Media Coverage of High School Football Deaths is Sensationalism at Its Worst

Mediaite.com:

If you’ve been following the news over the past few months, no doubt you’ve heard about the recent spate of high school football players killed playing the sport. What was once considered a local tragedy has become a national story as outlets have begun counting each death and weaving a narrative: high school football, once considered a harmless past-time, is claiming more and more lives.

The seventh and most recent death was covered by CNN, CBS, USA Today, NBC, ESPN, Fox News, Sports Illustrated, New York Times, Washington Times, and Yahoo News. Previous deaths were also covered by People, ABC, The Guardian, Reuters, MSNBC, The Washington Post… it’s harder to find a national outlet that hasn’t covered the story. And schools are listening: CBS reports that in the wake of mounting casualties, some schools are closing their football programs all together.

You know it must be scary, because CNN even got its graphics team to animate two CGI football players tackling each other (“Is high school football worth the risk?” the segment asked).

All of which is baffling, given that the frequency of high school football deaths hasn’t increased at all, and death rates remain extremely low.

In the past two decades, there were 282 deaths as a result of high school football, or 14.1 annually. This year there’s been seven, about halfway through the season. In short, the rate of football deaths has remained completely constant.

The chances of dying during a high school football game have also always been absurdly low. 1.1 million high schoolers play the sport every year, so even if the rate of death doubled overnight, they’d have about a 0.00001% of dying before the season is out. In fact, high school football isn’t even the deadliest high school sport; it’s less dangerous than water polo, softball, and field hockey, and roughly as dangerous as lacrosse.

What then justifies all the sudden media attention? It should go without saying that every sporting death is a tragedy, especially when the victims are so young. But hundreds of high schoolers die every day of equally tragic causes and fail to make front pages and television screens across the nation. Why should football be singled out?

The simple answer is because right now at the highest level of the sport, there is a massive scandal surrounding the National Football League’s handling of concussions. In a recent study, a whopping 96% of former NFL players’ brains were found to have suffered permanent damage. The league was forced to pay $1 billion in settlements to players who allege they covered up the risks of repeated concussions.

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