When I was playing competitive sports growing up, I never wore a mouthguard for anything except football (because it was required and you’d be an idiot to ever play tackle football without a mouthguard). Mouthguards were goofy looking, and ranked just below rec specs on the list of uncool things you could do if you were an athlete. Back then, taking a shot to the mouth and losing a tooth or two would’ve been a minor inconvenience and a major street cred improver. Sports injuries were a sort of badge of honor. Girls would feel badly for you and give you unwarranted attention.

Also, mouthguards tasted awful. And your parents would bear the financial burden of getting your face fixed if you messed it up.

Also, mouthguards tasted nasty.

But things change. I decided recently to invest in a mouthguard, because I took a pretty serious elbow from a big dude who resembled deceased NBA player Robert “Tractor” Traylor when I was playing basketball at a Brooklyn playground. This elbow successfully removed an upper incisor from my mouth. I found out at work the next day that when you’re playing recreational sports as an adult, friends and coworkers find it hilarious when you’re injured as a result. And client meetings are even more awkward than usual when you’re wearing a freshly cleaned suit but missing a tooth and looking like you were in a fistfight the day before. I was hoping that one of them would approach me afterward and ask if I could introduce them to the local fight club, at which point I would have told them that I could not, but I could wear them down with my fundamentally sound post moves.

I never thought I’d be recommending a mouthguard to people, but if you’re on the market I highly suggest you look into a MOGO.

Why?

Because they’re flavored. And not like I imagine generic condoms are.

You can cop a MOGO in five flavors: lemon, fruit punch, mint, orange, and bubble gum.

I have fruit punch. It’s the bee’s knees.

The flavor is embedded into the mouthguard’s flexible plastic, so it has staying power. The flavored resin also meets FDA standards for food contact, so I guess however they make the flavors won’t give you the cancer.

I suppose I should also mention that MOGO doesn’t sacrifice mouth and tooth protection to infuse the flavor. Which is nice.

You can cop one here for only $12. If you’re an employed adult like me, you can probably afford more than one flavor, if that tickles your fancy.

Man up. Wear a mouthguard.