All-Star Cali Aces Jamz Incident

[Goosepatrick]

I have a question..it's an honest question for USASF, Coaches and EP's.

What is the protocol taught to athletes in the case of an injury? Think about this question as a sport, not a show must go on mentality. These girls behaved in a way that the show must go on. Should it? I think everyone is expressing it shouldn't have.

In football, basketball and other sports, if an athlete is injured, they drop to the ground, stay still and this stops the game to ensure they are attended to appropriately. If you are not sure if you are injured, they limp to the sidelines and get attended to, but there are other players to substitute so the game can continue. They take helmets away from players to ensure they can't go back out and play when they are clearly injured, but can't judge for themselves.

There aren't substitutes. There isn't a back up plan. You can't take away helmets.

If they are injured or another athletes sees blood, that athlete injured should pull over to the side (race car analogy) of the mat, don't leave the mat, as this would protect them from further injury as most would keep going, but not leaving the mat would ensure a clear signal the music should stop and proper attention paid. (Caution would come out).

Is the issue that there isn't a protocol established for athletes to know what to do? Should we be establishing and teaching a protocol to the athletes?

 

[njallday]

*warning this may become a rant*

i have now seen numerous postings on twitter saying some variation of "obviously cheerleading is a sport" and those head injury photos attached.

on what planet does GETTING HURT qualify you as an athlete? are cheerleaders athletes? absolutely. but why does getting hurt have to justify that?! Let's look at baseball (because i'm sick of the football comparisons). do the baseball players ever get hurt? yes, but it's not common. when you are that elite and well trained, you should not be getting injured every game (injuries happen, i know but they should be isolated incidences) cheerleading having the highest ranking of number of injuries does not justify us as a sport, it reinforces the fact that we need certified athletic trainers, conditioning regimens, an offseason, and quality coaches. not that we're a sport. (actually without those things, we sound like the farthest thing from a sport)

if you tore your acl or broke an ankle in a baseball game, the umpire/coach/a teammate would have taken you off the field immediately. you don't keep going.


sorry, rant over. i'm all for cheerleading being a sport and i know injuries happen... but saying getting hurt makes us a sport is the most ridiculous thing i've ever heard.

 

[fullinitup]

i think that injuries like this are going to continue to happen with the huge push for syncro/squad tumbling....

 

[Mom Jeans]

*warning this may become a rant*

i have now seen numerous postings on twitter saying some variation of "obviously cheerleading is a sport" and those head injury photos attached.

on what planet does GETTING HURT qualify you as an athlete? are cheerleaders athletes? absolutely. but why does getting hurt have to justify that?! Let's look at baseball (because i'm sick of the football comparisons). do the baseball players ever get hurt? yes, but it's not common. when you are that elite and well trained, you should not be getting injured every game (injuries happen, i know but they should be isolated incidences) cheerleading having the highest ranking of number of injuries does not justify us as a sport, it reinforces the fact that we need certified athletic trainers, conditioning regimens, an offseason, and quality coaches. not that we're a sport. (actually without those things, we sound like the farthest thing from a sport)k

if you tore your acl or broke an ankle in a baseball game, the umpire/coach/a teammate would have taken you off the field immediately. you don't keep going.


sorry, rant over. i'm all for cheerleading being a sport and i know injuries happen... but saying getting hurt makes us a sport is the most ridiculous thing i've ever heard.

I agree the amount of praise because of cracked heads and continuing is pretty sickening , is this what we have taught out kids

 

[lucyemma]

I just saw on IndustryNews that the girls have cracked skulls. IMO, these girls are elite tumblers, they are tumbling with a large amount of momentum in their BHS and to crash as they did-it was inevitable that there WOULD be a serious injury. To see two athletes crash at such speed, it should have been stopped right away without waiting to see what happens and how the athletes were-they weren't going to come out of that unharmed ad like others have said, there is a likely to be a rippled effect if the routine continues with bases off the floor. As much as cheerleading is our lives, a 2:30 routine is not worth continuing with at the risk of serious injury, brain damage or worse and I think there is a limit to pushing through when something so drastic happens.There needs to be more awareness to athletes about when to stop and to make it easier for coaches to have control over stopping a routine. I like the idea that if someone shouts a certain word (the example given, potato) everyone stops.

 

[AndrewSky]

*warning this may become a rant*

i have now seen numerous postings on twitter saying some variation of "obviously cheerleading is a sport" and those head injury photos attached.

on what planet does GETTING HURT qualify you as an athlete? are cheerleaders athletes? absolutely. but why does getting hurt have to justify that?! Let's look at baseball (because i'm sick of the football comparisons). do the baseball players ever get hurt? yes, but it's not common. when you are that elite and well trained, you should not be getting injured every game (injuries happen, i know but they should be isolated incidences) cheerleading having the highest ranking of number of injuries does not justify us as a sport, it reinforces the fact that we need certified athletic trainers, conditioning regimens, an offseason, and quality coaches. not that we're a sport. (actually without those things, we sound like the farthest thing from a sport)

if you tore your acl or broke an ankle in a baseball game, the umpire/coach/a teammate would have taken you off the field immediately. you don't keep going.


sorry, rant over. i'm all for cheerleading being a sport and i know injuries happen... but saying getting hurt makes us a sport is the most ridiculous thing i've ever heard.

Thank you for literally saying what I've been holding back for a while now.

 

[GreatWhite92]

i think that injuries like this are going to continue to happen with the huge push for syncro/squad tumbling....

Totally agree. The more people tumbling at a time the more chance for collision. But no lets take away the skills that Are usually done by a single athlete at a time and keep the 20 girls tumbling through each other at a time encouraged.

 

[crazyredhead]

*warning this may become a rant*

i have now seen numerous postings on twitter saying some variation of "obviously cheerleading is a sport" and those head injury photos attached.

on what planet does GETTING HURT qualify you as an athlete? are cheerleaders athletes? absolutely. but why does getting hurt have to justify that?! Let's look at baseball (because i'm sick of the football comparisons). do the baseball players ever get hurt? yes, but it's not common. when you are that elite and well trained, you should not be getting injured every game (injuries happen, i know but they should be isolated incidences) cheerleading having the highest ranking of number of injuries does not justify us as a sport, it reinforces the fact that we need certified athletic trainers, conditioning regimens, an offseason, and quality coaches. not that we're a sport. (actually without those things, we sound like the farthest thing from a sport)

if you tore your acl or broke an ankle in a baseball game, the umpire/coach/a teammate would have taken you off the field immediately. you don't keep going.



sorry, rant over. i'm all for cheerleading being a sport and i know injuries happen... but saying getting hurt makes us a sport is the most ridiculous thing i've ever heard.

I agree to some extent. I think its to show that what they do is alot more than waving a pom pom and doing a high kick. To show that it takes actual skills and you can get hurt. Not saying its effective just thats my take on the pics.

 

[kickdblcj]

*warning this may become a rant*

i have now seen numerous postings on twitter saying some variation of "obviously cheerleading is a sport" and those head injury photos attached.

on what planet does GETTING HURT qualify you as an athlete? are cheerleaders athletes? absolutely. but why does getting hurt have to justify that?! Let's look at baseball (because i'm sick of the football comparisons). do the baseball players ever get hurt? yes, but it's not common. when you are that elite and well trained, you should not be getting injured every game (injuries happen, i know but they should be isolated incidences) cheerleading having the highest ranking of number of injuries does not justify us as a sport, it reinforces the fact that we need certified athletic trainers, conditioning regimens, an offseason, and quality coaches. not that we're a sport. (actually without those things, we sound like the farthest thing from a sport)

if you tore your acl or broke an ankle in a baseball game, the umpire/coach/a teammate would have taken you off the field immediately. you don't keep going.


sorry, rant over. i'm all for cheerleading being a sport and i know injuries happen... but saying getting hurt makes us a sport is the most ridiculous thing i've ever heard.

I tore my achilles getting out of my car... does that make getting out of cars a sport?

 

[njallday]

I agree to some extent. I think its to show that what they do is alot more than waving a pom pom and doing a high kick. To show that it takes actual skills and you can get hurt. Not saying its effective just thats my take on the pics.

i know what you mean, but i could easily tear my ACL getting out of bed in the morning and trip over my own 2 feet and fall and crack my head open. i'm not discrediting these girls, i praised them earlier in the thread... but injury does not equate athlete. and bragging about how these injuries makes cheerleading a sport is insane. injuries show how we need stronger industry-wide standards in place for safety.

 

[cheersafety]

Thank you for literally saying what I've been holding back for a while now.

Cheerleading isn't a sport because of injuries. But All Stars is not cheerleading. Those athletes do NOT cheer or lead cheers they compete in a gymnastic skill set that evolved from sideline cheerleading to compete only so All Stars is a sport and why we call them cheerleaders is strange. I usually refer to All Stars as cheer athletes since saying cheerleader seems odd when they don't even own a pair of pom pons.

When we treat All Stars like an activity we leave out many key elements of risk management and this issue discussed here is just one of them.

So just imo cheerleading isn't a sport and most experts like myself who think the skill set should be classified as a sport is because it is gymnastics, not because of injuries.

Injuries do not make it a sport, but it not being a sport causes many of the injuries.

 

[cheerisloving]

The fact that the girls who had the actual collision went off was one of the reasons they went on. The other injuries probably felt like "Fight through it" injuries. There was also a shoe loss by the time the pyramid came. The routine prov. Stopped at that point because it was when there would be a real hazard. Also the girls may not have noticed the collison because the majority of the team was tumbling during that time.

 

[cheersafety]

I have a question..it's an honest question for USASF, Coaches and EP's.

What is the protocol taught to athletes in the case of an injury? Think about this question as a sport, not a show must go on mentality. These girls behaved in a way that the show must go on. Should it? I think everyone is expressing it shouldn't have.

In football, basketball and other sports, if an athlete is injured, they drop to the ground, stay still and this stops the game to ensure they are attended to appropriately. If you are not sure if you are injured, they limp to the sidelines and get attended to, but there are other players to substitute so the game can continue. They take helmets away from players to ensure they can't go back out and play when they are clearly injured, but can't judge for themselves.

There aren't substitutes. There isn't a back up plan. You can't take away helmets.

If they are injured or another athletes sees blood, that athlete injured should pull over to the side (race car analogy) of the mat, don't leave the mat, as this would protect them from further injury as most would keep going, but not leaving the mat would ensure a clear signal the music should stop and proper attention paid. (Caution would come out).

Is the issue that there isn't a protocol established for athletes to know what to do? Should we be establishing and teaching a protocol to the athletes?

There is NO protocol for ANY major cheerleading organizations like what is done in other sports. And yes this issue should be addressed asap and gyms, programs, events that continue to do this are at a higher risk for a lawsuit.

 

[AndrewSky]

Cheerleading isn't a sport because of injuries. But All Stars is not cheerleading. Those athletes do NOT cheer or lead cheers they compete in a gymnastic skill set that evolved from sideline cheerleading to compete only so All Stars is a sport and why we call them cheerleaders is strange. I usually refer to All Stars as cheer athletes since saying cheerleader seems odd when they don't even own a pair of pom pons.
I don't get why this was in response to me?
When we treat All Stars like an activity we leave out many key elements of risk management and this issue discussed here is just one of them.

So just imo cheerleading isn't a sport and most experts like myself who think the skill set should be classified as a sport is because it is gymnastics, not because of injuries.

Injuries do not make it a sport, but it not being a sport causes many of the injuries.

 

[lucyemma]

The fact that the girls who had the actual collision went off was one of the reasons they went on.

One of the girls (point flyer) stayed on with a crack in her head.