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Fracking in School Sports

May 1, 2015

First there were rumors, then there were reports, and now there are beginning to be results from geological surveys warning that the process of fracking in oil and gas exploration and deep ground extraction is increasing the frequency of earthquakes in several parts of the United States.

I want to say, “Duh! How could it not?” Why would it surprise any rational human being that the delicate blue marble we inhabit would not get off kilter when we bore deep into the surface with drills and explosive charges and then pump water at high pressure into the tunnels we create and the crevices we exploit? When I put that picture in my mind, I shudder.

Often I picture the world of school sports like this marble we inhabit. Sometimes I see exploiters drilling deep into our core, dropping explosives, applying pressure, and extracting what they believe are valuable resources while laying waste to everything else, including very much that is very precious to very many other people – in fact, to most athletes, coaches, administrators, officials, parents and spectators.

We should pay attention to the times when we feel our foundation shaking, even just a little. We should make it difficult for the exploiters to extract our elite, especially when they disregard and lay waste to everything else that holds our world – educational athletics – together.

The Boomerang Effect

March 6, 2013

The image of football on all levels, and the future of football at the youth level, are both worse off today as a result of the NFL’s recent years’ public relations and political campaigns.

The constant barrage of negative publicity about youth football as the NFL advanced its agenda to pass concussion legislation in all 50 states has, to levels not seen before, kicked off the concerns of moms and dads and the media nationwide.  In state after state, kids with concussions have been paraded before state legislators, in the company of NFL staff.  The NFL has administered a self-inflicted wound, shot itself in the foot, and made FOOTBALL the face of America’s youth sports concussion problem.  How the NFL brain trust ever thought this would promote the game of football in America is a wonder.

School-based football today has no greater obstacle to promoting a safe game than the NFL.  No brand of football captures the game’s brutal aspects for video more than the NFL.  No brand of football celebrates it more.  No brand of football CAPITALIZES on it more – so much so that the NFL can donate several million dollars to youth football to buff its “caring” conscience, when in fact it’s a miniscule portion of its multi-billion-dollar business.

Moreover, one of the NFL’s favorite groups for its self-promoted “philanthropy” is USA Football which promotes itself as the national governing body for amateur football in America.  One of USA Football’s initiatives is an international championship for high school players, which of course means more hitting out of season for these players.  The very activity the experts are telling us to reduce – out-of-season contact – is being promoted by this NFL underwritten organization!  And WE get criticized as being against the promotion of football in America when we don’t go along with this backward thinking?