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Whenever I mention where I go to school, people don’t ask me about my classes or professors. They ask me about football. I don’t mind. Every fall, when tens of thousands of people pour onto the University of Oklahoma campus for games, I feel proud.
Or maybe I should say felt. Part of me can’t wait for football season to start. The other part of me wonders: Is it O.K. to be a football fan in 2018?
My school says yes. The Friday before we play the University of Texas each October is an official school holiday. Our stadium just underwent a $160 million renovation. Outside the football stadium, larger-than-life bronze statues commemorate Oklahoma players who have won the Heisman Trophy.
It’s not hard to see why schools like mine encourage this kind of culture. College football is a big business. This year, the Big 12 conference distributed a record $36.5 million in revenue to each of its 10 member schools, including Oklahoma. The school earns about another $5 million annually from its independent distribution deal with Fox (and when the Big 12’s current media rights agreement expires in 2025, the school will likely be in position to earn even more, thanks to some shrewd maneuvering by former university president David Boren).
Even with all that money flying around, players are unpaid. Under N.C.A.A. regulations, student athletes can’t profit from their on-field work in any way, not even through their image, likeness or autograph, not to mention compensation from their schools.
College football teams are under tremendous pressure to win, which can also create an environment that enables intolerable behavior, including violence against women. Oklahoma has seen a few examples of this. In my first semester of college, Missouri Senator Claire McCaskill wrote an op-ed criticizing Oklahoma’s head coach, Bob Stoops, for recruiting the wide receiver Dorial Green-Beckham, who had been kicked off the University of Missouri team for pushing his girlfriend down a flight of stairs. Two months earlier, the freshman running back Joe Mixon had been arrested for punching a woman at a restaurant near campus. Mr. Stoops suspended him for one year.
At its worst, this win-first, high-stress environment can prove deadly for student athletes, as it did at the University of Maryland earlier this year, when 19-year-old lineman Jordan McNair collapsed during a conditioning workout and died two weeks later.
As tragic as extreme cases like Mr. McNair’s are, the health risks of an ordinary football game are no less troubling. At this point, the dangers of repeatedly getting hit in the head throughout a career in football seem pretty clear. These blows have been linked to chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or C.T.E., a brain disease that causes many different symptoms including depression, memory loss and dementia.
As parents have grown more aware of these risks, participation in youth leagues has dropped. Eventually, football as we know it will be forced to change, because without athletes willing to play, the sport will die.
In the face of all of these problems, can I continue to cheer? Every year so far, I’ve chosen to be a fan. But as the first game of the season approaches on Saturday, that decision is harder than it’s ever been.
Whenever I mention where I go to school, people don’t ask me about my classes or professors. They ask me about football. I don’t mind. Every fall, when tens of thousands of people pour onto the University of Oklahoma campus for games, I feel proud.
Or maybe I should say felt. Part of me can’t wait for football season to start. The other part of me wonders: Is it O.K. to be a football fan in 2018?
My school says yes. The Friday before we play the University of Texas each October is an official school holiday. Our stadium just underwent a $160 million renovation. Outside the football stadium, larger-than-life bronze statues commemorate Oklahoma players who have won the Heisman Trophy.
It’s not hard to see why schools like mine encourage this kind of culture. College football is a big business. This year, the Big 12 conference distributed a record $36.5 million in revenue to each of its 10 member schools, including Oklahoma. The school earns about another $5 million annually from its independent distribution deal with Fox (and when the Big 12’s current media rights agreement expires in 2025, the school will likely be in position to earn even more, thanks to some shrewd maneuvering by former university president David Boren).
Even with all that money flying around, players are unpaid. Under N.C.A.A. regulations, student athletes can’t profit from their on-field work in any way, not even through their image, likeness or autograph, not to mention compensation from their schools.
College football teams are under tremendous pressure to win, which can also create an environment that enables intolerable behavior, including violence against women. Oklahoma has seen a few examples of this. In my first semester of college, Missouri Senator Claire McCaskill wrote an op-ed criticizing Oklahoma’s head coach, Bob Stoops, for recruiting the wide receiver Dorial Green-Beckham, who had been kicked off the University of Missouri team for pushing his girlfriend down a flight of stairs. Two months earlier, the freshman running back Joe Mixon had been arrested for punching a woman at a restaurant near campus. Mr. Stoops suspended him for one year.
At its worst, this win-first, high-stress environment can prove deadly for student athletes, as it did at the University of Maryland earlier this year, when 19-year-old lineman Jordan McNair collapsed during a conditioning workout and died two weeks later.
As tragic as extreme cases like Mr. McNair’s are, the health risks of an ordinary football game are no less troubling. At this point, the dangers of repeatedly getting hit in the head throughout a career in football seem pretty clear. These blows have been linked to chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or C.T.E., a brain disease that causes many different symptoms including depression, memory loss and dementia.
As parents have grown more aware of these risks, participation in youth leagues has dropped. Eventually, football as we know it will be forced to change, because without athletes willing to play, the sport will die.
In the face of all of these problems, can I continue to cheer? Every year so far, I’ve chosen to be a fan. But as the first game of the season approaches on Saturday, that decision is harder than it’s ever been.
![[zoomLENS]](https://rivals-cdn.s3.amazonaws.com/forums/oklahoma/data/avatars/m/6/6732.jpg?1633963129){kind=avatar}
