In October 1976, Turkey Jones slam-sacked Terry Bradshaw, throwing him on his head and leaving him with a concussion that sidelined the Steelers quarterback for weeks. Watch:
The response to Turkey’s tackle led directly to the “in the grasp” and control rule which continues to govern the game, including the famous Helmet Catch of Super Bowl XLII.
Over the years, the issue of head injuries in football and other sports has trickled down to high school and youth activities. But instead of rule changes (high school and college football have never adopted the NFL’s rules regarding control of the quarterback, due primarily to the style of the game on those levels as much as safety concerns), legislation has been passed to attempt to address concussions for minors.
On January 1, 2014, the Tennessee Concussion Act went into effect, requiring among other things, that any youth athlete who may have sustained a concussion must be removed from the sports activities and not allowed to return until he or she has been given the all-clear—in writing—by a health care provider. The Department of Health has adopted a concussion checklist to assist coaches to determine whether a concussion has occurred, listing symptoms such as headaches, confusion, dizziness and memory loss.
The act also establishes annual education requirements to be documented for all coaches, athletes and parents.
According to this 2013 study, the concussion rate in high school football is 11.2 incidents per 10,000 exposures—head and shoulders above the other sports: the second most concussion-heavy being lacrosse at 6.9/10,000, followed by wrestling at 6.2 and soccer at 4.2. ESPN reports that high school football players are nearly twice as likely to suffer a concussion as their collegiate counterparts.
Whatever percentage of high school football players have had diagnosed concussions, very nearly 100% have likely exhibited one or more of the symptoms described on the checklist at some point during a practice or game.
Head injuries should never be taken lightly, but even experienced medical professionals have trouble diagnosing the occurrence of and monitoring recovery from minor injuries—most of which are not the obvious result of extreme incidents like the Turkey Jones-Terry Bradshaw play. Elementary through high school coaches will now have to err even further on the cautious side when determining whether there has been a concussion. One wonders how wide a margin the sport can afford, given that participation has been decreasing among youth athletes. For the record, Forbes contends it’s not fair (or accurate) to blame concussions for the decline; football fans, take a knee before the gods of irony and pray that the potentially cumbersome implementation of new concussion regulations doesn’t prove to be a further devastating blow to the sport.
