Sports: The Role Of Concussions In Professional Sports

Many varying kinds of head injuries can cause epileptic seizures, or other traumatic diseases, disorders and even paralyzation. The most usual form of head injury is a concussion. A concussion can cause many forms of disorders of the brain that are potentially fatal. A concussion is a head injury which occurs when the brain hits the skull when contact is made or when the head is moved quickly and abruptly (Reynolds para 2). The most common way to receive a concussion is from contact sports, such as football, basketball, hockey, and baseball. But the sport that causes the highest amount of concussions in football. The National Football League, NFL, is a league that consists of 32 teams from North America, averaging 53 people per team. In today’s

According to the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, tackling is associated with 67 percent of catastrophic injuries in football since 1977 (“Sports-related” 7). Tackling is one of the most dangerous actions in all of sports because it can lead to so many different types of injuries. Football was also one of the highest rated sports in head injuries, reported with 46,948 in 2009 (“Sports-related” 2). This shows that football is a very dangerous sport that needs to be regulated. During the last few decades, the concussion rate in the NFL has been rising. According to Kevin Seifert from ESPN, there were 206 concussions reported in 2014 and 229 concussions in 2013. In the 2015-2016 season, there was a total of around 244 concussions (Seifert para 2). The increase really does display the risks and dangers of playing football. It also needs to be regulated because of the after effects of concussions. Since concussions are the most prevalent in football, the NFL current and former players need to be protected. This protection is needed because CTE is becoming very common for former players to have. From a source by Tom Goldman, 110 out of 111 donated brains of former NFL players contained CTE. An infamous example of CTE is from a football player named Aaron Hernandez. Hernandez was a rising star with the New England Patriots. He was a promising, young tight end who could do nearly everything on the field. He made a mistake that changed his life for good. According to Kilgore, while Hernandez was 27, he murdered a man named Odin Lloyd over an argument at a club, then buried him a few miles away from his mansion in North Attleboro (Kilgore para 24). After hearing his sentence for prison, he hung himself in his cell. His body was examined after his death. While scientists were examining his brain, they found severe damage to the structure of the frontal lobe, which