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AFM Magazine


Limits on Live Tackling in Practice – Good or Bad for the Game?

by: Rey Hernandez
Retired High School and College Coach
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National player safety concerns prompted in great part by the National Football League’s (NFL) response to player lawsuits and scientific research data that is calling into question the safety of the game has led to numerous efforts to implement changes that will hopefully make the game safer on all levels of play. The California Assembly by a vote of 50-22 has approved AB 2127 a bill that will prohibit high school and middle school football teams of school districts, charter schools or private schools that elect to offer an athletic program from conducting more than two full-contact practices per week during the pre-season and regular season.

The bill was signed into law by Governor Jerry Brown and will take effect on January 1, 2015. The new law will prohibit the full-contact portion of a practice from exceeding 90 minutes in any single day and completely prohibit full-contact practice during the off-season.

Public policy activist Philip Howard in a talk at the Washington Policy Center on July 27, 2010 expressed the opinion that one of the problems in education today is that our schools have been transformed by law. Based on my experience as a teacher and coach that dates back to the mid-1970’s, I would have to agree that the intrusion of the law in the educational setting has played a significant role in creating what Howard calls the legal minefield that now exists on our campuses. Educators today must take into account a wide range of legal mandates that address due process, special education, zero tolerance, No Child Left Behind, work site rules and in states such as California one can now add full-contact practice planning limitations in the sport of football.

One important reality that perhaps has not been considered throughout the legislative process is the fact that high school programs throughout the state can differ in many ways and although one program might be able to implement this legal mandate with little or no difficulty there are others that might be impacted in a much more significant manner. High school football programs can vary in size and total number of participating athletes throughout the varsity, junior varsity and freshman levels. In addition, the total number of on-campus and walk-on coaches on each staff can vary from program to program. Another very important difference is the configuration of the academic school year that includes both traditional and year-round calendars. Additional differences can also include but are not limited to facilities, total funding, district pre-school bus transportation availability and the availability of athletic trainers. In addition head coaches that work at schools that do not have last period athletic classes could possibly have additional scheduling problems that will only be complicated by the two full-contact per week practice limitation.

In programs that consist mostly on off campus coaches, the two-practice full contact per week limitation could possibly create a situation where head coaches might not be able to adequately prepare their teams from not only a strategic standpoint but also from a player safety standpoint. Head coaches in these type of programs have to design practice schedules that take into consideration the availability of off-campus coaches depending on their distinct employment schedules. These coaches are often school district employees that work at schools with different bell-schedules, coaches in non-education related professions that have varying employment hours and coaches that might have to travel longer distances to get to the school where they coach. This constraint could be especially burdensome for head coaches when they plan their pre-season practice schedules when classes are not in session yet. In these programs scheduling a double-day practice session might be even more complicated when the staff consists of one or more coaches who work in professions that have traditional work hours that make it difficult to attend practices in the mornings or early afternoon.

In order to highlight some of the concerns that might arise now that AB 2127 has been signed into law, I took a look at the pre-season practice schedule that I put in place for the 2012 season which was my last year of coaching. If AB 2127 had been in effect that year, the weekly full-contact practice limitations in the new law would have allowed for only four full contact practices prior to our scheduled four-way scrimmage on August 24th. In a program such as ours I would have been particularly concerned about the many freshmen football players that came into our program with no tackle football experience. One cannot ignore the legal issues associated with placing athletes on the field under game conditions with too little live transitional tackling practice. This is a potential source of tort liability that seems to be escaping legislators as laws similar to AB 2127 have been enacted throughout the country. The problem however is not just a tort liability concern but also a player health and safety concern for all coaches.

One of the problems associated with the national concussion and safety discussion is that too often the discussion centers mostly on the quantitative minutes of live transitional tackling practice that takes place but does not adequately account for the quality of the live transitional tackling that takes place. Because not all programs are alike to a one size fits all approach such as that provided in AB 2127 is probably not the best way to go about making high school football as safe as possible for the student-athletes. Practice scheduling decisions are best left up to the coaches as they are the ones who are best able to make decisions that will be tailored to meet the needs of their own individual players while taking into consideration any special constraints that are associated with their programs. Laws should set boundaries regarding what is unreasonable without stripping coaches of their authority to run a productive and safe practice based on their personal experience.

If legislatures across the country want to make changes that will have help improve the health and safety of student-athletes participating in interscholastic football, they should start by enacting laws that will require school districts to hire certified athletic trainers, fund baseline concussion testing and appoint experienced athletic directors that will be able to adequately monitor a school’s athletic program.

 

 

 






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