Professional Athlete or Politician?

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If you were a professional athlete would you be ‘brave’ enough to endorse a presidential candidiate?  Some would be hesitant, but this article from Sports Business Journal focuses current and retired athletes being more likely to express their political beliefs or even take office themselves.  Our October 11 class session highlighted the connection between politics and sport.  We discussed how athletes like Jesse Ventura, Lynn Swann, Bill Bradley and Tom Osborn have used their past accomplishments to enter the political realm.  This is based on Q-rating, or a measurement of how well-known celebrities and athletes are and how that helps ‘springboard’ into political positions.  The article highlights how that has been a theme in the sport industry and how the impact of endorsements tend to hinder current athletes from taking a political stand. 

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For example, former Boston Red Sox pitcher was fired from ESPN after publicly endorsing George W. Bush during the 2004 presidential election.  Not good, right?  However, using sport to connect to the public and can helping candidates sway votes in in an election.  Good for the candidate, but what about the athlete?  Kareem Abdul-Jabbar noted that his political endorsements did not effect his endorsements and proudly expresses his political views.  The strong connection between government and sport is clearly visible in this article written just months before the 2016 presidential election.  Do you think athletes should be less scrutinized because of their political views? Or should they stick to what they know?    

http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Journal/Issues/2016/08/01/Law-and-Politics/Athletes.aspx?hl=politics&sc=0#.V__FTCN95QQ.email

How to Score a College Athletic Scholarship

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In correlation with our discussion on high school and college sports, “How to Get Paid to Play Sports in College,” focuses on the scholarships offered to college athletes.  With over 7 million high school students participating in sport, there is a tough competition for Division I college sport scholarships.  We learned that there is around 500,000 college athletes in America.  This article also shows how there is only a 1 to 5 percent chance of a high school athlete receiving a Division I scholarship.  Over $500 million in athletic scholarships are offered from the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics, and high school students are doing whatever it takes to set themselves apart. 

Athletes can encounter pressures to succeed in their sport of choice, as well as over training in privatized programs to work for these scholarships.  However, high school athletes can also experience more pressure during the recruitment process in the classroom than on the field.  Academic requirements are put in place for future college athletes to reach while in college, only increasing your chances of receiving a collegiate sport scholarship.  One characteristic of Division I sports programs that we discussed in class was that full scholarships are available to some, which the US News article also states.   The average scholarship ranges from $12,359 to $17,529 per year for NCAA athletes, which in some cases is still not enough.  The competition is fierce, but with college costs continually rising for some it may be the only option for an education. 

http://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/articles/2016-09-23/how-to-get-paid-to-play-sports-in-college

Increasing Concussions in Youth Sport

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In a very recent article from a Boxford, Massachusetts’s newspaper, Wicked Local reported that concussions in children between 10-18 year olds went up 82% in the state.  In the United States the statistic went up 71%, making Massachusetts’s #1 in the nation for concussion diagnoses.  This is a starling new statistic for the parents of the 47 million children that participate in sport today.  One problem mentioned in our September 22 discussion on problems within youth sport is the 1.35 million children that have sport related injuries a year.  

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This Wicked Local article mentions the increased awareness of head injuries in sport is part of the reason why the reporting rate has increased.  As said in class, things like the concussion protocol test implemented by the NFL, research of former NFL player brain damage and even the movie Concussion has shined a major light on the real health issues related to sport.  Another reason for this increase is a recent trend of children playing only one sport, which related to the increase in privatized and performance based programs.  Since these programs are at a higher competition and training level, burn outs and over training play a big factor in youth sport injuries.

It is important to know how to prevent these injuries like progressively increasing training by 10% each week and becoming aware of injuries, however this will not completely solve the problem.  What other precautions can be implemented to lower the rate of sport injuries among children?

http://boxford.wickedlocal.com/news/20161020/youth-sports-injuries-up-as-mass-leads-in-concussion-diagnoses