"Throwaway players" nonfiction book response

1. A summary of your text.This book focuses on two main issues in football. One of those being doping by players and the other concussions. The book goes into great detail with each of these subjects. Which makes it a very valuable resource to anyone looking to know more about concussions. I would recommend this book to any parents trying to decide if they should let their kids play football or not. It is written by an insider, but has very little bias in it.
   Doping may not seem extremely relevant to my topic of sports injuries, but it is. As the players get bigger and strong with new technology and drugs that puts more stress on their bodies. There might be the same amount of violence as there was 50 years ago but now, instead of 250 pound men crashing into each other at five miles an hour, we have 350+ pound men crashing into each other at ten miles an hour. They may be big and strong but the human body was not meant to withstand such abuse. There was a very intriguing chapter of the book that featured a former player who had abused drugs talking about the affects and reasoning behind the drugs. It gave very good first hand experience to back up what the author was saying.
   The other important issue this book discusses is concussions. Concussions have always been a part of the game but it wasn't until recently that anybody new about them. It seems like they just jumped into the spotlight overnight. The book goes on to talk about the old days and how previously a player had been able to just pop up after a hit that left them seeing stars, run to the bench for a play, and the very next play are back in the game. But now they are under heavy watch and are held out of the rest of the game if there are any concussion like symptoms at all. The fact that the writer is a former NFL president means that there is inside information. She tells about what really goes on in the locker room and how the coaching staff tried to brush it off like it was no big deal. When information first started coming out the NFL was reluctant to take it seriously or make any changes. But then when former players started dying or committing suicide and it was clearly linked by doctors and specialists to head injuries sustained while playing football, they knew something had to change.
   
   
2. At least 3 key passages from your text.“Experts say that the most frustrating aspect of concussions in football is the silence surrounding them. Football’s play-with-pain mentality discourages players from high school to the pros from revealing this virtually imperceptible injury to coaches or trainers, often causing more serious harm.” Page 68

“Society itself has become accustomed to feeling no pain. We solicit pain killers regularly to deal with the usual aches that bodies experience.” Page 35

“To complicate matters, football is no longer seasonal. There are weight and strength programs year-round for the committed athlete. There is competition to make the roster year after year. There is no time off.” Page 112

“These players, these men, had been thrown away after their years of gripping our hearts with their plays. What remained were the broken bodies and lost souls of the men who have permanently left the locker room? This is what remains after the cheering subsides. This is what the NFL does not want you to see.” Page 125

3. At least 5 thought-provoking questions that allow readers of your page to think about the topic you have chosen in relation to your nonfiction book and the world around us.
   
   Would you ever use drugs to increase your level of play, knowing the consequences?
   
   If everyone in professional sports used performance enhancing drugs, they would then be on an equal playing field, do you think this would be a good idea?
   
   In your opinion, what would be a good way for the NFL to take better care of its players once they retire? They clearly need some kind of care with their broken bodies.
   
   Have you ever had a concussion? Did you tell anyone about it? Why or why not? Have you had any other injuries you have not reported and continued to play with?
   
   The author, Gay Culverhouse, was so concerned with player injuries that she testified before congress. Do you think that this is really that big of an issue? Why or why not?
4. A citation for your nonfiction book.

Culverhouse, Gay. Throwaway Players: The Concussion Crisis: From Pee Wee Football to the NFL. Lake Forest, CA: Behler Publications, 2012. Print.

5. Include a picture(s) (one that you created or composed) on the page that relates to the book you have chosen.

6. Finally, include a section on how this particular book has guided or fits in with the issue you have chosen to work with for this project.
   This book talks about concussions and performance enhancing drugs as main points. My broad topic is sports injuries and this book talks a lot about that. The main connection is that NFL players have suffered so many injuries, concussions in particular that they are having a hard time living after retirement. In addition to that the average career is only three years and after that the don't have many job applicable skills that they can use, so they really have to make enough money in those three years to live off of. Players would have much longer careers if they didn't get injured and be forced to retire.

(Writing)