The compelling, heart-wrenching story of high school football star Chris Carnales, whose life changed when he became par | dG1fcGhtdTV5UHg0Mkk
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00:00Football, a uniquely American sport, it defines young men's lives, it gives them a place to
00:07learn, and a way to think about themselves and the other players around them.
00:12But now football finds itself at a crossroad, it creates, but sometimes it destroys.
00:31I've seen 70, 80 year old grandmother up in the stands saying, chill and take his head off.
00:36Nobody ever wants to see anybody get hurt.
00:39Unfortunately, in football, people do get hurt.
00:41For years, football celebrated the guys who delivered the big hits.
00:45A lot of these injuries are led to by leading with one's head, which was indescribably dangerous.
00:52And everybody says, oh, it's a tragic accident.
00:54It's tragic, but it's not an accident.
00:57It works for that particular play, but it came with a cost that a lot of people didn't
01:02recognize until it was too late.
01:07Before the game even started, I just had this weird feeling that something was going to happen.
01:11Chris was basically having the game of his life.
01:13Came up on that one tackle.
01:16Everything just slows down, hearing the crowd go silent, and then seeing your teammates
01:21come to try to get you up and you can't move.
01:23The doctor told us Chris would be paralyzed from the shoulders down.
01:27Eddie and Chris, father and son, formed Gridiron Heroes with a simple and powerful mandate.
01:33It's opening up your heart.
01:34I mean, it's taking all the pain that he's gone through and sharing it with someone else
01:37and helping that person get through their pain.
01:39Tonight we celebrate CNN.
01:41Gridiron Heroes.
01:42The Gridiron Heroes.
01:43The Gridiron Heroes absolutely sum up what Heroes is all about.
01:46To have the honor of being able to present him tonight, he's going to use that tragedy
01:50to impact other people.
01:52In the blink of an eye, or the course of a career, what can be done?
01:56I don't know where my mind will be in 10 years.
01:58And it's scary.
01:59It is scary.
02:00But for me, the damage is done.
02:03Football is going to have to adapt.
02:06If it doesn't change, the game's going to die at the roots because nobody's intelligence
02:09is going to let their kid play.
02:10We have a huge responsibility to make this game as safe as it can possibly be.
02:16Because like Chris and Eddie, the hope is for the game to go on and stay deeply embedded
02:22into the fiber of America.