In the article, “The Brutal and Bloody History of the Mesoamerican Ball Game, Where Sometimes Loss Was Death” by Monica Petrus, she writes about how certain factors of the game caused the death of many of the players to prove that the losers of the games were used as human sacrifices in sacrificial or bloodletting rituals. This supports the original historiography that the losers of the games played by captives of war or slaves became sacrifices to the Mayan gods. But the article also adds that the Mayans used protective gear such as helmets, pads, and thick protective yokes which allowed the players to play without sustaining major injuries unless they were hit on an unprotected area. Also, something that was not written or said in the textbook,
