How can Rutgers protest football spinal injuries?
Right now every player on the Rutgers football team is wondering what they can do to help their paralyzed teammate, Eric LeGrand. No doubt, players for West Point who were on the field when LeGrand was injured tackling an Army runner, feel the same. What can they sacrifice? Time? Money?
There is probably very little they can do save Eric's spine now. Maybe, in time, he will walk again. Maybe not. That is out of his teammate's hands.
What is in their hands is the ability to make a statement. They could protest the design of the helmets that have hard shells which transmit the full impact of a helmet collision to the players neck. They could insist on wearing a soft cap -- the kind worn in the early 1990s by pro football players Mark Kelso (Buffalo Bills) and Steve Wallace (SF 49ers).
Some say the helmet doesn't look cool, but what could be cooler than having every Rutgers player walking onto the field this Saturday wearing one? What kind of statement would that make? What kind of message would it send to kids around the country?
If Army players insisted on the same thing, it would send just as powerful a message. I wonder which team has more courage to stand up to convention?
(HT to Paul Lukas and a personal note from Gregg Easterbrook which mentioned Kelso to me).
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