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 Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill Monday that limits full-contact football practices at high schools. The law is a response to concerns about concussions. Under the legislation, which takes effect on Jan. 1, 2015, drills involving game-speed tackling are prohibited in the offseason and they are limited to 90-minute sessions twice a week the rest of the year.
Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill Monday that limits full-contact football practices at high schools. The law is a response to concerns about concussions. Under the legislation, which takes effect on Jan. 1, 2015, drills involving game-speed tackling are prohibited in the offseason and they are limited to 90-minute sessions twice a week the rest of the year.

The head coach in Sacramento just sent in a new play.

Local high school football teams are trying to figure out how to run it.

Gov. Jerry Brown on Monday signed into law AB2127, which limits full-contact football practices at the high school and middle school level. The law, which takes effect Jan. 1, will limit teams to two full-contact practices a week during the season, with such practices restricted to 90 minutes, and prohibits any full-contact practices during the offseason.

The restrictions represent the latest and perhaps most aggressive attempt to reduce concussions and other head injuries incurred in youth football. The rules apply to public, private and charter schools.

This is a move in the right direction, says Dave White, veteran football coach at Edison High.

“We’ve got so many guys who are one concussion away from not being allowed to play again,” White said. “I’m scared of losing them” to a serious injury.

The California Interscholastic Federation, the governing body of high school athletics in the state, supported the bill that was sponsored by Assemblyman Ken Cooley, D-Rancho Cordova. The bill was also supported by the Brain Injury Association of California.

Under the new law, California high schools must observe new concussion protocols. A student-athlete suspected of sustaining a concussion or head injury must be removed from athletic activity for the remainder of the day and cannot return to athletic activity until being cleared by a licensed health care provider.

The bill passed with a bipartisan vote on June 19, and there was a general feeling of support for it among coaches and administrators throughout the region.

“I just think we have to do something, and I agree we’ve got to look at every opportunity to make the game safer,” Troy Thomas, Crespi High’s coach and the former coach at Servite High, said at the time.

But now coaches and administrators have to figure out the new rules, and how to adjust to them, and they are looking for answers to their questions.

“What constitutes full contact?” asks Westminster High coach Ted McMillen. “And the 90-minute thing is kind of confusing.”

“Full-contact practice” is defined in the new law as “a practice where drills or live action is conducted that involves collisions at game speed, where players execute tackles and other activity that is typical of an actual tackle football game.”

Many coaches will be uncertain what that definition means, said Glenn Martinez, the assistant commissioner of the CIF Southern Section, which includes most Southern California high schools. Martinez is in charge of the section’s management of football.

“‘Game speed.’ What does that mean? What is ‘full contact?’ And how do they define exactly what offseason is?” Martinez said.

“We’re going to need better definitions of this.”

Martinez expects those definitions will be sorted out by the CIF state office. The Southern Section is one of 10 sections within the state CIF.

Growing awareness of concussion issues already has affected high school athletics in Southern California. This past school year, the CIF Southern Section adopted a rule that limits, to 18 hours a week, a student athlete’s participation on a high school sports team. The 18 hours includes competitions and practices.

Similar practice rules are in place in more than 15 states, including Alabama, Arizona, Illinois and Michigan. In Texas, teams are allowed only one 90-minute full-contact practice per week.

At the college level, the Pac-12 Conference reduced full-contact practice to cut down on head injuries.

White, going into his 29th season as Edison’s coach, said the restrictions go along with how the school’s program has evolved, by choice and by necessity.

“We never really go full contact anymore, anyway,” said White. “By the time league starts, we’re not even in full pads (for practice).”

White also is curious how the law will be policed.

“Who’s going to monitor this?” White said. “Most coaches will be good about it because they want to do what’s best for kids, and some will break the rules because they don’t care.”

Much of the teaching about blocking and tackling at Edison is done with the use of tackle dummies, bags and blocking sleds, White said. Many high school programs often teach those techniques in player vs. player drills.

The latter method will be forbidden starting in 2015, and Martinez expects that to be a much-debated issue.

“The biggest concern I’m hearing from coaches is, ‘How am I going to teach kids how to block and tackle?’” Martinez said. “We’re all wondering how this is going to be implemented.”

Contact the writer: sfryer@ocregister.com