Danyelle Heinz
English Composititon II
Professor Stalbird
March 7, 2015
Concussion. By Peter Landesman. Dir. Peter Landesman. Prod. Ridley Scott, Giannina Scott, David Woltroff, Larry Schuman, and Elizabeth Cantillon. Perf. Will Smith. Columbia Pictures, 2015. Film.
This movie is about an autopsy that was done on a former NFL football player, Mkike Webster by a forensic pathologist Dr. Bennet Omalu who discovered a neurological deterioration that is almost like Alzheimer’s. As Dr. Omalu goes through one brain, he gets curious as to other players and if they could possibly be carrying the diseases as well. This movie is to help raise awareness about the dangers of football-related head trauma.
The film “Concussion” which was released in 2015, was wrote by Peter Landesman and is based on Game Brain by Jeanne Marie Laskas. The movies running time is 122 minutes with the budget set at thirty-five million dollars. Colombia Pictures distributed the film earning forty-five point two million dollars in box office sales alone. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film had a rating of 60%, based on 153 reviews, with an average rating of 6/10. On CinemaScore, audiences gave the film an “A” on an A+ to F scale.
This information will be useful in my paper because it is a documentary on CTE and Dr. Omalu’s discovery within the brains of deceased NFL football players. A lot of audiences liked this movie and gained information that was not only interesting and inspiring. This movie will also give me more information on the players, amount of CTE that was found, what drove them to act the way that they did and Omalu’s efforts to not give up when he was doubted.
"Concussions in American Football." Wikipedia.. Wikimedia Foundation, 1 Mar. 2016. Webber. 01 Mar. 2016.
This article talks about the National Football League and how repetitive blows to the head can lead to CTE. It also talks about how the issue of the continuous diagnosis of concussions in the NFL is becoming a problem and could be considered neglect. The league is in multiple law suites that are saying that league is hiding things from the players like brain injuries. The article talks about what all they are going through with the helmets to control the impact by a triangular system being put into the helmets to see what type of impact they are getting by the G-Force to determine a players risk of having a concussion.
The writers of this article come from numerous amounts of people with tons of credible sources. Many people contributed to this article to tie it together as one with information that they found on the internet. The sources that were used in this article are credible coming from News Analyst, Universities, and news papers.
This information will be useful in my paper because it gives a lot of information on multiple topics that fit within my paper. There are many sources that this information comes from and it is not about one specific thing. The article jumps around from topic to topic while staying on the main subject completing every aspect of the NFL and the concussion crisis.
"Concussions and NFL: How the name CTE came about." CNN Wire 2015: Business Insights: Essentials. Web. 29 Feb. 2016.
This article talks about how CTE can be found after a person has been pronounced dead. Dr. Omalu was not aware of CTE at the time. It talks about the process and what was going through the doctors mind as he was looking at a players brain after being pronounced dead. It talks about how he came up with the symptoms, the name, the cause behind it being in an American Football Player, the research he had to do and how he was assisted by his fellow mentors with the reality of it being there. It also talks about how he discovered CTE in more than just the person he was already looking at.
Bennet Omalu, the writer of this article is a Nigerian-American physician, forensic pathologist, neuropathologist who was the first to publish findings of CTE in American Football Players. He attended medical school starting at the age of 16 at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. In 1990, he graduated with a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery. In 1993 he began looking for scholarship opportunities in the United States. He then attended the University of Pittsburg in 2000 and 2002 to receive a masters in Public Health. He also received a Masters in Business Administration from Tepper School of Business at Catnegie Mellon Universtiy in 2008. Omalu is currently chief medical examiner of San Joaquin County, California and is a professor in the UC Davis Department of Medical Pathology and Laboratory Medicine.
This information will be useful in my paper because it is filled with first hand knowledge on how CTE came about and how it was found in players. I feel that this will give a lot of accreditation towards my paper because it is coming from the founder of CTE himself.
Dodd, Johnny, Diane Herbst, and Michelle Boudin. "Taking On The Nfl His Fight To Make Football Safer." People 85.1 (2016): 56. MasterFILE Premier. Web. 29. Feb. 2016.
This article talks about how Dr. Bennet Omalu was trying to prove a point to the NFL and how he was ignored and mocked saying that nothing was wrong with their players for nearly a decade. This article is questioning whether youth football should be abolished due to the 13 deaths in one school year alone. They are trying to make football safer and some are saying that they work and research that they are conducting could kill football as we know it but instead they are simply trying to save football.
Johnny Dodd, the writer of this article is a writer for PEOPLE Magazine and creator of non-fiction books. He has roamed the county as a staff writer and reporter for the past twenty years. PEOPLE Magazine is a well known magazine company from around the United States that has covered numerous amounts of stories with facts that seem to be reliable.
This information will be useful in my paper because it has a negative side on why football should not be banned at a youthful age and that the rules and regulations should be more strict. This balances out whether or not things should be tightened when it comes to safety and football.
Drysdale, Thomas A. "Helmet-to-helmet contact: avoiding a lifetime penalty by creating a duty to scan active NFL players for chronic traumatic encephalopathy." Journal of Legal Medicine 2013: 425. Academic OneFile. Web. 1 Mar. 2016.
This article talks about what measures the National Football League had to take to make rules and regulations safer for the players during season and retirement. It talks about how some players will continue to play violent no matter what the rules are because the ideal of preventing a concussion is inevitable. It talks about what CTE is and gives it a definition of “repeated blows to the head” and defines what a concussion is in medical terms. The article also talks about how concussions dated as far back as 1994, medical professionals have warned them on the negative impacts that players face. The talks of rule changing and making the NFL safer since 2010 but not all of them have been implemented.
Thomas Drysdale, the writer of this article is an Associate Professor and Founding Chair in the Department of Photography and Imaging at Tisch School of the Arts. He received his PH.D froth University of Toronto, M.Sc. from the University of Guelph and B.Sc. from the University of Guelph. His major goals of his lab is to understand the molecular events that goern the development of specific organs.
This information will be useful in my paper because it is not one sided. It backs claims to why the NFL should be safer and why they cannot do too much to make the game safer without having to change the game altogether. It also talks about how concussion prevention in a tackle team sport is almost inevitable although something needs to be done. This will also help me to balance my paper and I can get most of my knowledge from this as well.
Logue, Andrew. "CTE found in short-time NFL player." USA Today 2016: Academic OneFile. Web. 29 Feb. 2016.
This news article talks about Tyler Sash who was a star defensive back for the Univeristy of Iowa and a member of the New York Giant’s Super Bowl XLVI and how the examination brought light to his family as to why he chose to end his life. It compares the amount of CTE in his brain that was found in Junior Seau who was a Pro Football Hall of Famer (commited suicide in 2012). It talks about the alarming numbers of games played in the NFL and how he only played 23 regular season games. The article also talks about how a player should not play tackle until about High School age. The newspaper talked to Sash’s brother Joah and talks about the changes that went through Sash in the period of time being a Pro Footballer.
Andrew Logue, the writer of this article writes for USA Today for The Des Monies Register, which is part of the USA Today Network. He joined the Register in 1996 and covers pretty much anything sports related with a particular eye on local media.
This information will be useful in my paper because it gives me a little bit more of detail as to what was going on with the players and the way that their behavior changed through someone else's eyes. It is a positive approach as to why the NFL needs to be safer and care for their players for when they retire considering the statists of how severe Sash’s CTE was compared to Seau.
Trahan, Kevin. "Is the NFL's Big Bet on Making Football Safer Working?" VICE Sports RSS. Vice Sports, 13 May 2015. Web. 01 Mar. 2016.
This article talks about former football players. It talks about how the NFL states that they have “never been safer” since the tackling initiative created and promoted by American Football. The article talks about “heads up football” and how it is put forth to trying and make football safer at a younger age so that injuries like we see today could be prevented. It talks about how concussions could lead to possible brain damage and that a simple MRI scan can look almost identical to a CTE scan. It talks about the purpose of the Heads Up program and how it teaches to tackle without the use of head contact but that they are not reducing exposure to the brain.
Kevin Traban, the writer of this article is a Freelance Sports Writer for Vice Sports. He covers college football and basketball and the NCAA legal issues for SB Nation. He is the co-founder of SB Nation's Northwestern site, InsideNU.com. He also writes about NFL News for SB Nation. Previously, he worked for Forbes, The Wall Street Journal and Rush the Court. He is currently attending Northwestern University.
This information will be useful in my paper because it is a negative attack on how CTE was found in football players. The fact that the article says that there are more things that lead to CTE being found inside of a deceased brain is an argument that I have been looking for in my paper. The fact that they are trying to make football safer at a younger age to help protect players in good in my paper because the safety and regulations is a major part of what I need in my paper to argue that football does need to be safer.