All Football Teams Should Have Athletic Trainers
I. Introduction
A. Imagine, you’re about to play your rival team in a head to head high school football game. You’re in the locker room putting your pads on and lacing up your cleats. The smell of your jersey fills your nose and you hear your teammates yelling and getting hyped for the battle. You grab your helmet as your coach leads your team out to warm up. You hear chanting in the distance of your local fans already in the stadium. Your fingers and toes are tingling and those butterflies in your stomach won’t go away. But you’re excited. You couldn’t be more ready to play for the name on your chest. As you near the stadium you hear the announcer introducing your team. All seems to be so well. Then you wake up in the third quarter. You have no recollection of the game so far. You feel dizzy and nauseas. Your eyesight is a little blurry and you have an unbearable headache. One of your coaches asks you if you’re okay to play, and since this is your rival game you say yes and play through the pain.
B. Today I’m going to tell you why I believe every football team, no matter the level, should have an athletic trainer.
C. I will talk to you about why football teams choose not to have athletic trainers, the effects of athletes that didn’t get the treatment they needed, and why athletic professionals are necessary.
II. Body
A. The level where most athletes play football is high school. There isn’t very much contact in leagues for younger kids, and most colleges have athletic trainers, but most high schools don’t. Mainly because they can’t afford one.
1. According to www.cnsnews.com, there were over 14,000 high school football teams in the U.S. alone last year, not counting college or pee wee football. Of course, teams differ in the level of play and the money the school brings in. So some schools excuse is that they are too tight on the cost it would take to hire a professional.
a. Schools that say this...