We Need You in the Locker Room

If you are one of the tens of millions of Americans who loves football-and who simultaneously worries if it can be safely played-then Dr. David Kaufman’s book is a must-read. Like such classics as Paper Lion and A Fan’s Notes, We Need You in the Locker Room provides a fascinating, unique, and immensely readable perspective on a game we only think we know. As a neurologist assigned to work with the coaches and players, his time in the locker room and on the sidelines made him an intimate witness to the drama, teamwork, and courage of young athletes-and to the toll this violent game exacts on them. A page-turner about a championship season, this book is also a smart, sensitive argument for how football can be preserved.As a professor at Michigan State University for over twenty years, Dr. Kaufman used to sit in the upper deck of Spartan Stadium with his family to root for his beloved football team. Occasionally, he would wonder what it would be like to be on the sidelines to help injured players. How that fantasy became reality is what this big-time college football narrative is about. Kaufman’s life as a clinician-researcher abruptly changed during the early days of the 'concussion crisis,' when awareness of the short-term and lasting effects of brain injuries suffered by players at all levels of collision sports became a hotly debated issue. At his first game, on September 4, 2010, he helped save the life of an injured student-athlete. Two weeks later, following MSU’s overtime victory against Notre Dame, his medical teammates had to do the same to save the life of the team’s head coach, Mark Dantonio, after he suffered a heart attack.During his time with the team, Kaufman learns that football indeed has risks; but that the game’s power to unite players and fans, and to bring entire communities together, is a valuable part of American culture that should be allowed to evolve and endure.