Bruce Arians just shoved his foot pretty far in his mouth. During a clinic for high school football on April 8, the Cardinals head coach basically embodied the football-trainer stereotype to a tee, complete with sexism and a gung-ho attitude. After acknowledging that athletes are beginning to question involvement with football for health reasons, Arians claimed, "We have to make sure that moms get the message because that’s who’s afraid of our game right now. It’s not dads, it’s moms. Our job is to make sure the game is safe, at all levels," according to 12 News.
Every facet of this claim warrants ridicule. The idea that mothers are the only demographic concerned about player health is absurd. The notion that safety in football is just some wrong to be righted by better coaching is ludicrous. Wrong as he is, this quote doesn't make Arians some kind of criminal to be loathed. It's just that Arians is a product of a hackneyed ideology, one that blames moms for spoiling the fun, and thinks that concussions are a sign of hard work.
The reality is that fathers care about the safety of their sons, and that players don't want to hurt themselves. Suppressing mothers won't show that football is safe. The sad truth is that football is not safe, and concussions aren't just a bummer.
A study by Boston University found that of 165 football players tested, 79 percent had contracted chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), and of 91 NFL players tested, 96 percent had the condition. CTE is a degenerative brain disease caused by repeated concussive and sub-concussive head trauma. The symptoms begin to manifest about a decade after involvement with the sport, but have been seen much younger. Those who've contracted the condition begin to experience amnesia, dizziness, depression and often suicidal thoughts.
2015's under-publicized drama "Concussion" documented the story of Dr. Bennet Omalu, as he battled to expose the link of repeated concussions in football with CTE, and the NFL's efforts to suppress his research.
So why is Arians asking moms (and really the football community at large) to trust that the NFL will pursue every avenue to eliminate the threat of CTE? Dr. Omalu's research at The University of Pittsburgh came to light over a decade ago, and the first official admission by the NFL that CTE is linked to football came on March 23 of this year. Even since that admission, NFL officials have backtracked, as Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones recently called the link "absurd", and Arians shoved his less dominant foot in his mouth claiming, "People that say, 'I won't let my son play (football) are fools.'"
In reality, players and their families have every right to be wary of participating in football. Even with proper technique, the dangers of such a condition as CTE are enormous. Arians, after asking moms to back off, claimed, "The head really has no business being in the game. There’s a lot of different teachers, but when I was taught how to tackle and how to block, it was on a two-man sled. You did it with your shoulder pads. That’s still the best way to do it."
That's good and all, but just smashing 300 pound bodies into each other is enough to generate sub-concussive impact, which adds up. Maybe we shouldn't be convincing moms that football is safe. Maybe we should be informing participants and their families about the risks, and letting them decide.
Related links:
ASU football partners with Riddell, TGen on concussion research
The football movie that might finally make a difference
Reach the columnist at sdeadric@asu.edu.
Editor’s note: The opinions presented in this column are the author’s and do not imply any endorsement from The State Press or its editors.
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