Pro athletes teach SWFL kids safer football to protect players

NFL safety Tre Boston held a camp Saturday in SWFL to teach young athletes about life and football.

About 200 athletes between the ages of eight and 17 came out to Moody Field free of charge to learn from Boston and other professional players. It marked the first annual camp for the Tre Boston Beyond Belief Foundation.

But the way Boston taught the kids football isn’t the way he learned to play.

Over the years, the game of football has changed to help protect players from concussions and other injuries they might sustain on the field. And Boston says new tackling techniques are about hands over heads.

“We try to work hands. You gotta learn how to control your body, so one of the hardest things that comes with the linemen is getting them to use their hands on blocks, teaching them how to avoid with their heads….compete, but you know especially at these camps, they don’t have helmets on. You don’t want them to ding their heads,” Boston said.

Fellow NFL safety Jaylen Watkins also joined the event. The Cape Coral grad says he’s happy to see his sport made safer for players of all ages and skill levels.

“Really the big hitting, using your head, the crown of your helmet, that’s something that I wasn’t taught until I got to the college level and it’s good that we’re able to go to that level here and start the guys young,” Watkins said.

While teaching our area athletes football, NFL safeties Tre Boston (North Fort Myers) & Jaylen Watkins (Cape Coral) share how the game has evolved to better protect players from concussions, injuries
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— Melinda Lee TV (@MelindaLeeTV) July 1, 2018