Is football dying? By the Numbers
After seeing XtraMelanin’s post about the decline of football yesterday, my interest was sparked. I’m recovering from surgery and have way too much time on my hands, so I figured I’d dive into the numbers to see if I could find any trends. Xtra’s thread provoked a lot of good debates. Unfortunately, due to each state having their own high school athletic organization, it takes awhile for the NFHS to compile all of the data. Statistics for last year won’t be available until the end of this year.
Who are the big players in High School Football?
I will focus on the ten largest states by participation; Otherwise there is just too much data. These numbers are for male football athletes during 2014.
State | Participants |
---|---|
Texas | 164,554 |
California | 103,474 |
Illinois | 47,068 |
Ohio | 44,431 |
Florida | 40,606 |
Michigan | 39,963 |
North Carolina | 36,273 |
New York | 35,552 |
Georgia | 32,979 |
Wisconsin | 26,680 |
Argument: Football participation corresponds directly to population
Let's take a look at how population has changed over the last decade.
State | Population 2014 | Population 2004 | Percentage Change |
---|---|---|---|
Texas | 26,956,958 | 22,490,022 | 19.8 |
California | 38,802,500 | 35,893,799 | 8.1 |
Illinois | 12,880,580 | 12,713,634 | 1.3 |
Ohio | 11,594,163 | 11,459,011 | 1.1 |
Florida | 19,893,297 | 17,397,161 | 14 |
Michigan | 9,909,877 | 10,112,620 | -2 |
North Carolina | 9,943,964 | 8,541,221 | 16.4 |
New York | 19,746,227 | 19,227,088 | 2.7 |
Georgia | 10,097,343 | 8,829,383 | 14.3 |
Wisconsin | 5,757,564 | 5,509,026 | 4.5 |
And now, football participation over the last decade:
State | Participants 2014 | Participants 2004 | |
---|---|---|---|
Texas | 164554 | 158575 | 3.63 |
California | 103474 | 95504 | 7.7 |
Illinois | 47068 | 49114 | -4.1 |
Ohio | 44431 | 44786 | -0.7 |
Florida | 40606 | 35993 | 12.8 |
Michigan | 39963 | 42717 | -6.4 |
North Carolina | 36273 | 25449 | 42.5 |
New York | 35552 | 33410 | 6.4 |
Georgia | 32979 | 27047 | 21.9 |
Wisconsin | 26680 | 30053 | -11.2 |
Findings: While Michigan was the only state whose population has declined over the last decade, four states saw declines in football participation. It is hard to ignore what population growth has done for North Carolina and Georgia.
Argument: The birth rate is on the decline.
Unfortunately, I was finding conflicting data for the birth rates during the time when high school athletes for my parameters were being born so I'd rather not go off of that. However, using the US Census estimates, I was able to get the number of 14-17 year old males in each state and compare to those playing in 2014.
State | Males 14-17 years old | Percentage playing football |
---|---|---|
Texas | 795,671 | 21 |
California | 1,060,283 | 10 |
Illinois | 353,058 | 13 |
Ohio | 317,032 | 14 |
Florida | 482,182 | 8 |
Michigan | 275,155 | 15 |
North Carolina | 263,117 | 10 |
New York | 497,089 | 7 |
Georgia | 286,185 | 12 |
Wisconsin | 154,191 | 17 |
Findings: Not a lot. I was actually surprised at how high the football interest was in Michigan.
Argument: The economy dictates how many participate in football.
When the recession hit 2008ish, many schools were faced with budget cuts. Some had to cut programs, or make them pay to play.
Year | Schools offering football |
---|---|
2004 | 13,680 |
2005 | 13,671 |
2006 | 13,727 |
2007 | 13,922 |
2008 | 13,987 |
2009 | 14,105 |
2010 | 14,226 |
2011 | 14,279 |
2012 | 14,241 |
2013 | 14,048 |
2014 | 14,262 |
Year | National Football Participants |
---|---|
2004 | 1,032,682 |
2005 | 1,045,494 |
2006 | 1,093,234 |
2007 | 1,104,548 |
2008 | 1,108,286 |
2009 | 1,112,303 |
2010 | 1,109,278 |
2011 | 1,108,441 |
2012 | 1,095,993 |
2013 | 1,086,627 |
2014 | 1,093,234 |
Findings: The recession did not affect football as a whole.
Argument: Kids these days are lazy. They would rather play video games than a sport. Now get off my lawn.
Year | Total Male Athletes |
---|---|
2004 | 4,038,253 |
2005 | 4,110,319 |
2006 | 4,206,549 |
2007 | 4,321,103 |
2008 | 4,372,115 |
2009 | 4,422,662 |
2010 | 4,455,740 |
2011 | 4,494,406 |
2012 | 4,484,987 |
2013 | 4,490,854 |
2014 | 4,527,994 |
Findings: The number of high school athletes have trended upward in the last decade.
Argument: Kids are playing other sports instead of football
Findings: Hard to argue with that. The total number of athletes has increased consistantly, while the football player numbers have had a bit of a ebb and flow.
Argument: Concussion research has hindered athletes from playing football.
I will refer again to this chart:
Year | National Football Participants |
---|---|
2004 | 1,032,682 |
2005 | 1,045,494 |
2006 | 1,093,234 |
2007 | 1,104,548 |
2008 | 1,108,286 |
2009 | 1,112,303 |
2010 | 1,109,278 |
2011 | 1,108,441 |
2012 | 1,095,993 |
2013 | 1,086,627 |
2014 | 1,093,234 |
Findings: There was a fairly dramatic decrease in football participation between 2011 and 2012. As you all remember, Junior Seau shot himself in May of 2012 and sparked the debate about long term concussion effects. This correlation cannot be ignored.
I couldn't find hard data about younger football players. The Wall Street Journal has reported that Pop Warner Football participation is down 6% since 2008. My guess is that more parents are discouraging their children from playing during crucial brain development years, but then letting them make their own decision once they get to high school.
Argument: Undereducated parents are more likely to risk their children's health playing football on the off chance it may be their ticket out of poverty.
Findings: False. According to a study done by The Child Trends Databank, parents with graduate degrees are the most likely to allow their children to play football.
I will be interested to see if high school football participation will continue to trend up once the new numbers are released.
Sources:
NHFS.org , Census.gov , WSJ.com
The argument about 'undereducated parents' being more likely to risk their children's health is a red herring. What you are seeing in that graph is the relationship between income and the probability that one's school district has a football program, and that one's teenage kid doesn't have to work and has the time to play football, and one has been able to pay for keeping thier kid involved in a sport through the years. And of course the fact that the lesser educated parents are more likely to be immigrants whose kids don't play football. Parental education is a proxy for household income here.
Also, I don't know who is arguing about the birth rate being on the decline: prior to an uptick last year, it was in steady decline after the recession. The population continued to grow due to net immigration.
I think the impact of the concussion debate is interesting and your numbers seem to show something happening there. Also the general trend in kids playing other sports is interesting and no doubt related to the higher proportion of children born to Hispanic families, who are generally more likely to be interested in soccer.
Thanks for the data. Polls don't determine what's going on in the world, and neither do anecdotes. It's good to have some raw numbers to look at and consider.
Your description of your point is a little bit "colorful", but it is quite accurate.
I grew up in a town just as you described. We played football in the fall, wrestled in the winter, and played baseball in the spring. It was a meat-and-potatoes menu. There was nothing else available except basketball and track. No "sissy" sports as they would describe them, like soccer or volleyball.
The emphasis was on toughness. Always toughness.
For better or worse, times have indeed changed. My old high school can barely field a football team and they are uncompetitive. Meanwhile they win state championships in soccer, which was not even offered when I was there.
The culture changes over time. We can look back now and tsk tsk the way it was, but it was very real just as you described.
The media frenzy about concussions (and resulting lawsuits) has intensified over the last year. It will be intwresting to see what these numbers look like two years from now when the impact of that affects youth that are coming up through the system.
I suspecct that you will see these numbers trending down significantly.
Another useful statistic if available, would be the number of schools dropping football or failing to field a team. This is clearly a trend on the upswing due to lack of participation and fear of lawsuits.
I am from India and I love football. However my son, like sons of many other friends who are from India and like football, does not have the frame or physic to play football. I don't think this part of the population is statistically significant yet to contribute to this study, but something to think about as the population make up changes in certain parts of the US.
I'm really surprised how few players there are in Florida given its huge talent pool. Hard to believe Michigan has about the same number.
thank you for taking the time to do so. my take away is that football is down a few percentage points in the 14-17 range. however, it may be significantly down in the 8-13 yr range, and that is the pipeline that is going to matter in just a couple of years.
August 1st, 2015 at 10:40 AM ^
is over 65 and I have to believe a good majority of those moved there after raising children.
Someone correct if I'm wrong, but I don't think Florida has that many high schools that even play football, certainly compared to its overall population.
Wow, interesting point. I looked into it. Even though Florida has 200,000 more 14-17 year old males, they actually have 100 less high schools that offer football in comparision to Michigan.
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