Personal Opinion by Sean Ellis

For years, the debate has raged as to whether or not cheerleading can be considered a sport.
If one were to use the strict definition of the word “sport,” then cheerleading would easily qualify as one.  It requires skill and physical prowess and there are plenty cheerleading competitions. However, unless we are all going to agree that Joey Chesnut is one of the greatest athletes ever due to his ability to out-eat the vast majority of humans, then we can’t go by strict definitions.
While some use the definition of sport to prove that cheerleading is a sport, you could also use the definition of sport to prove that it is not.
Many activities take skill. Few could argue that a carpenter is not a skilled individual. A carpenter’s work is physically exhausting and if he or she does not have the talent and ability to properly craft whatever it is that they are building then it falls apart. However, no one is arguing that carpentry should be classified as a sport.
Sports do not only require skill. They require a specific set of skills that must be honed over years and years of work. While I will not argue that the skills needed for cheerleading do not take the same amount of hard work and dedication to achieve, at some point we have to be able to differentiate between what a football, basketball or baseball player can do and what a cheerleader can do.
Competition cannot be used as a defining factor for any activity to qualify as a sport. Organizers of toe wrestling, like the childhood game thumb war but with feet, lobbied for their “sport” to be including in the Olympics, there are Rock-Paper-Scissors and Sauna-Sitting World Championships and I think we can all agree that Beer Pong and Competitive Eating are not actual sports.  By nature, people are competitive. How many times have we compared our grades, compared jobs or compared looks? Those can all be considered competitions but none of them can be considered sports.
Competition cannot be forced. We can’t simply wave a magic wand and declare that something is both a sport and a competitive activity.  It is not enough to put together a routine, slap some judges at a table and say that cheerleading is a sport because it is a competition. As much as it pains some to believe, winning a trophy for something does not mean that it is competitive. Beauty pageants come to mind, but that’s a story for another day. Not to mention, sports have rules and, outside of these organized competitions, cheerleading does not.
I would like to reiterate that I fully believe that cheerleaders are talented and skill individuals who can do things that I never could. But it’s high time we stop trying to make it into a sport. Don’t worry, we won’t set back any movements if we call it what it is: an activity that takes a lot of skill but is not a sport.

Personal Opinion by Michael Hotard

According to dictionary.com, a sport is an “athletic activity that requires physical prowess or skill and often a competitive nature.”
For the most part, cheerleaders are asked to entertain audiences at sporting events, but those that compete against other squads, by definition fits into the criteria of a sport.
Let’s take a look at the physical prowess. Male cheerleaders have to lift and hold females up in the air, then toss and catch them. This isn’t catching a ball. It is catching a full-grown human.
Given the fact that I am about 5 feet 9 inches, 150 pounds and can barely lift an iPod, that is a pretty tough task. I know for a fact I sure as hell could not do it. To be a cheerleader, you have to have serious core strength while maintaining flexibility to toss, turn and perform acrobatic flips.
The Fairport-East Rochester Post reported that Hermann Engels of Wayne State University conducted a study of 33 cheerleaders regarding the fitness and physiology of them. The results showed that the cheerleaders showed “superior athletic fitness.”
In a technical sport such as football, players have the choreographed plays they practice and have to execute them to perfection on game days. Cheerleading is similar because they have choreographed routines that have to be practiced and executed in front of judges at competitions. Just like in football, if something does go wrong, the cheer squads have to improvise to get back on track. The only difference is that, they do not have opposing defense trying to stop them, but a much harder task at stopping gravity.
When a 115 lbs. girl is spring-boarded into the air, there is always the risk as to whether or not the girl will be caught. Sprained and twisted ankles are common in cheerleading, but concussions have become an issue in cheerleading. It is widely known that concussions are generally associated with football, but cheerleading has caused its fair share of head trauma.
NBC correspondent Dr. Nancy Snyderman released a report indicating that from 1998 to 2008 the number of concussions went up by 26 percent each year.
The rise in cheerleading injuries has spiked the numbers on a grand scale as well. The United States Sports Academy did a study on injuries in cheerleading and came away with three “alarming” facts:
-Cheerleading is the No. 1 female sport and No. 2 in catastrophic injuries when compared to all sports – only American football ranks higher.
-The National Center for Catastrophic Sports Injury Research at the University of North Carolina reports that 65.2 percent of all catastrophic injuries in youth sports occur in cheerleading.
-Cheerleader falls from gymnastic-type stunts have been reported to have a greater impact than being tackled by a professional football player.
I have played almost every major sport (football, baseball, basketball, soccer) competitively at some point in my life. I still play most of them to stay active and in shape, but if someone tells me “hey, go throw that girl in the air and catch her,” there is just no way I could physically do that. Neither could most people.