The Future of Football

According to a study I saw on CNN, there are four million concussion-related sports injuries each year and over half of those were during football games or practices.  With the growing concern of concussion-related injuries, where do you think the future of football is headed?  Here are a couple scenarios that might happen:

• Loss of Talent - With more and more studies being done on the post-careers of professional football players, the results are not encouraging.  The wear and tear that playing football takes on a human body is already disturbing (bad knees, backs, and other body parts), but it is the effects of repeated blows to the head that are really taking their toll.  Former players are losing their memory at increasingly younger ages from the result of numerous concussions when they played, but it is the other symptoms that are really scary.  Very recently, All-Pro linebacker, Junior Seau, took his own life due to extreme depression which is directly linked to concussions.  Other players have become unusually violent even though they have always been known to be gentle people.  And some studies have shown that players with numerous concussions had the mental deterioration of a 60-year old Alzheimer's patient.  So, with all this in mind, why would a kid's parents want their child to play the sport?  Sure, there will always be plenty of parents who will only be looking at the dollar signs their kids will make, but there will also be more and more parents who won't allow their kids to play because they will and should be concerned about their health.  You would have to assume that with the more studies done about concussions that the more the talent pool will be reduced due to parent's not allowing kids to play the sport.
• Changes to the Game Itself - Since concussions are believed to be the biggest threat to the health of football players, does this mean that football will have to dramatically change the rules to the game to the point that it doesn't even resemble football anymore?  Will they take away kickoffs because the most violent collisions occur during this aspect of the game?  Will football eventually take away tackling altogether?  Football would no longer be allowed to be called football with such radical changes and sadly, we may be headed in that direction.
• Insurance - The biggest concern of all for the future of football is the fact that high school and college football may no longer be able to afford the cost of insuring the sport at their respective levels.  Because of the studies done on concussions, insurance companies will either raise their premiums too high for the lower levels of football to afford, or they may just not insure the sport at all.  If either of these outcomes happens, then football may actually cease to exist.  No more tailgating.  No more tradition.  No more fantasy football.  No more football.

Any and all of these things are a very real possibility, so I would suggest consuming as much football as you can now before the sport either changes beyond recognition or dies a slow death.

"I feel obligated to show a scantily clothed female to lighten to the mode.  You're welcome."