SACRAMENTO, Calif. – For generations, parents across America have taken pride in introducing their children to the game of soccer, along with the benefits that come with playing the sport.
Youth football coach Steve Famiano is among the most committed to bringing the traditional sport – tackle football – to families who want to get their kids involved at any age.
“My boys stopped playing youth football a long time ago. They’re approaching 30, so I stuck with it because I love the kids in my community,” Famiano said. “[The sport]is much more than what you hear about tackle football.”
He started an ongoing social media campaign in 2018 to preserve youth tackle football.
It came after California Houseman Kevin McCarty introduced a bill that same year aimed at restricting tackle soccer in the state to children under the age of 12.
Although the bill failed, McCarty recently introduced a similar bill with the same goal in mind.
He hopes to get the law through this time as more people become aware of brain injuries caused by repetitive hits to the head, a common occurrence in tackle football.
While most adults who play tackle football are aware of the risks that come with one hit to the head after another, McCarty said children with developing brains are often at the mercy of their parents when it comes to participation in sport.
“Tackle football, it’s American as can be – it’s like apple pie,” McCarty said. “And people don’t want that to change, but there are certain things where the government steps in and sets sensible regulations for young children.”
The struggle for youth tackle football
Although McCarty’s 2018 bill failed, in 2019 Gov. Gavin Newsom passed new restrictions on youth football below middle school, including:
- No more than 30 minutes of full contact practice per day
- No more than two days of full contact practice per week
- No full contact training in the off-season
- Greater urgency to screen players for head injuries and remove them from the game if found
dr Brandee Waite, director of sports medicine at UC Davis Health, said parents should check out the “CDC website HEADS UP” for easy-to-understand information about youth sports and concussions.
“Connecting with an athletic trainer or someone else who has experience with head injuries and concussions can provide guidance,” Waite said.
Both Waite and McCarty say a safer alternative is flag football, which doesn’t require physical contact.
“The 2023 NFL Pro Bowl was a flag football game for player safety. Why can’t we have that for our youth?” McCarty asked.
In 2022, the National Institutes of Neurological Disorders and Stroke updated their page on the brain disorder known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) to confirm that the disease is caused in part by repetitive traumatic brain injuries.
dr UC Davis professor and Elk Grove resident Bennet Omalu is considered the father of CTE research. He was even portrayed by actor Will Smith in the 2015 film Concussion.
Retired WWE wrestler and Harvard University football player Chris Nowinsky is a big believer in Omalu’s research. He also earned his Ph.D. in Behavioral Neuroscience from Boston University.
Following his athletic career in the early 2000s, Nowinsky worked with Omalu to collect data on NFL players suspected of having mental and behavioral health issues. Nowinsky hopes the growing body of CTE research will inform current and future tackle football players.
“The problem with football is that it’s a fun activity because your brain doesn’t contain pain nerves and you can’t feel the damage you’re getting,” he said. “This is how kids will tell you they’re having a good time while their brains are being damaged.”
Though Nowinsky and McCarty continue to advise parents and lawmakers to restrict juvenile tackle football, Famiano doesn’t expect any new legislation.
“You’re going to hear the talk of CTE and all this other stuff, and you’ll have NFL players campaigning that kids shouldn’t play in this and that, but there’s really nothing that’s changed from 2018 to 2023, what.” “So you want to ban a US sport because something might happen to[a child’s]brain later on, and that’s the key word, right? ‘Can’ happen.”
Waite says the younger a child gets hit to the head, the longer it takes to recover from possible brain injuries.
“It seems that having more frequent concussions or numerous concussions may have a greater impact on their later thinking, but there’s no magic number,” she said.
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