I centered my research on the NFL and concussions because of recent events effecting the NFL. Ever since the mid 2000's this topic has just been constantly increasing in popularity. A movie about this topic, Concussion, goes into depth about the problems with serious blows to the head in football. This movie increased interest in the subject about concussions because it shows how poorly the NFL handled the situation. I chose to use an excerpt from this book to support my argument that I will be making in my paper. Recently there has been a lawsuit from former and current players in the NFL who feel like they have been treated unfairly and been exposed to injuries they weren't even aware of at the time. This lawsuit has risen to a settlement of nearly a billion dollars because of how important this is. The research question was easy to come up with because after reading articles and seeing how the NFL handled the situation involving concussions, it became apparent that they did not do everything in their power to protect the players. Instead they chose to care only about the money the players would earn them. This topic really intrigues me because football is my favorite sport to watch and talk about. The concussion issue could completely change the game forever.

I am a stakeholder in this topic because I am a fan of the game. Since I have a vested interest in the sport, it affects my life, thus making me a stakeholder in the situation. This research relates to my personal values and beliefs because I believe in safety in sports. Just because I am a fan of the game does not mean I agree with the NFL, in my opinion what they did is wrong. I believe that the players of the NFL should have been notified of this issue when it was first presented to the NFL. Safety should come first in any sport, but instead the NFL tried to sweep this problem under the carpet, away from the media and fans. I had a strong opinion coming into this research paper because of all the facts I already knew and the personal values that I hold. Although I did come into this paper with a strong point of view on the situation I can remove bias because while making my argument I will look at both sides and both perspectives. I will look at unbiased articles that present both sides of the argument and then show why one side is right. Just because I have certain beliefs about the situation, that doesn't mean I will have any bias in my paper. 

There are a lot of details about this topic that I do not know and am hoping to find out. I have been paying attention to the NFL ever since I was a little kid so I know a lot about the game, but since the topic of concussions is so substantial I have a lot to learn. I watched the Concussion movie, and read multiple articles relating to concussions to grasp a better understanding of the topic and what it truly means to the game of football. I am hoping that through all my research I am able to discover how the NFL handled this situation and why they did not take more caution about CTE when they were first presented with this problem. I know that the NFL has a job of providing safety for the players and I want to investigate if they truly did all they could have done to protect their players. The NFL is such an immense organization that I am hoping to find a lot of articles regarding my topic.  

With the argument I have I expect to show the reader how the NFL did not do everything in their power to protect their players from injury. I will be able to address this in my paper effectively because of all the research that I will conduct on the topic. By the time I am done researching I will easily be able to show the reader how the NFL is a corrupt organization that only cares about profits. Since my argument is very specific and about a very popular event an 8-10 page paper will be feasible. From all the articles that I have read so far I have agreed with all of their statements about the NFL's handling of the case.  In my articles they discuss the certain aspects of concussions in the NFL. Each article focuses on a different aspect of the incident, but they all connect back to the bigger idea in order to make my argument a lot stronger. I agree with all of the authors because they share both sides of the story and then explain how the NFL is responsible for the mistakes. Because the articles are showing both sides this makes them unbiased, but in order to increase my research and make my argument stronger I want to find an article that really focuses on the NFL's side. I believe that if I find an article that does this then I will be able to show the two sides to the argument and the display how the NFL screwed up. In order to get a more working thesis from my research question I will need to conduct more research on my topic. And with this more research I will be able to focus more on certain, specific aspects about concussions in football, that way I don't have too broad of a thesis. By narrowing my research down into a more specific topic it will create a better and more powerful paper. In my opinion right now I believe I have a good start for my thesis and argument that falls well within the categories of scope, complexity, and controversy. In my topic there is a lot of complexity because of all the science and information on the topic. Concussions are complex and still being studied in order to try and make the game a safer environment. There is a broad scope this affects because football is the most popular sport in America. Within football and anyone talking about the NFL there has been a lot of controversy over this concussion issue. A lot of people don't want to see this game get changed because its Americas sport and has been this way for so long. But there are a lot of people that are recognizing this as too big of a problem to ignore and not change the game. Too many people have died from excessive hits to the head. The only way to fix that is to change the game, because of all this controversy, concussion in the NFL is a great topic to research. 
