You can’t put players in Bubble Wrap.

You can’t stick padding on every inch of their bodies.

You can’t keep them from cutting and jumping and landing and falling.

Injuries happen. In all sports.

With the rewards come the risks.

Last Friday was a particularly rough day for a slew of standout Butler County area football players.

Some of the news was bad — Mars fullback and defending Butler Eagle Scoring Trophy winner Josh Schultheis broke his fibula while getting tackled in the first quarter of a game the Planets were in control of at the time, but ultimately lost.

Some of the news was good (well, as good as could be expected) — Seneca Valley quarterback T.J. Holl, who combined for nearly 3,000 yards passing and running last season as a junior for the Raiders — suffered “only” a sprained right knee, not a blown-out one.

He’ll be back in a few weeks.

Other athletes aren’t as lucky.

There has been an increasing emphasis on safety in all sports.

The Slippery Rock High girls basketball team participated in a class this summer aimed to better educate them on how to possibly avoid ACL injuries.

The Rockets took it a step further and had their girls’ hoop players evaluated by Butler High School graduate Lyneil Mitchell, who runs Revolution Physical Training in Cranberry Township.

It’s impossible to completely prevent them, but it’s a proactive step that more schools should take.

Science has gotten to a point where there is a tremendous amount of information on the causes and treatments of some of the most devastating injuries.

An ACL tear was once a year-plus injury. Now, players are returning in as little as six months.

The vast amount of information on concussions has led to protocols which have undoubtably saved lives.

It used to be when a player got his or her “bell rung,” they shook it off and returned to action.

No more.

That’s a huge positive step.

Still, no matter how many classes athletes take to learn how to prevent ACL injuries, no matter how much the medicine and even the equipment improves, injuries will still happen.

Sometimest, they are just random — a misstep here, an awkward cut there.

Athletes can only hope the injury bug doesn’t take a chomp down on them.

Mike Kilroy is a staff writer for the Butler Eagle.