League of Fans

By Ken Reed

Football starts in earnest this weekend for youth, high school, and college football teams. It’s estimated that there are 3.5 million youth football players, 1.3 million high school football players, and 100,000 college football players in this country.

The vast majority of the players and their parents aren’t aware of the brain […]

By Ken Reed

ESPN recently decided to end its partnership with PBS on a project called “League of Denial,” a documentary that was supposed to be part of PBS’ high-quality Frontline series.

The New York Times reported that ESPN officials met with NFL administrators, including commissioner Roger Goodell, and shortly thereafter pulled the […]

League of Fans’ Sports Policy Director Ken Reed has a new regular column on contemporary sports issues at The Huffington Post.

By Ken Reed

Washington DC mayor Vincent Gray is the latest politician to push sports welfare on local taxpayers. Gray has reached a tentative agreement with the private owners of DC United, a Major League Soccer franchise, calling for taxpayers to split the cost of a new soccer sports palace with DC United’s owners.

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By Ken Reed

In many ways, and in many instances, Texas A&M’s Johnny Manziel, aka Johnny Football, has shown himself to be an immature spoiled brat. Comedian Argus Hamilton described Manziel’s past year this way: “In one year he’s gone from Johnny Football to Johnny Walker to Johnny Hancock.” Character-wise, it doesn’t appear that Manziel, […]

By Ken Reed

In the early days of American football, skull fractures and severe head lacerations were a major problem. Today’s high-tech helmets have virtually eliminated skull fractures and lacerations from the game.

However, despite the hopes and wishes of parents, coaches, and players, there’s very little a helmet can do to prevent concussions and […]

By Ken Reed

Dan Snyder, the owner of the Washington Redskins, has been called a spoiled brat, an egomaniac, and a good old fashioned jerk. Peter Keating, writing for ESPN, makes a strong case that by proclaiming that he’ll never change the Washington NFL franchise’s nickname, Snyder can also be called a bad businessman.