#7- contradicting an analysis

In my analysis, I will be arguing the article from the New York Times, “Not Everyone Says Headgear Is Right Fit for Girls’ Lacrosse.” In this article Bill Pennington talks about how women's lacrosse is one of the fastest growing sports in the country, with many injuries occurring to the head, such as concussions. This is causing a debate within the lacrosse associations about if women should be required to wear headgear or not. From an outsider's perspective it seems like a no-brainer, but it is causing worry to coaches, players, and officials. The debate is if required headgear will change the game of lacrosse forever. Pennington has done his research and gets his facts from coaches opinion of the game to sway the outsiders stand. “Some of the sport’s longest-tenured coaches and officials worry that the headgear, though optional for now, will lead to more aggressive play and will ultimately ruin the nuanced spirit of the game, which has been played in North America for about a century.” He gets quotes from the coaches to get their point of view across, that if headgear is allowed it will take the game down a slippery slope to more aggressive play and change the game of lacrosse forever. He uses the rhetorical device of pathos to evoke a connection from the pity of the coaches. Pennington then goes on to say, “The idea that athletes will play rougher if wearing extra padding is known as the “gladiator effect” and dates to at least the early 20th century, when it was suggested that college football players were hitting with more ferocity because they had begun to wear leather helmets.In 1986, Massachusetts high school officials required that girls’ lacrosse players wear hard ice hockey helmets. The experiment ended after several years, and the consensus was that offensive players were more likely to instigate contact with opposing defenders, and vice versa.” He also got a quote from a coach that thinks the game could be totally lost and treated more as the boys game. “A lot of us coaches talk about where things are going and what might happen to girls’ lacrosse,” Fronckowiak said. “And we’ve all agreed that if they change too much, it will be time to leave the game, because it’s just going to be the boys’ game. The beauty of our game will be gone.” There is some contradiction in the article from other insiders who say although headgear is added, lacrosse is lacrosse. “Our game is not going to change because the rules aren’t going to change,” said Carter Abbott, the head coach and athletic director at the Pingry School in New Jersey. “Headgear or no headgear, it’s about training coaches to teach the game the right way. It’s about educational programs for game officials.” He does not mention any solutions to this problem among the lacrosse culture, considering the matter is out of his hands. Pennington collected great data from the coaches he got quotes from, and his article has great grammar and flows well. He collects data as well from the companies that would be selling the headgear. I do not agree with this article because I think that the rules of the game will not change because of headgear, nor do I think that girls will start to be playing with more aggression. I feel like some of the quotes from these coaches are overdramatic, they are not thinking about the safety this will bring to the game.