, “If you consider the coach is a fool, there are no rules that are foolproof.”

This story left me speechless.

[Alan T]

This is near where I live and has been all over the news here.

Pretty much my opinion on this story is that every single adult involved (Coaches, officials, parents) all are at fault and should seriously be looked at.

There were so many people that could have put things to a stop or brought things to other's attention and didn't that it is mind boggling.

[JonInMiddleGA]

I hit speechless right around this part

In June, Pop Warner told its coaches to limit player contact in practices and to eliminate full-speed head-on blocking and tackling drills.

Seriously? That's one of the most absurd things I've ever heard from the youth sports realm.

As for the rest of it ... something here just doesn't seem to add up right. The kids were all in the same weight class as required? The equipment used by the losing team was proper & certified & in working order? I spent a couple of years running the scoreboard or working the chain gang for rec football games that covered this age group as well as younger & older and I don't think I saw 5 KO's (which these effectively sound like) in all those games put together. And those were age, not weight, restricted leagues.

Something here just sounds fishy, something has got to be missing.

The other thing that has me stunned is the suggestion that the winning team's coach should have taken his team off the field. That might be the most inane thing I've heard ever, youth sports or otherwise. Mutual agreement, sure. Suggest the officials stop the game, sure. But pull his team from the field unilaterally? That anyone would suggest that in this scenario is mindboggling.

[sterlingice]

It almost sounded like one team had to stay under the 120 limit while the other did not or something

SI

[molson]

I googled this league, just because I'm from this area and was curious how the teams are divided v. when I was a kid, and damn, this league has a competitive balance issue. Pretty much every game is 35-0ish. I guess they're actually dividing teams by what town they live in, which probably isn't the best way to ensure balanced teams (if that's a goal.)

[MizzouCowboy]

Reading this story I thought it was going to be about the winning team using older and bigger kids, 'bout the only way I could see 5 kids getting concussions.

I don't understand punishing the winning coach, uh, what the hell is he supposed to do? Forfeit the game because his kids are destroying the other team, which, I dunno, is kind of the goal in sports.

Something has to be screwy. The losing team had some smallish kids and the helmets didn't fit properly? Mouth pieces not being used, or have been chewed on so much they are useless?

[Passacaglia]

Maybe only one side actually eliminated blocking and tackling drills?

[King of New York]

Originally Posted by miami_fan

Pee Wee Football Game With Concussions Brings Penalties for Adults - NYTimes.com



This story left me speechless.

Probably left a lot of the concussed kids speechless, too.

[Alan T]

There is alot more detail in the local news stories then what was in that NY times piece.

From the last few days, what I have gathered, it has been something along the following:

Tantasqua barely had enough kids to even play the game to start (There is a minimum of 16 kids to play the game), and they had 17, but a few of those 17 were already injured with unrelated issues, or came in to the game a little below full health. In the first few minutes of the game, they lost 6 more players and ended up playing with only 11-13 players for the most part, no real chance for any breathers or anything for any of the players.

As can be imagined, that game got out of control pretty quickly and other kids got hurt (the concussions and other various injuries), and it just got ugly.

After the fact, the coach for Tantasqua was coming out blaming the Southbridge coach, stating that he pre-scouted the team and knew specifically which were the most talented players and had his team specifically target those players. (even though common logic would state your best players are the ones usually with the ball, thus usually getting targeted the most anyways). He also is claiming that the weigh-in should be questioned, that they didn't get any accurate readings for any of the southbridge players that day (no idea how that happens).

The Southbridge coach is claiming they did not pre-scout nor target to try to injure players, and they said that they should not be held accountable for the poor coaching of the other team to let that game even happen. They shouldn't be penalized for something they were not even aware of. He said he was showing them mercy during the game, they were punting on first down, etc. He said he could have won by 100 points or more if he wanted to.

The referees are being blasted for letting the game get out of hand, and letting it continue despite multiple rules regarding minimum required number of players and score mercy rule where they should have stopped the game anyways.

[Alan T]

Dola, if people want to see various comments from parents posted to the local newspaper website, here is a thread where they are commenting about the game.

Telegram.com - An edition of the Worcester Telegram & Gazette and Sunday Telegram

[RendeR]

They ll fucked up in some way, including the winning coach, and yes there is certainly a precedent for calling the ref over and saying "go talk to their coach, we're gonna kill somebody at this rate, we don't want to do any more harm."

[BYU 14]

I have a couple of opinions on this. First, in Arizona I am seeing the chasm in competitive balance in youth Football grow on a yearly basis. There are numerous youth leagues here now and a couple basically have no rules about where you can pull your players from. This results in heavy recruiting by some coaches, leaving coaches who are not as 'serious' with players not wanted by other teams or just taking whoever wants to play because they are not in tune with what is going on.

When you have youth teams with more knowledgeable, better equiped coaches with better players and the sole agenda of winning vs youth teams with less talented kids who are not as fundementally sound, coached by men who are not just about winning games at all costs, this stuff happens. A team with superior athletes, who are aggressive and schooled in fundementals are going to inflict injuries on teams that in some cases have no business on the field with them.

I am not advocating for one side or the other on the team stacking/correct coaching mentality at the youth level. I will say that I like how it was done in Utah when I coached there. You played in the boundaries of the HS you would attend, you wore their colors and represented their mascot at all levels. Was there still cheating? Sure, but no system is without flaws and this was certainly better than the free for all style I see in Arizona now.

To me you take the players you get and as a coach take it seriously enough to be competent in fundementals and scheme and make sure your staff is equally prepared. The number priorities in youth football should be safety, development and instilling a passion for the game in the kids. If you are lucky to have talent winning takes care of itself.

The other issue is there is more awareness of concussions than ever at the HS and Youth level now. I have no doubt that I played a handful of games that I would not be allowed to play in today due to concussions. This season on our freshman team I have lost more gametime to concussions than all other injuries combined. I have had more kids deemed to have concussions based on the current AIA protocol than any other season in 26 years of coaching and it is not even close. Under the old protocol I can think of only 3 cases that would have resulted in kids being held out. I think I can safely say that at least a few of the kids that were held out because of our test here, did not have concussions. I can also say I would rather have them held out and be safe than sorry, so I support our new protocol strongly, despite the lost time.

I will also add we have revolution helmets, which are among the best at concussion preventtion and place a great emphasis on making sure kids are fundamentally sound when they hit or block.

In terms of head on blocking, there is no need to eliminate these drills, just be smart. Don't start kids 15 yards apart and have them run full speed and hit head on. That is just stupid. Don't do drills that put a kids neck/head at risk just be the nature of the drill. One of my favorite examples here is putting two kids on their back, blowing a whistle and then have them roll over and get up and hit each other. First off this drill has no practical purpose as you never have this happen in a game, secondly, the kids often will instinctively put their heads down doing this and that is the first point of contact.

The ultra cautious approach to concussions will continue as it should and the rest just comes down to protecting the kids as much as possible through solid fundamentals. In the case of the situation in post 1 of this thread, maybe they need to take a look at the way their teams are put together and the training they require their coaches to take. It sounds like a much better team was in a mismatch and the the team they were playing was possibly not coached to be fundamentally sound in the way they tackled/blocked, or the physical disparity could have just been that great that it made it unsafe.

[kcchief19]

There's also something to be said for realizing you've over matched your opponent and telling your team to back off.

It sounds like everything that could go wrong did go wrong. But again this goes back to the culture of the game. Can anyone justify an argument for why kids are being coached coached to hit each other hard enough to cause concussions? Are the kids trying to imitate Donkey Kong Suh, and do the coaches think that someone is going to see them leading a pee-wee football team and give them a real coaching job?

On the other hand, I know how these things can innocently get out of hand. When I was a 12-year-old baseball player, I was coming off a broken thumb and my first game back was Fourth of July week and it was 104 degrees. We had a bunch of kids on family vacation, so we only had 10 kids. We had an emergency catcher who was also our starting shortstop. That day our pitchers decided to have zero control. We had an inning go on for half an hour, we walked nine guys in the inning and I was chasing wild pitches back to the backstop repeatedly. I went to the the mound during a pitching change and told the coaches I needed out and they should sub out our SS to get him in the catching gear. They told me they would, then didn't, and our pitchers walked a couple of more guys. After the last walk, I was so pissed I launched my throw back to the pitcher into centerfield. They came and got me.

When I got the bench a bunch of parents got worried about me because my uniform was soaked and I was beat red. They were dumping ice from the coolers on me trying to get temperature down and discussing if they should take me to the ER. The game went on, and nobody was too concerned.

In retrospect, maybe everybody but the parents hated me.

[BYU 14]

Originally Posted by Alan T

Tantasqua barely had enough kids to even play the game to start (There is a minimum of 16 kids to play the game), and they had 17, but a few of those 17 were already injured with unrelated issues, or came in to the game a little below full health. In the first few minutes of the game, they lost 6 more players and ended up playing with only 11-13 players for the most part, no real chance for any breathers or anything for any of the players.

A HUGE problem in youth sports. There should be a minimum number (24-25) per team and if they can['t meet this combine teams. This is on the league.

Originally Posted by Alan T

After the fact, the coach for Tantasqua was coming out blaming the Southbridge coach, stating that he pre-scouted the team and knew specifically which were the most talented players and had his team specifically target those players. (even though common logic would state your best players are the ones usually with the ball, thus usually getting targeted the most anyways).

I know of a company here that hires itself out to youth teams to go film their opponents....Yes this goes on and a lot of teams do it. Again, not advocating either side, but if I am coaching a youth team and know I have an opponent filming me, I would have to do the same so I could prepare my kids. It may be sad, but youth football is like HS football in AZ now in terms of some of the stuff that happens.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by kcchief19

Can anyone justify an argument for why kids are being coached coached to hit each other hard enough to cause concussions?

{scratches head} Force = mass X velocity ... right?

What do you suggest, that coaches teach players to run slower? Or sprint to the ball but try to make an abrupt stop before contact, risking all sorts of knee injuries in the process of that unnatural act?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by BYU 14

There should be a minimum number (24-25) per team and if they can['t meet this combine teams. This is on the league.

25 per team is more than at least 2-3 dozen high schools in Georgia have. Anything more than about 15-16 players at the standard rec league youth level & the wailing about lack of playing time would seem like a huge problem with typical 6-8 minutes quarters. (*middle school teams play 8 min qtrs here, I don't have a clue what other states do though, maybe ours is unusual)

[Glengoyne]

Originally Posted by molson

I googled this league, just because I'm from this area and was curious how the teams are divided v. when I was a kid, and damn, this league has a competitive balance issue. Pretty much every game is 35-0ish. I guess they're actually dividing teams by what town they live in, which probably isn't the best way to ensure balanced teams (if that's a goal.)

There was a scandal in one of our local youth leagues where one of the programs was actively recruiting kids that should have gone to other teams. The teams were broken up by the high school that the player's schools "fed" into. One of the programs was very well run, very well coached, and the parents of kids who demonstrated physical skill were encouraged to get their kid assigned to that team next season. It got to the point where that team more than 50 strong, and so much better than the rest of the teams in the league the other teams refused to play them.

I even see it my my son's youth soccer league. He is in an under 10 league. Now my son is not all that athletically inclined, he just wants to have some fun. I was a bit concerned this season when there were only a couple of kids on his team that seemed to have any semblance of experience/skill. I've now learned that ALL of the talented kids get lumped onto two or three teams with good coaches. These team's have scrubs that are much better than the kids on my son's team. So I'm a little disappointed that my son's team has to be subject to drubbing after drubbing in an under 10 youth league.

[Blackadar]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Seriously? That's one of the most absurd things I've ever heard from the youth sports realm.

That's not exactly right, so don't believe what you read.

Pop Warner coaches are limited to no more than 40 minutes of hard contact during practices. Also, you can't have any drills where players go head-on at each other and are separated by more than 3 yards. The idea is to give enough time to practice at full speed, but limit the number of blows to the head in any given practice.

We lost the biggest kid on our team this year due to a severe concussion sustained in 1-on-1 tackling drills in practice. The kid showed concussion symptoms for over a month after sustaining the injury - he couldn't even go out and deal with direct sunlight for close to 3 weeks.

Oh, and they play 10 minute quarters at that age.

[Blackadar]

Originally Posted by Glengoyne

There was a scandal in one of our local youth leagues where one of the programs was actively recruiting kids that should have gone to other teams. The teams were broken up by the high school that the player's schools "fed" into. One of the programs was very well run, very well coached, and the parents of kids who demonstrated physical skill were encouraged to get their kid assigned to that team next season. It got to the point where that team more than 50 strong, and so much better than the rest of the teams in the league the other teams refused to play them.

I even see it my my son's youth soccer league. He is in an under 10 league. Now my son is not all that athletically inclined, he just wants to have some fun. I was a bit concerned this season when there were only a couple of kids on his team that seemed to have any semblance of experience/skill. I've now learned that ALL of the talented kids get lumped onto two or three teams with good coaches. These team's have scrubs that are much better than the kids on my son's team. So I'm a little disappointed that my son's team has to be subject to drubbing after drubbing in an under 10 youth league.

This isn't uncommon in youth sports. Pop Warner breaks out by area, so a well-populated area can field 3 or 4 separate teams. It's amazing how all the really good kids tend to wind up on one of those squads. For example, we took on the Titans twice this year. We lost to their A team 32-0 and beat their B team 32-13. This happens every single year.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Blackadar

That's not exactly right, so don't believe what you read.

That happens quite a bit with articles like this, thanks for the clarifications. What you describe seems a lot more reasonable that what the article claimed.

Oh, and they play 10 minute quarters at that age.

I wondered if it might be different than what I'd seen. Interestingly, Pop Warner Football (as a league/brand) was dormant in Georgia until 2011 when it looks like 2-3 areas in the south & east affiliated with them. Otherwise, it's primarily either rec department leagues or in some cases school leagues.

[Solecismic]

We accepted this until doctors told us that accumulated concussions - especially if one comes too soon after the last one - can mean greatly reduced quality of life down the road.

Now, we have to make changes if we want to keep football.

It's fairly easy, when you're in the sports mindset, to go out and play and get your bell rung and want to get right back in there and prove you're tough enough. Football is the perfect blend of team sport, which builds discipline and inter-personal skills that really do help in life, and that tough, beat-the-other-guy-down competition that we otherwise don't get without boxing or wrestling.

The problem is that it's truly dangerous and now we're aware of the danger.

I don't know the answer here. If you want to play football the "right" way, you're going to bang heads accidentally once in a while and you're going to hit the ground hard, back-of-your-head first once in a while. Proper technique makes a difference. Big penalties for targeting the head makes a difference. But it doesn't solve the problem.

I'm afraid that the next step must include technology. A better helmet. Maybe Revolution is as good as we can get with the hard shell. Unfortunately, I don't see how you even begin to test another type of solution without enormous liability and resistance.

In this particular case, rather than blaming the coaches or the kids or the parents, I would simply tell the league director that he didn't do his job and replace him, permanently.

[BYU 14]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

25 per team is more than at least 2-3 dozen high schools in Georgia have. Anything more than about 15-16 players at the standard rec league youth level & the wailing about lack of playing time would seem like a huge problem with typical 6-8 minutes quarters. (*middle school teams play 8 min qtrs here, I don't have a clue what other states do though, maybe ours is unusual)

Wow, I know some of the 8 man schools here have numbers like that and we actually played 2 freshmen teams this year that suited 21 and 24 respectively for our games (we will end with 58 Freshmen and that is a down year for us numbers wise) and the results were predictable, our starters done before halftime.

I can't imagine only dressing out 15-16 kids for a youth team. Not only for the sake of injuries, but how can you really have an effective practice?

I don't know all the youth league rules here, but I know Pop Warner requires each player play 8 plays a game, which is not a lot for coach to fit in playing with rosters of 20-25.

[Blackadar]

Originally Posted by Solecismic

I don't know the answer here. If you want to play football the "right" way, you're going to bang heads accidentally once in a while and you're going to hit the ground hard, back-of-your-head first once in a while. Proper technique makes a difference. Big penalties for targeting the head makes a difference. But it doesn't solve the problem.

I'm afraid that the next step must include technology. A better helmet. Maybe Revolution is as good as we can get with the hard shell. Unfortunately, I don't see how you even begin to test another type of solution without enormous liability and resistance.

The Pop Warner equipment leaves something to be desired. The helmets are often ill-fitting and don't have great padding. At the same time, if PW goes with the more expensive helmets, parents couldn't afford to enroll their kids. It's already a very expensive sport compared to other sports. It's $200+ for a season just to play, get a helmet, shirt, pants and shoulder pads - you're still on the hook for a chin strap, mouthpiece, removable pads, practice gear, cleats and a few other things.

They are trying with the new rules. They also try to really emphasize the proper tackling technique, which is not done with the helmet. Unfortunately, these are kids and not exactly in full control of their own bodies.

Originally Posted by Solecismic

In this particular case, rather than blaming the coaches or the kids or the parents, I would simply tell the league director that he didn't do his job and replace him, permanently.

The coaches deserve a lot of blame here. To keep sending kids out after they're knocked silly is ALL on the coaches. To keep playing in that kind of a blowout is on the coaches and the refs.

[Glengoyne]

This brings to mind a story of my father's. He went to a small town high school, and graduated in '43. His football team won their league and advanced through the play offs to the "valley championship". This put his team with a school size of maybe 150 kids in the whole high school against a school with over 1000 students.

His coach forfeited the game when he saw what school they would be facing. He wasn't going to subject his players to that kind of potential harm.

I have never been able to understand how my father never had any trouble with his coach's decision. When I questioned it, my father said that he'd never questioned his coach's call. He said that his team would have been clearly out matched by the much physically larger team (larger players and more of them), and that someone could have been really hurt.

When I reconcile that story with something like this, I'm left to think there really is something to that whole "greatest generation" thing.

[gstelmack]

Originally Posted by Glengoyne

I even see it my my son's youth soccer league. He is in an under 10 league. Now my son is not all that athletically inclined, he just wants to have some fun. I was a bit concerned this season when there were only a couple of kids on his team that seemed to have any semblance of experience/skill. I've now learned that ALL of the talented kids get lumped onto two or three teams with good coaches. These team's have scrubs that are much better than the kids on my son's team. So I'm a little disappointed that my son's team has to be subject to drubbing after drubbing in an under 10 youth league.

The league my son is in has separate rec and competitive leagues that start around the U8/U9 age to help with this. In his current U8 season, they discovered that some teams were killing other teams, so they adjusted rules a hair (make kids back up to the center line whenever the opposing goalie gets control of the ball) and broke up the rec tourney into two separate brackets.

I love this league.

[MizzouCowboy]

I remember my brother's senior year in high school, back in '81. They started out with around 20+ players, but by the end of the season it was down to 13. It was a small 1a school in Missouri, and it was normal to play the bigger 2a and 3a teams nearby.

Near the end of the season they were playing the #1 ranked team in MO 1A, believe it was Greenwood, and they had a stud RB, Glenn Adams IIRC, who had numerous college offers. Well anyway, my brothers team did the impossible, and were up 6-0 at halftime. Unfortunately, the game ended something like 63-6. Just got wore out never leaving the field.

The school dropped varsity football the next two seasons and only played JV. Luckily for me, we moved away. I was in 8th grade at the time.

Hmmm, come to think of it, 8th grade was when I probably sustained my first concussion. Having already ran for 4 tds, on my 5th carry of the game I broke around the right side, cut back to the middle and just got destroyed by a guy I didn't see. Rung my bell badly. Didn't get to play the rest of the half, and finally talked the coach to let me back in with around 30 seconds left in the game, since I was so close to 200 yds for the game. One play, and 65 yards later I had my 5th TD of the game.

First one of numerous that I can recall. Can't imagine playing all the way to the NFL and actually being able to function.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by BYU 14

Wow, I know some of the 8 man schools here have numbers like that and we actually played 2 freshmen teams this year that suited 21 and 24 respectively for our games

Our JV played last week (10 min qtrs) with 16 dressed, one of tweaked an ankle & was out for about a half. We dress 30ish for varsity, several of whom only play in extreme blowouts. Of the 79 schools in the lowest classification that play football, we're just about median in enrollment (a little below), which gives you some idea of what the numbers look like elsewhere.

[RainMaker]

I think this is on the league. They should be doing their best to create some parity. If a team is capable of beating another by 100, then it's not even a sport.

Football is a sport that should be treated like other physical ones (wrestling, fighting, boxing). Besides weight, overall skill matters. You wouldn't throw an amateur boxer in the ring with one of the Klitschkos. These teams should not have been playing one another.

[Blackadar]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

I think this is on the league. They should be doing their best to create some parity. If a team is capable of beating another by 100, then it's not even a sport.

Football is a sport that should be treated like other physical ones (wrestling, fighting, boxing). Besides weight, overall skill matters. You wouldn't throw an amateur boxer in the ring with one of the Klitschkos. These teams should not have been playing one another.

You really don't understand Pop Warner/Youth football then. It's not like soccer where you get 150 kids in the same geographic area to play, so it's easy to divide up the players to make even teams.

In our Pop Warner league, there are about 8 teams (I live in Charlotte, so it's worse out in the rural areas). Road games generally take 45 minutes to get to. Since we practice twice a week (three times before the season starts) for two hours each, it's important to have a team that's relatively close to home. It's far more regional, which can mean teams that have more players (or other resources) can have a huge advantage on the field.

For example:

In our league, one team from the poorer area is funded/sponsored by the Charlotte Panthers. Needless to say, they have access to the best equipment, coaches and since the entry fee is covered by the Panthers, they can cherry pick the best players in their area to play on their team. And they do. It's no wonder that PAL is 7-0 and that only a couple of teams have even scored on them.

Another team comes from the Lake Norman (a wealthy) area. They have access to the best equipment, turf fields and more coaches. As such, it's no wonder they're 7-0 and also a perennial contender. They just have access to more resources than the other teams.

Our team doesn't - we get mainly suburban kids, have limited equipment and sporadic coaching. Needless to say, our team isn't that good this year and we've been hammered in a couple of games.

It's essentially the same reason why some High Schools are football powerhouses and others aren't.

[CU Tiger]

My little league/rec team I have 14 kids though Ive never had more than 13 show up for a game and frequently only have 11.

My biggest complaint is we play 2-3 games a week, which just seems excessive to me.

[BYU 14]

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

My little league/rec team I have 14 kids though Ive never had more than 13 show up for a game and frequently only have 11.

My biggest complaint is we play 2-3 games a week, which just seems excessive to me.

WTF, is this tackle?? That is way too much! You need time to recover, even at a young age.

My biggest bitch out here is one of the youth leagues has 3 back to back seasons with like a 2 week break between and they try and get our freshmen and young sophomores to play when our season ends. Just really bad for the kids IMO, you never get a chance to mend and if you are a Freshman or Siph you are never going to develop since you are missing our off season training. We have had a few kids do this (that we found out) and none of them have ever developed into players that helped us on the varsity. Just got too far behind in the area of physical development.

At some point even I think there is such a thing as too much Football.

[Blackadar]

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

My little league/rec team I have 14 kids though Ive never had more than 13 show up for a game and frequently only have 11.

My biggest complaint is we play 2-3 games a week, which just seems excessive to me.

Football? Tackle? That's far, far too frequent.

In Pop Warner, you can't show up with fewer than 16.

[gstelmack]

Coaches among nine arrested*for Florida youth football gambling - More Sports - SI.com

[Poli]

Originally Posted by BYU 14

Wow, I know some of the 8 man schools here have numbers like that and we actually played 2 freshmen teams this year that suited 21 and 24 respectively for our games (we will end with 58 Freshmen and that is a down year for us numbers wise) and the results were predictable, our starters done before halftime.

I can't imagine only dressing out 15-16 kids for a youth team. Not only for the sake of injuries, but how can you really have an effective practice?

I don't know all the youth league rules here, but I know Pop Warner requires each player play 8 plays a game, which is not a lot for coach to fit in playing with rosters of 20-25.

My last year in Festus, MO I had 19 kids that had to play six plays per half. Each kid had more like 10 a half. To do this I set up a substitution chart. I didn't care about downs, distance, or score. If the game got too out of hand the better kids were going to have an even shorter game.

I was given some grief for it...I had some great kids that didn't have eleventy billion rushing yards. Instead, every kid that was eligible to carry the ball had at least 3 carries on the season. Nine of them scored touchdowns.

I tried to do that last year in St Charles but I was overridden by the head coach.

[miami_fan]

Originally Posted by gstelmack

Coaches among nine arrested*for Florida youth football gambling - More Sports - SI.com

Ahhh the innocence of amateur sports......

[molson]

Originally Posted by gstelmack

Coaches among nine arrested*for Florida youth football gambling - More Sports - SI.com

That's too bad because I was looking to put some money down on Tantasqua Braves next week - no doubt the dumb public would have overreacted to the concussions and would have gone WAY too heavy against them. That might have moved the line enough to make a play on the Braves really pay off.