To Be Announced...

Iowa study finds high school football players overweight, 1 in 10 obese

In other news, the Earth circles around the sun!

IOWA CITY (AP) --- Heavy tackles and 300-pound nose guards are common in pro and college football. Now a study shows the trend toward beefier, overweight linemen is emerging at the high school level.

Researchers at Iowa State University found nearly half of the offensive and defensive linemen playing on Iowa high school teams qualify as overweight, and one in 10 meet medical standards for severe obesity.

Just a guess, but do you think that this article is timed for release around the Super Bowl? Sort of like the one we always get every year about the "increase in violence against women on Super Sunday" story. Not true (see link), but the correction and retraction wasn't on page 1 of the sports section.

I'm not saying that the story about obese football players isn't true...it's quite obvious to me that they're 'overweight' but I'm not a big fan of the overuse of the word, "obese"

It's all based on perspective too. I personally would be more concerned about an overweight guy sitting behind the wheel of a semi - smokin' and eating cheese puffs - than I would about a guy who weighs 250 and can still run the 40-yard dash. Just ask John Candy.

They said it's impossible to lay blame on any single source or factor.

"But I think if we're honest about it, at least in this case, we'd have to look at the role models for these young athletes," said Dr. George Phillips, a pediatrician at the University of Iowa's Sports Medicine Center.

"Most of these kids aren't going to play professionally or even at the college level. So what we need to do is to make sure if they're going to add weight, muscle mass, that they do it in a healthy way."

Like I said...I hope they took their physical conditioning into account and not just their weight. You can be very healthy at 260 pounds. Just ask the Governor of California.