Football is a violent sport, which can lead to broken bones, torn ligaments, and concussions. According to a 2022 National High School Sports-Related Injury Surveillance Study, football is the sport that has the most concussions. Per 10,000 athletic exposures, high school football players will have an average of 11.2 concussions. This is a higher rate than both college and professional football players.
High school football is one of the most dangerous sports due to the physical aspect of the game and especially the hits to the head which have been severe and leading to things like Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. CTE is a degenerative brain disease characterized by memory loss, confusion, mood swings, violence, suicidality and more.
CTE is caused by lots of brain trauma and whole body hits which is a common thing that happens in football. The best way to prevent CTE from happening is to avoid repeated head injuries, which is why it is very important to have proper equipment, like helmets and pads, to minimize the effects of these injuries.
A study from The Boston University CTE center found that 345 of 376 (91.7%) former NFL players that were studied were diagnosed with CTE. In comparison, 164 brains of men and women which were donated to the Framingham Heart Study found that only 1 of 164 (0.6%) had CTE. This is where Guardian Caps come in; they are a newly introduced piece of equipment. They are a soft shell that goes over the player’s helmet and they help reduce the impact of hits to the head.
Guardian Caps are something that is important to the transition of making football safer. The NFL started to implement these safety measures back in 2020 when they introduced these caps to players and started to require certain positions to wear them, mostly lineman and positions that required a lot more contact during practice.
In 2024, the NFL has expanded these rules and now require most positions to wear these Guardian Caps. They have also now started to allow players to wear these caps during games this season.
According to a Sporting News article, several players – Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah, Josh Whyle, James Daniels, Jabrill Peppers, Rodney Thomas II, Luke Goedeke, De’Von Achane, and Kylen Granson began the season wearing the Guardian Caps. Granson told The Athletic, “Why wouldn’t I (wear it)? Just because it looks silly? I feel like health and safety is more important than aesthetics.”
Colleges and high schools are also using these Guardian Caps for practice and they are also game approved, but unlike practice they aren’t required to be worn during games.
The Guardian Caps were created to address the clear need to advance the standard helmet. According to the official Guardian Caps website, they realized that there had been no major changes to helmets since the 1960’s so they decided to engineer the soft shell covers.
The creators, Erin Hanson and Lee Hanson, realized that a lot of players, fans, and coaches were going to be against this big change for the sport. Despite that they decided to market affordable Guardian Caps that could be easily attached to the helmets and they have been very successful, not just for the NFL, but also in youth football.
Here at Alisal, varsity football coach Francisco Estrada requires his players to wear them for practice. He considers it as another part of their equipment. which he describes as a main part of their equipment because of how serious head injuries are in the sport.
Although the Guardian Caps aren’t required during games, Estrada said that he thinks they will be soon.
Another thing that Estrada does in order to ensure the safety and well being of his players, is that players who have suffered concussions any time during the season are required wear the Guardian Cap during games; this is to reduce the likelihood of a concussion occurring again to the player.
Currently the district is allowing them to be used during games and Athletic Director Jose Gil stated that if players want to use them during games they can definitely do that.
The district is funding the Guardian Caps, at a cost of $69.99 per cap, because there was an increase in concussions and the athletic directors proposed purchasing them for all the schools, which the district did.
Gil said he isn’t sure if the district would start requiring them to be mandatory during games next year, but he said that the athletic directors always take safety as their top priority.
