IT’S THAT TIME OF YEAR AGAIN

(FRAZER CHRONICLE)

(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

 

The fall, leaves turning to their magical colors, back to school for the kids (so mom can get a break), when outdoor activities days are numbered, and when a young man’s fancy turns to emulating his favorite football players. High school spirit builds from the first day back in the class-room; it’s a time of pep rallies, and of gearing up for those gridiron battles with your arch rivals.

 

The coaches are antsy, the players feel invincible…..and why not, everybody throughout the entire state of Wisconsin has yet to taste defeat, and the football prognosticators are batting 1.000% with their pre-season predictions. The morning of the opening game of another football season brings a renewed vigor that has usually been missing since the end of the previous season.

 

High school football is a great game, it teaches young people how to act, react, and interact with a group of their peers, how to except defeats, how to win gracefully, and the concept of teamwork. High school football also teaches a kid how to juggle his time during the roughly nine months of down-time in a high schoolers sports year. You see there is the weight room, for some, spring-time track, and then the summer football camps and clinics that these young men are encouraged to attend.

 

Today in high school there’s all sorts of teaching tools that coaches can use to hone a players natural abilities, there are diet programs to strengthen a student-athlete, there are running drills to increase speed. And of course offensive and defensive playbooks that players are required to know front-wards, and back-wards.

 

EVERY MALE HAS BEEN A STUD ON THE GRIDIRON

I can remember my time in high school as a football player, Friday’s were electric, attending school on Friday’s during the fall was merely a formality…..nothing academically was accomplished, and in my school, there was an afternoon pep rally…..and that was home games.

 

On travel games (my school had some of the longest road trips in the entire state) the team left for the game as early as 10:00 A.M. The student body, at least 40% of them, would cut class around noon to get to the away game by three or four o’clock. To say the least, our fans were rabid.

 

I had the good fortune to play on the varsity for three years, and during that time, our overall record was 24-3. The pride and camaraderie that was built, and the friendships developed have lasted a lifetime…..I took away from the game much more than I gave. The lessons learned have been with me my entire life, and I can still dwell on them more than 50 years later.

 

I’ve covered sporting events, been involved in sporting events and one thing has been imprinted on my mind, clearly 75% of those ex-players relive their experiences each fall, and their accomplishments become bigger and better each year.

 

And you know…..that’s ok, it’s a harmless “padding the statistics.” It is common throughout ex-athletes stories, nobody means any harm, and anyways, who wants to hear about the twelfth man on a basketball team, the scorebook keeper in baseball, or the practice dummy holder at football practice.

 

 

THERE IS ONE PROBLEM HOWEVER

There is a big problem with football on the high school varsity level, and it goes down as far as junior varsity…..the problem, injuries. When I was playing I suffered banged up knees, broken fingers, a broken nose,  muscle pulls, bruises, and was shot in certain areas of my body with Cortisone…..and it worked to, couldn’t feel a thing, for several hours.

 

However today, injuries to high school football players has, in my opinion, jumped of all of the charts, 1.6 to 3.8 MILLION concussions…..a year. That figure, to me, has completely dumped the old apple cart. My first reaction is NO WAY, but I guess the figure is as accurate as is possible, three different sources guesstimate about the same figures…..and that’s just for concussions alone.

 

What about sprains, muscle pulls, broken bones, and the less important knee, and other joint injuries that linger a lifetime? I totally understand that head injuries can lead to all sorts of ailments throughout an ex-players life. Hell, Wisconsin’s even got a concussion law that was enacted in 2012 to help regulate head injuries…..of course what law, or who, is going to reign in an overzealous playe, or coaches that need a scruples transplant.

 

High school players today are bigger, faster, stronger, and know more about the technical aspects of the game than anybody in my generation. The impact of a 200 pounder, going against another 200 pounder would seem to me to be incalculable and a formula for a physical disaster.

 

Head football coaches today actually have a sacred trust when it comes to their players, and coaches’ assistants. First and foremost, the head coach needs qualified assistants that are completely aware of the different types of injuries, and can watch for the tell tale signs of injuries, like light-headedness, or incoherent speech, or behavior.

 

And the head coach needs to have some sort of certification with regards to injuries, and this quality that a coach needs leads directly to a school’s Athletic Director, and the school board as well. I do know that sometimes people are hired into a position because they are teachers, or a friend of a friend. For the sake of the student athlete…..this practice should stop.

 

So go to the Friday football games, enjoy your kids accomplishments…..and console him in his defeats, and above all else, keep track of where your coach and his staff have come from…..what exactly is their background, and Hank the hardware man, or Joe Smoo might be nice guys, but be totally unprepared and uneducated for the position of an assistant football coach for your kids high school football team.

 

HAVE A NICE DAY!