Maine Is Looking Into A Possible Age Limit On Tackle Football
With the exception of a few people I know who just care nothing about sports at all, just about everyone I know loves football. Baseball may be America's favorite pastime, but football is pretty much ingrained into America's DNA. Sure the World Series is a biug deal, but do you see corporations shelling out millions and millions of dollars for a 30 second World Series ad?
That said though, a lot of attention has been brought to the problem of head injuries in football. Especially long term. We've all seen stories in the press about famous football players either suffering in older age, or even younger players already feeling the effects of repeated blows to the head. Overall participation in high school football is down all across the country, due to fear of injury.
According to the WGME-TV13, there is a new bill, LD-711, being sponsored by State Rep. Michael Brennan, is looking to establish a new committee that would task itself deciding if there should be an age limit set for young Mainers to play tackle football. It would be a 13 member group that would put to gether a report to present to state legislature in 2020. Currently there is no group overseeing younger players.
Other states have considered such measures, but none have actually become law. Most parents seem to feel that they should be the ones to choose what age their kids do something, rather than letting state lawmakers decide. But the amount of injuries being reported on a national level has kept the dialogue open in many places.
Likely around here, it will spark a huge debate about government intrusion, and whatnot, but it really just sounds to me like they'd really like to do more to make sure kids are safe. And I think politics aside, that is one thing we can all definitely agree on.