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ATHENS, Ga. — Kirby Smart made it sound grim. On paper, Smart coaches the most talented college football team in America. But as he examined his roster this month — down to the last detail — one fear was confirmed: Fewer people are playing football, and that’s affecting the quality of the game.
“I feel like we have less depth than ever before, and that’s a common theme when talking to other coaches,” Smart said. “I call it the deterioration of football.”
A high school coach from Georgia expressed this opinion.
“The number of kids playing football is definitely decreasing,” said Adam Carter, coach at Lowndes High in Valdosta. “I think there are a couple of reasons. Football is hard work, it’s summer and the number of parents in this generation who don’t let their kids play at a young age. That means they only play baseball, basketball, soccer, etc. and never make it to a football field when they get older.”
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So are they right? Even though football has never been more popular and has made more money, fewer and fewer people are playing it? And is this a huge warning sign for the future of the game?
The data tells a complex story (and several other high school coaches contacted say they have record numbers of players).
“We are encouraged by the numbers out there and the number of players,” said Steve Hatchell, head of the National Football Foundation.
Kirby Smart begins his ninth season as Georgia coach. (Todd Kirkland / Getty Images)
Be that as it may, the stewards acknowledge the concerns and say they will continue to take measures to make the game safer.
“There’s just a general awareness that we need to change player behavior for the benefit of the athletes and to preserve the game,” said Steve Shaw, the NCAA’s referee coordinator and chairman of the football rules committee. “I would say nothing is more important.”
First, a look at the data:
• Participation in high school football has increased slightly in each of the past two years after a downward trend from 2015 to 2022: According to data from the National Federation for High Schools, 1,031,508 players played 11-man football in the 2023 season, an increase of about 3,000 from the previous season.
• The downside: The numbers are still below the 1,136,301 in 2009, and when population growth is taken into account, it represents a smaller percentage of the available talent pool.
• At the same time, the number of colleges and universities sponsoring football teams has continued to grow: 774 this season, including six new ones this fall, with 51 new programs since 2008, according to the National Football Foundation. And the number of FBS (formerly Division IA) schools has grown from 112 in 1998 to 134 this year as more schools chase the money in the game.
So there are more college teams, but a consistent amount of talent. The obvious conclusion: Smart and his fellow coaches may be right because the supply of talent has not kept pace with demand.
Another factor, Carter said, is that kids aren’t playing football, or at least tackle football, until later in life, whether it’s middle school or even high school. Smart pointed to safety protocols at the high school level regarding the number of practices per week and the amount of tackling and physical contact.
“High school doesn’t have as many opportunities to develop the kids because their training schedule and program is tougher,” Smart said. “It’s a trickle-up effect, so the guys come from high school.”
Smart, it must be stressed, doesn’t necessarily have a problem with this. He has often spoken about wanting the game to be safe for his son, who is 12 years old and has played football. Smart is a member of the NCAA rules committee and has been involved in drafting rules designed to make the game safer.
The NCAA’s most tangible change was the targeting rule, which went into effect in 2013 as a 15-yard penalty and resulted in automatic ejection a year later. Fans, coaches and players have vilified the rule, but it’s not going away because it works.
“I know fans often don’t like being targeted, but honestly, this is one of the best rules we’ve put in place,” Shaw said.
The rule was designed to change behavior and discourage bounty hunting and dangerous hits. Shaw pointed to data and anecdotal evidence that the rule has worked. The number of targeted tackles has declined over the past four years, reaching 0.16 per game last season. And that’s not because referees are looking the other way, but because players have adapted their play because of the rule.
“It’s really good for our game,” Shaw said. “We’ve noticed a change in the players’ behavior, in their technique, how they block, how they attack, how they approach and how they use their helmet.”
Beyond aiming, the rules committee has continually explored changes for safety reasons. It has changed the rules for blocking below the waist to prevent knee injuries and eliminated blindside blocks.
It looked at the number of plays per game and referred to them as “exposures.” There have been efforts to have fewer of them, mainly for safety reasons, but more attention is being paid to shortening game times. Thanks to the changes, particularly not stopping the clock on first downs, the committee has cut an average of 4.5 to 5 plays from games. Fans complained about shorter games, but the goal of having fewer exposures has been met, so that won’t change either.
“The progress we made there was really good for our game, maybe even saving it,” Shaw said.
Equipment, particularly helmet technology, was also a focus. Shaw predicts that in a few years there will be position-specific helmets, using data currently collected on the impacts the head receives at each position. For example, a safety needs a different helmet than a lineman because he is not exposed to the repeated hits of a lineman, while the safety needs a helmet that takes into account impacts while running.
All of this, of course, followed years of negative coverage about safety in the game. And while this has had a noticeable impact on participation, data suggests this trend may be reversing, and not just at the high school level.
The Sports and Fitness Industry Association, which tracks youth participation at all levels, presented data showing:
• Tackle football participation rates among 13- to 17-year-olds declined from 2012 to 2017, but then increased over the next six years.
• Participation rates among 6- to 12-year-olds in tackle football have been “consistent to slightly increasing” over the past 12 years.
• While tackle football participation declined after 2010, “the decline was halted and participation has stabilized in recent years,” and participation has increased every year since 2020.
“This data set clearly shows that the claim that tackle football participation has dropped dramatically and is on a steady downward trend is simply not true,” wrote Tom Cove of the SFIA in a report. “And in fact, after some challenges related to the concussion issues, tackle football participation numbers are quite stable and good overall during the period 2011-17.”
Hatchell pointed out that flag football is a growing sport. The sport will be included in the 2028 Olympics, and the number of high school girls playing flag football has more than doubled in the last year, now at nearly 43,000.
“It’s exploding. It’s not just growing, it’s exploding,” Hatchell said.
Hatchell said he and other football advocates don’t see flag football as a long-term replacement for tackle football, but rather as a complement to it. There is a consensus in tackle football about making the game safer so parents will let their kids play. The game’s popularity, at least in terms of ratings and attendance, puts the sport in a good position to risk making these changes and sacrificing parts of the game if it means fewer injuries.
Nothing will change. And the game will never go back to the way it was.
“As parents of players, you encourage them to play hard and play strong. But you want it to be safe,” Hatchell said. “That’s the most important thing. And I think the rule changes have been really good in that regard.”
(Top photo: Andrew Nelles / USA Today)
