Former defensive back Bobby Hosea is a hero of sorts: He is running camps to teach youthful football players how to protect their heads when they tackle.
The New York Times did a Page One profile of Hosea Sunday that was headlined “Teaching Safer Way To Tackle: Not Headfirst, but Heads Up.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/26/sports/football/26tackling.html?ref=todayspaper
“As football careens through its dark cloud of head injuries, Hosea sees himself as saving more than the players’ ability to walk and think,” The Times said. “He sees it as saving the sport, one youngster at a time.”
Hosea has apparently won the faith of USA Football, the governing body of Pop Warner and other youth leagues, which has hired him as its tackling consultant.
Hosea’s gospel, for boys as young as nine, is for football players to tackle with their knees bent, heads up, butts out and chests up. They should not be doing what The Times called almost “instinctual”: crashing into a runner head down.
How does he instill his lesson? Kids that drop their heads for a tackle are forced to do pushups, and are also razzed by their fellow students.
Anyway, it’s refreshing to read a story that offers solid suggestions about preventing concussions. The NFL should hire Hosea.
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