Archive for November, 2005

“Each year, far from the gaze of fans, hundreds of college football players with ambitions to play in the NFL are herded into classrooms, handed pencils and asked to take a 12-minute standardized test with 50 questions designed to measure cognitive ability. NFL teams long have tried to keep the results secret.” The Wonderlic Personnel Test helps teams choose the smartest players. Football is no longer about a bunch of big muscle-bound guys who would rather tackle than read a book. Smarts count today. “Modern day players are expected to impress teams with the speed of their mental processors. ‘So long as he plays at a high level, we’ll always choose a guy that is smarter (Rams coach, Mike Martz)’.”

The Wonderlic Personnel Test is a test that measures how well people comprehend problems-how quickly they can solve them, and it requires test-takers to spend less than 15 seconds on each, on average, in order to finish.” Play books are fat, full of coverage, combination and alignment plays. Each player needs to know INSTANTLY what to do, where his teammates will be going and how to adjust to the opposing team’s behavior. “To make this (the Rams) offense tick, linemen have to master multiple protection ‘packages’ and some receivers have to learn four positions.” The years Rams team scored tops in the league. The Tamps Bay Buccaners’s offensive guards scored an average of 34, higher than the typical attorney. “Our smartest four franchises – the Rams, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Oakland Raiders and Tennessee Titans – have eached played in a Super Bowl in the past five years.”

College players are also evaluated by the Wonderlic test for cognitive skills. Smart High school players are prized by colleges and are recruited accordingly.

Kids need to know that being an athlete means being an educated smart player. Their brains are recruited along with their muscles. Brains need to be well-fueled for strong physical performance . Football players are academics and athletes. This truth applies to most sports. It is difficult to be succeed without the use of well-developed brains. Tells your kids!

Source: Jon Weinbach, Wall Street Journal, Weekend Journal, Septamber 30, 2005, PP W1, W10.