Participation in all high school sports have been on the decline since 2000, but American football participation has fallen especially fast. It is the fastest falling top 10 sports participation rate in the US. The physicality and its effect on the brain are undoubtedly big factors for participation decline. The discovery of CTE in former NFL players in 2002 caused many negative headlines throughout the 2000s and changed public perspective on sports safety.
In 2015, Concussion was released, a movie that peered into the real lives of former NFL players: Mike Webster, Junior Seau, Matthew Willig, etc.. The movie’s popularity was undoubtedly a factor in negative outlooks on football safety.
Due to the dangerous nature of football, there have been actions taken to make the game safer. The NFL, for instance, made rule changes and equipment improvements in an attempt to limit injuries. Any NFL fan knows about the newest rule changes for the kickoff, where both teams -besides the kicker and returner- are lined up five yards apart from each other.
Also, the NFL has implemented guardian caps to wear in all practices and, for the first time in 2024, allows them in games. Guardian caps are extra protection for the head that are attached on top of the helmet. The banning of head to head contact at all levels of the game was also influenced by the danger of football.
We also have to factor in the decline in sports in general which all sports are facing at the high school level. According to a Los Angeles Children’s Hospital study, 90% of seventh graders play sports compared to only 39% of high school seniors. High school students that quit sports say that they don’t have time to practice and play games. They would rather use their time away from school on their jobs and school work.
Playing sports as well increases stress that students are already having from school and work. As someone who played high school football on top of a job and school, my experience was difficult. I typically had no time after school or on the weekdays along with the extreme burnout that I felt at the end of the day, making it almost impossible for me to care about school work.
In other words, high schoolers are deciding that sports are less important to them as other activities such as work, school work, time with friends, etc. While there are many negative signs for the future of high school football, the sport is still currently in a good place. So we will have to see what the sport (and other sports) will become in the future.
