I'm going to be doing some reporting around this for an upcoming piece. Can't wait to tell you guys what I find.Here's my favorite proposal to improve the situation: eliminate free substitution and go back to having the players play both ways. If they had to play both ways, there would not be so many of the freakishly large players on the field who create the lethal forces that endanger others' lives. An added benefit is that it would tilt the game more in favor of the best, most versatile athletes.
Besides, super-specialization is a hallmark of the modern industrial society, along with super-commoditization and super-organization. Sports are supposed to be a way to bring back a taste of the more primitive life we left behind when we all became cogs in the giant industrial machine.
« Ted Haggard | Main | The "end" of the culture war » The dilemma of the modern football fan29 Jan 2009 11:00 am
How do we love a sport that is taking years off the life of its players? I found this suggestion to be interesting:
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What you are going to find is a nigh-unquenchable thirst by American sports fans (myself included) for controlled violence.
The problem with the suggestion is that, at least as to the brain injuries, the guys sustaining them aren't usually the linemen, it's the cornerbacks (i.e., the smallest guys on the field). The big guys don't move fast enough to snap a head back and they see what's in front of them better so they can react. It's the little athletic guys flying into each other at 25 MPH that cause the severe brain injuries.
Same thing with boxers. The heavyweights suffer a lot less severe head damage than the bantamweights, even though they hit harder because the little guys land 10x as many punches and fight these incredibly intense wars where both guys get too tired and dehydrated to absorb punches properly. If you had all smaller, more athletic football players, I think you'd see the same phenomenon.
That's not to say there isn't a problem with the big guys, but it usually comes after they retire and keep the eating habits while giving up the exercise routine. The deadly part of the game are concussions and that's much more of a small guy problem.
I'm one of the people who emailed you about this. The thing that gets me the most is the way these athletes get treated by the league.
I like the thought of reducing specialization, but I confess it's in part because I'm a casual football fan (at best) and it'd be easier to keep track of the players that way....
Good...you can start by interviewing NFL-officials on why concussion-reducing helmets aren't mandatory in the league?!?! Now if you'll excuse me, im off to muay-thai practice...the irony of life!?
I don't know that the suggestion works. Especially the part about the freakishly large athletes. Its often guys like Brian Dawkins who are delivering the scariest hits. It wasn't a DE or LB that crush Willis Magehee (sp?)in that Steelers game. Does this commenter think that guys like Shawn Merriman and Jason Taylor and Jevon Kearse were grown in a lab? And steriod use still would not account for the lions share of the things modern athletes can do. I think the first commenter was closer to the mark. Take the pads off. Rugby is a rough game, but I don't think it produces the sort of devastation, long term and short term, that football does. And some of those dudes are beasts. Like that dude from the All Blacks.
Another thing about the comment: I thought sports was about competition. Since when is football, baseball, soccer or whatever a way to relive the hunter-gatherer misery of our ancestors? Also, the ancient greeks played sports, so did the Mayans. Those societies were a long way from an industrial machine.
Good luck on the piece TNC. Can't wait to read it.
It's always a thrill to watch a player get on the field for both ends of the ball, and it sure would be fun to watch an entire team do it. Agreed on sports reflecting an agrarian vs. industrialized way of life; Giamatti's Take Time for Paradise is a must-read on that point.
However, I'm not sure this would be a great idea, nor am I convinced that it would improve safety. Hyper-specialization is what makes the NFL exciting on a day-to-day basis. People want the amazing aerial catches and the bone-crushing hits. Football is inherently a mechanized, industrial game; cutting rosters won't change that. If you want a reflection of the agrarian ideal, watch baseball.
I would need to see data on whether more "lethal forces" were created by the big, slow players who would get cut in a both-ways game, or the fast, dense missiles that would become more common. Ryan Clark, who laid out Willis McGahee in the AFC Championship, is 5'11" 205. (It looks like McGahee will be fine, but that hit easily could have gone another way.) You can't tell me that Clark couldn't play offense too. Bigness isn't the problem.
Another interesting football article:
http://www.slate.com/id/2209436/
Making a player play offense and defense, as in every other team sport? An excellent idea. Another proposal: Remove all the body armor. The dangerous way players tackle, and the force with which they propel their bodies into each other is directly (and ironically) related to the amount of protection they have. Think of the countless concussions, ripped apart knees, neck injuries, spearings etc. that would be prevented just by returning the sport to its roots. The sport would also be more affordable to young players, and you'd see more continuity between the amateur, playground game and the professional version.
Of course, then you'd pretty much have a stop and start version of rugby with forward passes; but frankly, that sounds like an improvement to me. Now if you could just get rid of the coaches and commercial breaks.
"Besides, super-specialization is a hallmark of the modern industrial society"
...without which there wouldn't be a job description for professional bloggers, correct? Besides, aren't we post-industrial?
If you force someone 30 and up to play both offense and defense, you're probably going to have them more hurt and die earlier. Someone who's in the field of sports medicine can speak professionally about this, but having played 13 years of organized football myself, from jr high through division 1AA college, I simply don't think a 30+ year-old's body will stand up to that kind of stress.
Another angle. You may make the sport more boring. The so-called "talent" positions, the receivers, runningbacks, quarterbacks, cornerbacks, safeties, etc, are all burst speed positions and those with quick-pulse musculature. Quick-pulsers tend to have far less stamina than slow-pulsers. If you make players go ironman, you will gravitate towards slow-pulse players who actually have the wind and muscle stamina to last four quarters of punishment. Just a guess, but the "big plays" will suffer. Nothing in football is as exhausting as running deep pass patterns the whole game. Try doing that AND covering the same type of position on the other side of the ball and you'll see less high jumps, dives, etc, as they all do everything they can to conserve energy.
On the other hand, we could go rugby with it and not allow ANY substitutions ;)
They should also get rid of the body armour. Before gloves were introduced to boxing there were only a couple of reported fatalities - it was too painful to punch somebody in the face with a bare hand, so they concentrated on the upper torso. With gloves, provided for safety, they could punch away at each others noggin with barely a scrape on the knuckle.
I assume the same is true for American football.
I know it may be heresy to say this as a Steelers fan, but if Troy gets a second ring, he may want to seriously consider calling it quits. The man's had nine(!) concussions. I love what he does and how he does it, but, yeah, it gives me pause that I'm cheering on a guy as he literally cripples himself.
Of course, as bad as the NFL is, pro wrestling's much, much worse. The frigthening thing is how the Benoit murder/suicide doesn't seem to have much impact. Or have I just not noticed since I basically stopped watching wrestling shortly before that?
From the desk of the Honorable TMQ:
"I don't know that the suggestion works. Especially the part about the freakishly large athletes. Its often guys like Brian Dawkins who are delivering the scariest hits. It wasn't a DE or LB that crush Willis Magehee (sp?)in that Steelers game."
Agreed 100%. Size has nothing to do with how hard you can hit someone. All it does is put mass behind it. I can still vividly remember the hardest times I got popped and both of them were at least two-thirds my weight and one of them as a 5'3" Samoan kid from Hawaii.
Lets be for real for a moment, this isn't a science project its a business. And like any business it takes money to sustain it. Fans aren't going to pay to see cats going both ways. They have even had to change the rules in Arena Football to favor specialization. It sounds good to send football back to the olden days but it's just not practical. If someone wants to do a study its more productive to do one on concussions as was the case a few years back when the results of such a study prompted the league to institute more stringent rules on when a player with a concussion can be cleared to practice or play again.
The problem as I see it with the study on the six ex football players brains is that in several of those instances the player also had a history of drug and or alcohol abuse. What would help make the case is if a "clean" guy who kept his mental faculties had their brain examined also because right now as I see it there are too many ways to attack the findings of this very limited study. Thats not to say ex players' brains aren't scrambled but moreso saying they aren't making the best case right now.
The Men's Journal article "Casualties of the NFL" is a depressing walk through this issue.
the corollery is NASCAR and what would happen to the ratings if the circuit went three years without a crash. We want the violence and the disasters, likely more so as the average person's life becomes more sedentary. You just can't admit to it in polite conversation. Watching the NFL, which i do every Sunday its on, is not so much participatory as pornographic.
JH sez,
If you did that, you'd have rugby with a forward pass. hehe
Ta-Nehisi,
You should try to dig up former RB Keith Elias's Princeton thesis on football. If memory serves, he wrote about how the increased specialization in the sport mirrored the development of specialization/industrialization in the economy.
"They should also get rid of the body armour."
I'd have to dig up the name of it, but there was book written by a famous sports physician who studied football neck injuries, and the doctor argued that there'd be fewer neck injuries if helmets didn't have face masks, because players would be more reluctant to lead with their helmets in that case.
Really? That's what sports are all about? That's news to me!
@ sgwhiteinfla
I'm not a doctor, so take this as the entirely uninformed babble that it is, but while you may not have brains from "clean" ex-football players, I assume (again, no proof to back this up) that there are plenty of non-ballers with drug/alcohol habits as bad/worse than these six men who don't show the same sort of traumatic brain injury.
Again, I'm not a doctor, but I'm not sure one needs to be a brain surgeon to figure out that getting blasted by the best athletes on the planet to the point where your brain literally bounces off your skull can cause some serious longterm damage.
I think it's telling that everyone mentions rugby as what football would look like if everyone played ironman without the pads. No one watches rugby in the US, nor soccer. We're a market niche devoted to a particular and (in comparison) peculiar sport. Better to keep the parts that people love to watch than to try changing the game.
"I don't know that the suggestion works. Especially the part about the freakishly large athletes. Its often guys like Brian Dawkins who are delivering the scariest hits."
That's a good point. The last hit Steve Young ever took was from a blindside corner blitz. I remember watching that game on TV and Young was in a fetal position after that hit, then when they came back from the commercial he still hadn't moved.
I would add that there should be an upper bound for weight, say 300 pounds, that all players must meet on the day of the game.
There's no way a human body was meant to carry as much mass as some of these lineman, especially when you add impact to the equation.
And for those who say mass doesn't matter, I ask you to hearken back to high school physics.
The spirit of Gordie Lockbaum lives!!
I read a few months ago that college football had a rule up til the 40s or so that if a player was subbed out he couldn't come back in until the next quarter. Now, that could reduce injuries, or it could encourage guys to "get up and shake it off" so they don't have to sit for another 12 minutes of game time -- especially in high school and college, where teams have less depth on the bench.
There are lots of high-contact, reasonably violent sports out there in which players wear much less padding. It would be useful to do similar studies of rugby players, Australian-rules football players, even soccer players (who not infrequently bang heads challenging for a ball in the air). Australian rules football, in particular, has some hellacious hitting -- you can only hit people who are within 5 meters of the ball, and only with your hip and shoulder, but even with those restrictions there are some massive collisions.
Watch this video. You can definitely get concussed, even if everyone is just wearing shorts, a shirt, and cleats, and the tackler can't go in head-first.
D-Sel
Well neither of us are doctors but I would say I don't agree with that. We should all know from the various "just say no" commercials that alcohol and drugs kill brain cells that don't come back. So it would have an effect on non ballers brains. To what extent I have no idea but the problem then becomes how much do you attribute to the drugs and how much do you attribute to football. Now again, don't get me wrong, football is inherently bad for your health. Ex ball players die younger and need more health care later in life than the average male by far. But my point is that this is such a small pool so far and there are other mitigating factors that make it hard to say its definitive in any sense of the word.
I'm all for limiting the body armor, and will poach a particular suggestion I heard elsewhere: get rid of facemasks. They're mostly a mental barrier at any rate, and let players believe they'll be protected when they lead with their heads on concussion-inducing (on both sides) hits, when they do nothing of the sort.
Realistically, we're not going to get the specialization reduced because the NFLPA is too myopic: it'd mean drastically fewer players overall, and the elimination of a whole class of players. Jevon Kearse would do okay but most linemen would be gone immediately.
For actual pace of play, I'll be a heretic and note that rugby is a much better game - very few stoppages of play compared to the 3-seconds-and-stop pace of American football - but that, yes, the forward pass is a much more exciting play than even a full-on breakaway for a try.
Something's gotta be done, though - these guys are just killing themselves and each other out there. When you have the previous generation of players - who were nowhere near as big and fast, generally - suffering these absurd rates of dementia and so on, I am really terrified to see what the case is 20 years down the road for today's players.
If you make players go ironman, you will gravitate towards slow-pulse players who actually have the wind and muscle stamina to last four quarters of punishment. Just a guess, but the "big plays" will suffer.
I think this is exactly right. The only no-substitution sport I can think of is soccer, which I've learned to enjoy as a sublime pleasure, but is quite different than what we'd probably want football to be.
I think the real way to make this change might not be to limit the number of substitutions, but instead limit the roster size. This would make it more like basketball or hockey; players can come in, sprint, and go out. That would advantage more versatile athletes, keep a good pace, and still probably take some of the starch out of those "one monster hit" moments.
Hi. There's this whole other sport played worldwide that involves big dudes hitting each other. It's called Rugby.
The players play two 40-minute halves on a field bigger than an American football field. There are no timeouts and no substitutions. Play is continuous like soccer. The best rugby player in the world? Jonah Lomu. He's 6-5, 240ish and runs a 4.3 40.
Playing both ways will get rid of some fat offensive/defensive lineman, but it wouldn't make anyone else smaller or slower.
From the stories that I have read, more lineman have had problems with brain injury than wide receivers and quarterbacks. The reason is simple and not related (primarily) to size. Offensive and defensive lineman hit someone with their head on nearly every play, certainly on most running plays. While they are going at a low speed, they are accelerating rapidly at the point of impact on running plays. As a result, they experience thousands of head impacts during the course of a career. Receivers, DBs, and QBs suffer hellacious hits, but those come much less often. Moreover, when they experience them, they are likely to be removed for some time. One of the few DBs to be afflicted is Andre Waters, who was know for the frequency that he lead with his head. One the other hand, Mike Webster (C), John Mackey (TE), and Ted Johnson (middle LB - lots of head contact on running plays) typify the positions where brain injury are an issue.
That said, it scary to think how many of the players at all positions are disabled soon after their careers. I love the game (and loved to play it), but it's worrisome. I look forward to the article.
"With gloves, provided for safety, they could punch away at each others noggin with barely a scrape on the knuckle."
Huh? Boxers ruin their hands all the time. Did you see the 24/7 series when Mayweather was fighting?
For actual pace of play, I'll be a heretic and note that rugby is a much better game - very few stoppages of play compared to the 3-seconds-and-stop pace of American football - but that, yes, the forward pass is a much more exciting play than even a full-on breakaway for a try.
jkd -- I agree. Top-quality rugby is like a combination of football, soccer, and fast-break basketball. Rugby and Australian-rules football are also fast, collision-based sports with few stoppages and lots of small (compared to the NFL), fast players. So I don't think I buy the argument that DBs and WRs would wear out if they played O and D. Although taking all the armor off would probably help with their stamina, too.
Brad L, the only problem with limiting roster size is that you risk encouraging teams to play guys when they're injured because there isn't anyone on the bench.
Brad L, the only problem with limiting roster size is that you risk encouraging teams to play guys when they're injured because there isn't anyone on the bench.
That concern - when and whether to play hurt - exists already in football and every other sport. Unless you make the roster size way too small, it shouldn't be a big problem.
And even then, it's a problem that could be solved with a little imagination. You could let teams pull a limited number of guys from their 'practice squad' to replace someone injured, with a proviso that a player that comes out for injury can't come back in.
I suspect a roster size of about, say, 25-30 would make for a damn good game without having that kind of concern. Course, that's just guessing.
Pesto,
Have you ever tried to play both O and D for a whole game? As far as the equipment is concerned, for someone that's used to it, you don't even notice it. Granted, it's a few extra pounds, but it's not substantial enough to make a big difference.
I would just add that I would like to know how many making suggestions as to the gear worn (no facemasks? Are you insane?) have actually played at a competitive level. Less gear means less safe. Better gear, like anti-concussion helmets, and segmented, wrap-around rib pads are better safety.
Looking at former pro-football players in their 40s, 50s, 60s, what are the rates of dementia-like illnesses? I did wonder, after reading this morning about the kid and a few mid-life guys who showed these signs on autopsy, if this is something common to all football players who've been multiply concussed, but didn't show up in external symptoms. Or if it's like boxing, where the rates of dementia are higher. (Though if the issue is bigger players, and I agree with the high school physics interpretation for tackling as opposed to punching, then an absence of evidence in 60-year olds is not evidence of absence in 30-year olds.)
(Non-boxing related metaphor: the rule used to be that white tea was lowest in caffeine, because it was less fermented etc. They finally actually measured the caffeine in white and green tea, and white is the most caffeinated, followed by green, followed by black. Sometimes what you would obviously expect doesn't follow when someone actually measures it.)
Minor correction: adult brains can grow new cells. This was big news a few years ago and may help with treatment for things like dementia.
I have no helpful sports-related observations except that I think sports are no more a way to recapture our hunter-gatherer past than video games are; they're something challenging and competitive that people who have free time do. Kind of like running used to be a sport dominated by guys who went to prep schools.
Gregg Easterbrook has commented on this in his TMQ articles on espn.com. He recommends that the NFL mandate an anti-concussion helmet. It is more expensive, but has been shown to drastically reduce the number of concussions.
Don't change the rules. Don't change the players. Don't change the style of the game. I want to see the best players possible play. Period.
Drastic changes in the equipment like loosing the helmets or the facemasks would change the game significantly. Not to mention how many more toothless high school seniors we'd have walking around.
Football is by far, the best sport out there, to my eyes, and changing it so that it more closely resembles some other, inferior as far as entertainment, in my eyes, sport, would be a huge mistake.
I'm all for more education for the players as to the risks they face, all for more research and development of better protective equipment, better medical care of ex players, but the stuff you guys are suggesting would destroy the sport.
I mean heck if anybody is really that concerned about football being too dangerous, there's always soccer, basketball, baseball, wrestling, lacrosse, track, and band.
Oh yeah, and not to mention maybe sitting out a play or two after getting a concussion, you know, treating it like any other injury.
For those calling for the removal of the padding, remember that there is a reason the padding is there. People we getting killed on the football field, and there were serious calls to ban the sport.
The player's union would never agree to cutting down an active roster in half.
The relative size of the players is an issue by itself (causing heart failure in linemen), but I agree it's the little guys in more danger of the concussions.
The concussion issue is due to problems with the helmets and pads. I think pads should be just that, pads; not plastic hard enough to deliver concussions. Helmets should be padded leather. The reality is that guys would hit almost as hard, but they wouldn't lead with their heads. The almost part would dilute the game a bit, but that seems like a small price to pay for your health.
You could offset the hit serverity loss by making the play clock significantly shorter. Make it 20-25 seconds, doubling the total number of plays per game for more action. The added bonus would be linemen who aren't as bulked up, and thus are less likely to keel over of heart disease and/or stroke in their 40's.
The NFL is way behind on dealing with concussions. Believe it or not, the NHL (yes, there still is pro hockey in this country) got this one right. They get all the players to basically take brain tests (IQ, reaction times, etc) to give a baseline. If players get a blow to the head or concussion, they aren't allowed back into full contact until a week after they make it back to their baseline standard. Still a potential for brain damage, but mitigated by at least looking after it, and not just sweeping it under the carpet.
Roster sizes are where they are for a reason. Teams can barely make it through a 16 game season as it is. Start playing guys two ways and it's the equivalent of a 32 game season (sort of). The ravens actually ran out of cornerback during the AFC championship game straight had to eliminate the dime package I think. And you guys want smaller rosters?
I don't think it's necessary to jump straight to the radical changes. Mandate the anti-concussion helmets; mandate that players must sit the week following a concussion; do something similar to the NHL plan mentioned above. That would be a good start, then see what needs to be done after that.
Coates it's the love of competition man! I was a D1 hooper who transistioned to boxing. When I told my physician he spent 15 minutes trying to convince me not to do it. Besides knowing all of the health risk, I climb in the ring 2-3 times per week and willingly take blows to the head and body.
Do I worry sometimes? Sure. But in the end machismo and the love of the competition win out!
k1
ryanculver.blogspot.com
The history of yacht racing rules suggests that whatever might be done to try and make the game safer for athletes, the quest to win invariably becomes a quest to win, costs be damned.
I'm not suggesting it's not worth thinking about. I'm appalled by what people -- both producers and viewer -- accept as "acceptable risk" in the (so called) adult entertainment industry.
Google [fastnet 1997] and/or [marc wallice HIV]
Hate to link a Steelers article but to piggy back on what dwhite said, there were 30+ deaths per years due to head injuries when they wearing leather. You guys want to go back to that?
http://www.post-gazette.com/steelers/20020728helmets0728p4.asp
"I would add that there should be an upper bound for weight, say 300 pounds, that all players must meet on the day of the game.
First, I think you might compound the danger of football by start introducing the concept of making weight. I mean, you want to risk these guys being more dehydrated and playing out west or in Tampa or something? It already causes problems in high level combat sports and those guys (and girls) have been making weight all their lives.
Second, the point a lot of commenters are making is that although the 300 pounders have the mass to become dangerous, they don't have the acceleration to maximize the potential force they can deliver (Force = mass x acceleration. I should note that I've now reached the upper limit of my knowledge of physics, highs school or otherwise). And even if they did, the way football works makes it so that the big linemen don't have that many opportunities to get a full head of steam with which to decapitate a ball carrier or defender.
Make that [fastnet 1979]
Scott-
re: padding and injuries:
Have you read the other comments? There have been numerous studies (as well as considerable anecdotal evidence) that have shown that additional padding has increased the incidence of serious injury. When guys wore padded helmets, they didn't dive head-first into players running full speed. Tackling in the 20s and 30s looked more like rugby tackling. And if you watch rugby, which is fast-paced, played by enormous, strong men, you'll see that there are much fewer traumatic injuries. Lots of messed up ears, but not as many torn ACLs, concussions, or major broken bones. It's like a smash-up derby vs. bumper cars.
I also dispute the contention that Americans are innately predisposed to like one sport over another. (Americans hate soccer, rugby etc.) People here don't play rugby. They don't watch rugby. They don't know the history and traditions of rugby. If exposed to it they'd love it. (Conversely, New Zealanders would like American football if it were their national sport.)
I don't think Americans are liable to take up the most popular sports in the world, like rugby, cricket, or soccer any time soon, but it doesn't have much to do with the innate nature of the individual sports--how can sports so broadly popular be without merit (and I'd count as part of that merit the fluidity and flow of the game, as well as the fact that it's a players' game, not a coaches' game)?
Sure, to each their own, but American football is, as another person put it, a global peculiarity, and not an easy game for amateurs to participate in. In another 20, 30 years, I wouldn't be surprised if it's supplanted in popularity by soccer here.
@Sean DeCoursey
Jonah Lomu hasn't been the best rugby player in the world for at least ten years.
@Pesto
Richie McCaw (the Captain of the All Blacks) is 6'2" and weighs about 230 lbs, about the same size as your average linebacker. Most of the forwards in rugby are his size or larger; front row forwards typically weigh between 260-280. Even the backs in rugby (at the top level), usually smaller players who depend more on speed than strength, are upwards of 200 pounds. Contrast that with David Beckham who's 6' 160 lbs bean pole and you'll quickly realize you can't lump rugby players and soccer players together.
Reminds me of this old Megan post and comments...
I don't mean to sound too... well, I don't know what. At the risk of offending.. .but is american football a real sports? I can see it with baseball - cause it takes talent and skill. Basketball takes talent, skill and fitness. But American Football? Is it strategic - the main trainer does not even know all of his team players by name? Most look as if they are competitive eaters and not much more?
I am not saying that football is a more organized, group-based form of Jackass episodes but seriously.. are the WWE and this not more or less the same as football only without teams, less waiting and a bit more excitement?
Since we are having fun.. an intriguing article about Kurt Warner's family discussion regarding dogs.
Scott,
Nope. I'm one of the non-playing commenters here. So my opinions and suggestions about football aren't informed by my personal experience.
But the fact is that there actually are thousands of top-level rugby and Australian rules football players all over the world, and many of those guys are very fast and quick and manage to play a violent game with very few breaks for 90 minutes per game. So my guess is that you could design a version of American football that demands lots more on-field time for the players without ruining the appeal of the sport.
I don't think it'll happen, though. The NFL and NCAA are not going to do anything that costs them much money. If they can mandate safer equipment, they'll do it. But they won't do anything that costs them fans (unless the players organize through the NFLPA and demand it).
One other note here: if you just want to reduce the number of huge, slower players, and increase the number of small, faster players, then the solution is to make the playing field bigger. Though I'm not sure that doing that would address the injury problem.
Dude, there a tens of thousand of golf players all over the world to, and I imagine that you could alter the rules of American footbal so that it'd be more like golf and probably reduce the injuries as well. But it wouldn't be football. Same if you made football more like rugby, soccer or any other sport. You like those sports, play them, watch them.
Ive played rugby (club level) and football (thru college) and for me there is no comparison between the two.
Green argues that he (sorry for the sexist assumption, but it is statistically justified in an NFL thread)wants to see the best players possible play, and uses that as a reason why there shouldn't be any rule changes.
There wasn't a single NFL game this season (or probably any other) where "the best players possible" played. There are always multiple players out with injuries. (A local story here in phx suggested that one of the reasons for the Cards' success (yup, we're as bemused by it as the rest of the country) is the relative paucity of serious injuries that they've suffered - the story called the low number of Cards on IR (3) "unheard of". Remember that putting a player on IR is a declaration that they're hurt too badly to play for the rest of the season.) An honest desire to see "the best players possible" play would have to imply rule changes up to the point of abolishing tackling.
Additionally, NFL careers are much shorter than careers in other sports because of the frequency of injuries. How many NFL rushing titles have been won by dudes over 30? How many batting titles, or league MVPs. Again, the best players possible aren't playing, because their careers ended years ago.
Green, I was sorta/kinda about to agree with you about your first post.
After all, if it doesn't bother most people that these guys die so young (avg. life expectancy of age 52 for linemen), and it doesn't bother them enough not to do it, then what's it to me? For every one of me that feels funny about this, there may be many more of you that think football is just perfect the way it is, thank you.
But this bit:
Roster sizes are where they are for a reason. Teams can barely make it through a 16 game season as it is.
Seems a little silly to me. I mean, yes, most sports have rules for a reason, and they change them (the NFL does this more often than most), also for reasons. Today's rosters are so large so they can support P, K, long snappers, random special teamers, etc etc, sometimes in multiples.
It's fine to say that getting rid of this sort of hyper-specialization would "destroy" football (YMMV), but arguing that a team (the Ravens) that had 3 QBs, 3 Kickers, a dedicated long snapper, and a guy that is basically a kick returner had trouble fielding a dime package in one game means that roster sizes are immutable - well, seems to me there is a little more here than just injuries cutting people down.
Besides, usually what happens when teams have real injury-based depth problems is that they put guys on IR and go get different guys.
It's all about technique. I played rugby for over a decade, and you are taught to form tackle in away that does not snap necks. In football(HS), I was taught to tackle in order to injure. In order for this to change, the culture of the sport in HS and college has to change. Unfortunately, nobody cares about this until it is their son, brother or husband.
Hugo,
I don't know if you're going to offend anyone, but you have exposed yourself as a fool. That is the most ridiculous comment I've read on TNC's blog all week.
The concussion issue is due to problems with the helmets and pads. I think pads should be just that, pads; not plastic hard enough to deliver concussions. Helmets should be padded leather. The reality is that guys would hit almost as hard, but they wouldn't lead with their heads. The almost part would dilute the game a bit, but that seems like a small price to pay for your health.
Unless they've changed football pads since I wore them in high school, they're not that hard. You make it sound like kids are out there in plate mail. Also, if I hit you in the face with my bare shoulder you could still suffer a concussion. and I'm no great physical specimen or anything.
I'd also like to retract my, "take the pads off" statement. After reflecting when I should have been working, I've come to my senses and agree with Scott.
Sophist:
That's not true. True careers are short, but there's always somebody else waiting in line to take their place.
LaDainian was a best for several years, looked like one of the best ever, completely dominated the field. This year he abruptly fell off, likely because of the strain of carrying the ball as much as he did for as long as he did.
But that's fine, because AP dominated in a whole new way this year, and likely next year as well. AP won't last long, but trust there will be someone else in line, at least as dominant as he is, when he's done.
And for those of you who think somehow for example limiting players weights too 300 pounds would make for more athletic players, you never saw Johnathan Ogden play. You put three hundred pounds on his frame and you got yourself a basketball center, not an offensive tackle. But he was grace and beauty in a 350 pound package. Dude could've been a ballerina.
I dunno, Green, the NFL changes its rules more often than practically any other major sport. In my lifetime, they've radically changed:
pass coverage (introduced the "5-yard-contact" rule)
blocking (blockers can use their hands -- remember the old "illegal use of hands" penalty?)
tackling ("in the grasp" for sacks has come and gone; no "horse-collars"; and in the past, no clothelines, no face-mask tackles, no head-slaps by DLs, etc.)
kickoff rules (moving the tee back, changing the penalty for an out-of-bounds kick)
offsides/illegal procedure (DLs used to be able to induce illegal procedure by jumping into the neutral zone; now that's offsides/encroachment)
location of the goalposts (goal-line to end-line)
And they've tinkered with:
tipped-ball rules (no more "immaculate reception" rule)
advancing fumbles (no more "Holy Roller" play)
various timing rules (timeouts on injuries within 2 minutes of halftime/end of game)
extra points (NFL introduced the 2-point conversion)
And, of course, they've introduced instant replay. And before my time, they introduced OT. And radically changed the shape of the ball to make passing easier.
The NFL changes rules constantly. Obviously, people can disagree with what changes should be/should have been made, but "it wouldn't be football if you change the rules!" means that it hasn't been football for a long, long time.
Brad,
What's wrong with having more than 1 kicker? Or a long snapper? Sure you could have some other guy who not a long snapper snap or having your kicker punt, but what you end up with is an inferior product. Some teams carry only two QB's, but it's a real risk given the importance of the spot. I think the Raven had to play a WR at QB for a few snaps a few years back because they were only carrying two QBs. And besides people aren't suggesting cutting the roster size back 5 or six spots, taking up these few positions that your pointing out. They're talking slicing them almost in half.
"Unless they've changed football pads since I wore them in high school, they're not that hard. You make it sound like kids are out there in plate mail. Also, if I hit you in the face with my bare shoulder you could still suffer a concussion. and I'm no great physical specimen or anything."
The point isn't that the pads do injury, the point is that the pads protect you as you attempt to do injury to others. If I hit someone in the face with my bare shoulder I could also break my collarbone . . . If I dive through air head-first, I might break my neck or get a concussion.
This is an interesting academic discussion, but obviously football's not going to change anything. People like the game the way it is now, and it's way too profitable. As bad as it is to the health of the players, people figure they're well compensated for the risk. No professional athlete is going to retire without knee problems, arthritis, hip problems, etc. Hell, even golfers screw up their knees!
But football hasn't always been this way, which is my point. Technological changes and rules changes have made the game evolve to where it is now, but it's not strictly accurate to say the way football is played now is the way it always has been. I can't think of another sport that jiggers with its gazillion rules more, season to season, than professional football. There is no immutable, Platonic game; it has been open to revision.
Also, this isn't the first time this has come up:
"I don't mean to sound too... well, I don't know what. At the risk of offending.. .but is american football a real sports?"
American football is war without killing. That makes it more of a real sport than most.
quick bit of physics: energy is mass times velocity squared (or mass times acceleration times distance accelerated.) So double the mass and get double the energy; but double the speed and get four times the energy. So if you're trying to minimize high-energy collisions, you want slower, fatter guys.
Caveat: you might not want to minimize high-energy collisions; repeated, lower energy collisions (linemen crashing into each other) might be the real problem. But you can't solve that by tweaking the size of the linemen; you've got to just get rid of the line altogether if that is the real health concern.
@wallyz
"In football(HS), I was taught to tackle in order to injure. In order for this to change, the culture of the sport in HS and college has to change."
...then you had a shitty coach, regardless whether or not you won state. Any coach in his right mind knows that teaching techniques like that do nothing but raise the odds drastically for injury to his own players.
The culture of football, whether back when I was playing and today with my HS senior son who's being prospected for college ball himself, or to my youngest brother who is a head football coach at a small HS in Illinois, is NOT to hurt the other team. You simply do not teach players to injure other players for a plethora of reasons.
What's wrong with having more than 1 kicker? Or a long snapper? Sure you could have some other guy who not a long snapper snap or having your kicker punt, but what you end up with is an inferior product.
Exactly. Because you feel this way, I am saying that your argument for the current roster size has little to do with injury, and much, much more to do with hyper-specialization. If you think 2 or 3 kickers per team makes the game better, that is the reason you want things the way they are. Not because some players get injured.
Of course, if I felt as you did, I think I would want more roster spots. I mean, why can't the Ravens have more than 5 CBs, if the backup safeties would be inferior? Why not have room for an extra long snapper, just in case?
Seriously - you love the game as it is. More power to you. And people dying decades ahead of their time doesn't take the bloom off the rose a bit for you like it does for me, and for at least some others. Which, remember, is where these ideas for rules changes come from. If that doesn't bother you enough to think about rules changes, then your only real argument is "so what? who cares?"
Which is not to say that its an invalid argument. But arguing about roster sizes being necessary because of injuries is just a big red herring.
How would cutting roster size reduce injury? I figure having fewer backups would cause players to play injured more often, and rush back from injuries before being fully healthy.
"So double the mass and get double the energy; but double the speed and get four times the energy. So if you're trying to minimize high-energy collisions, you want slower, fatter guys."
Yes, but smaller faster guys still aren't two times faster than slower, fatter guys. I understand your point, but that's not entirely accurate. It seems to me that a 325 lbs. player and 225 lbs player running at their max speed are going to inflict a similar amount of damage.
Regardless of this discussion, I don't think I've seen anyone point out the obvious. These aren't coal miners. They aren't FORCED by economic circumstances to work in an extremely dangerous job. They know, intimately, what the risks are going in and are extremely well compensated.
It's a choice, pure and simple. This is simplistic analogy taken to epic proportions, but if you support legalized drugs, why do you care about the lifespan of a football player?
I'll add my voice to the chorus of those who have chimed in to blame the profusion of protective equipment for escalating injuries.
The classic discussion of this remains Edward Tenner's "Why Things Bite Back." He nicely synthesizes the extant research. Particularly relevant is an Australian study demonstrating that Rugby produces comparatively miniscule rates of concussion; doing without helmets dramatically reduces the risk of head and spine injuries.
Unfortunately I believe that some people are forgetting that in football many times there is more than just one collision. With the "slower fatter" guy you still have to worry about the impact when that slow fat guy takes you to the ground and your head slams into the turf. In fact there are probably as many concussions that come from a players head whipping back into the turf after the initial hit as there are from the hit itself. Especially when a lot of teams used to have astro turf instead of field turf.
The hell? That's going camping. Sports are about enjoying strategery, skill, and seeing amazing athletes doing amazingly athletic things.
I'm as big a football fan as you'll find, but I don't want a damn thing to do with simpler, more primitive life. Heck, I like being a cog in the giant industrial machine.
I wonder if they ever did remove facemasks, would the NFL start marketing individuals over teams a la NBA?
American football is war without killing. That makes it more of a real sport than most.
I started being able to follow football when I started thinking of it as a turn-based strategy game.
Scott, are players really being well informed about the possibilities of post-concussion syndrome, long-term effects from brain damage, etc.? It seems like the keys points of the study are the piece that Ta-Nehisi points to are that the damages might be worse than anyone thought, and that the NFL works pretty hard to obfuscate the issue.
If those things are true, then it seems hard to believe that football players are as intimately aware of all the risks involved as you suggest.
These aren't coal miners. They aren't FORCED by economic circumstances to work in an extremely dangerous job. They know, intimately, what the risks are going in and are extremely well compensated.
NFL players are well-compensated. NCAA players are not, and I'd bet that players can also suffer a good deal of damage in high school and college, even if they never play as pros.
Furthermore, part of the problem here is that they don't know all the risks because no one's studied this stuff before. Did anyone ever tell Andre Waters about the dangers of repeated head trauma? Did they even know? I'm glad that someone's studying it now, but it's only natural to ask (1) what will change as a result of this knowledge? (2) what other information that could save players' lives/health could we learn if someone bothered studying it?
But in general, yes, I agree we need to remember that, in the case of the NFL (and, to some extent, college) these are adults making choices.
@Green:
The Steeler's article that you link to says there were 38 deaths a year, thirty years ago.
That would be after they went to hard shell helmets, wouldn't it?
I might be wrong about going back to the leather helmets, but I don't think that article disproves it.
Basic physics would indicate that the forward pass is why football is more dangerous than rugby. You've got quarterbacks looking downfield, repeatedly caught unawares when hit. And you've got wide receivers consistantly being hit by players running full speed in the opposite direction, maximizing velocity at collision.
Increasing the size of the field would help because it would make it harder to hit players (also a reason rugby players would suffer less injuries, their field is wider).
But, generally, anything you can do to increase the time between just before the impact and the time of full stop will help reduce the injury. For example, cars nowadays are safer because they "give" when they are hit. Older cars would not, so you came to a full stop faster, making the deceleration trauma worse.
Making pads and helmets that give more and are soft would help and would make hitting more likely to hurt the hitter as well as the hitee.
Popular Science ran a piece about five years ago where they described a new helmet being tested in the semi-pro football leagues. It extended down to the shoulders, meaning that the shock of blows wasn't being absorbed by the head, but evenly distributed down the body.
I never heard about it since. I can't even find it in the PopSci archives. It sounded like a great idea, albeit one that players would resist (due to its bulkiness). There is a concussion-sensing helmet en route, but that just diagnoses a problem rather than prevents it.
I tried to go through all the comments, but it's moving too fast, so I hope I'm not repeating anything.
I think the game has evolved so much that the early fatalities will start happening more often. It's not just the concussions, it's the 300+ pound lineman smashing heads all game, every game as well.
Having played both rugby (union) and (American) football, I am inclined to think that some rules changes could protect the health of the players wihtout making the game boring. Namely, eliminate shoulder charges just the same way they eliminated spear tackling. There's no need to come flying across the middle shoulder first trying to decapitate someone...for what a 2 second sportscenter highlight?
I think there is some merit to having players play both ways. In rugby, it's a more free flowing game, minus all the stops and there aren't any 300 pound behemoths who can't run more than 10 yards without getting winded.
Someone mentioned the lack of subs in rugby, that's not correct. You can substitute, but there are limitations....once you're substituted for, you can't come back in and there's only 7 (i think) per team per game.....
Getting back to the player health issues, I think that alot of these factors contribute to the reason I find myself watching less and less football, especially NFL...that and the endless commercials, inane commentary and endless minutiae.
After watching McGhahee getting laid out during the Steelers-Ravens game I was done for the day. Talk about unnecessary roughness.
"Talk about unnecessary roughness."
Well, frankly, if there was ever a time for necessary roughness, that was it. He hit him so hard, he caused a fumble, and the game was over. It was difficult to watch, but it certainly was effective.
@Destro Villian
You're correct, there are seven subs in rugby but there are a couple of exceptions to the once you go out you can't go back in rule.
One is for blood; you have to leave the game when you have visible blood, but once the bleeding in under control you can come back in. That's why you'll always see tampons in a rugby med kit, they're very handy for stopping nose bleeds.
The second exception is when you have an injured front row player that can't continue. In the event that you don't have any suitably trained players for the front row among your subs, you can bring back in a front row player that was subbed out earlier in the game.
I usually make allowances for anonymous commentators on a blog specifically as to their level of knowledge on a given topic. The lack of actual knowledge being displayed here is quite stunning. I would attribute most of it to someone's idea of writing pizazz. Such as,
"Furthermore, part of the problem here is that they don't know all the risks because no one's studied this stuff before."
It's been studied extensively for quite a long time. But, I can tell you, even before I was aware that there WERE studies, I was completely and utterly aware of the types of injuries I could sustain because I suffered/caused/saw them happen. We were schooled extensively how to tackle, how to fall, how to turn, how to block, all with the emphasis on not getting hurt. If you want to make the point that I believe TNC was alluding to, that there may levels of injuries not previously known, but the types of injuries have been around for a long, long time.
And, when I played college ball, I don't believe I ever met one athlete that was there against their will, so it's not to a lesser extent, it's still a choice.
"and there aren't any 300 pound behemoths who can't run more than 10 yards without getting winded"
That's a pretty sweeping generalization of football players over 300 pounds. How many do you know? How many have you watched run 10 yards and start breathing heavy? Granted, there are plenty of "Fridge" Perry's, but there are plenty of 6'5" 325 players that are rock-solid and could probably run you into the ground. More in college than in the pros, I grant, but still...
@Scott
Don't sleep on the Fridge, he was huge but he was also an athlete. Did you know that he could dunk a basketball?
http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/hunting/news/story?page=h_ath_perry_william
Oh, I wasn't I actually had typed something like, "and even he was much faster and more agile than he looks", but didn't want to belabor the point.
@Scott
I think a lot of the commenters that are talking about the NFL's 300+ club don't realize that the majority of those guys are pretty damn fast and most are freakishly good athletes that excelled in numerous other sports.
Greens response to me proves my point. LT wasn't as good this year because his body wore down. We both agree on this. My argument is that the game that Green wants, one with the "best possible players" is a game that includes an un-worn down LT. This would be a game in which he hasn't had to absorb 300+ brutal hits a season for the past n seasons.
@Stacy
Yes, it effectively ended the game, but I didn't think it was necessary to try to end someone's career at the same time. Not to mention the danger to the tackler. Remember Chucky Mullins? But that's just my opinion.
@Hill Rat
You're right about the rugby subs, I was just trying to keep it as brief and as on topic as possible.
Scott, I was referring specifically to the long-term effects of repeated head trauma. I'm not talking about whether players realize that their bodies can break down like Jim Otto's, or whether they can suffer traumatic leg injuries like William Floyd or Joe Theisman or Tim Krumrie or Bo Jackson, or whether they can end up as a quadriplegic like Darryl Stingley.
That's why I asked, "Did anyone ever tell Andre Waters about the dangers of repeated head trauma?" And every article I've read about this over the last 10 years mentions that, for a long time, players who "had their bell rung" went right back in after their head cleared. Research into the long-term, post-retirement effects of multiple concussions is relatively recent.
But, I can tell you, even before I was aware that there WERE studies, I was completely and utterly aware of the types of injuries I could sustain because I suffered/caused/saw them happen.
Again, Ta-Nehisi's post and my comments were focused on long-term, post-retirement neurological damage resulting from repeated head trauma. Were you really aware of that when you played? And was that more than about 15 years ago?
@Scott
Actually, I know a couple, but that's neither here nor there.
My concern with those 300+ pound behemoths is actually more in regard to the overall topic of player health, especially once they've retired. If I've offended any 300+ pound behemoth that can actually run more than 10 yards without getting winded, I do apologize.
That being said, I would love to see those same behemoths play a full game with minimum subs or timeouts playing both ways. Again, this is merely my opinion, I think that when comparing the NFL lineman to say, a rugby front rower, the most apt comparison, sure, there are plenty of 300 pound guys who can move, but I doubt they'd do so well with fewer substitions, tv timeouts, regular timeouts, etc. And I also think they'd be a lot better off once they're playing days are over.
Speaking for myself, I think NFL players are clearly some of the best and fiercest athletes in the world, and the combination of their freakish size with the strength and speed that is required is amazing--and I've only watched them on tv.
But I'm not a big fan of the game because so much of this athleticism, for most of the players on the field, is restricted to a few, very specific skills: blocking, tackling, etc. One reason, I think, why people don't appreciate football athleticism is that it seems like most of the players out there are just pushing each other. It's easy to appreciate a wide-receiver, or a running back, or a quarterback; what they do more clearly registers with our ideas of grace and beauty--plus they are more directly, heroically, involved in scoring. But it's hard to appreciate the roles that most of the people on the field are performing. (And I know it's not easy memorizing all those plays--I was astonished in college to see the amount of homework the football players were doing during preseason when all the athletes were carbo-loading between sessions in the cafeteria.)
Now I know there is a tremendous amount of technique and skill required to block and tackle well, but the regimentation of football, and the narrow displays of athleticism by most of its players are all just part of a larger aesthetic difference between a sport that asks a lot of players to each play very specific roles, with little room for creativity on the field, and the sports that ask all the players on considerably smaller squads to have mastered all the basic skills (dribbling, passing, catching, shooting, defense, decision making, etc.). When the ball is in the possession of any individual basketball player or soccer player, etc. they're the quarterback. Everyone can score. Everyone must play defense. Everyone can "receive" the ball. Everyone has to learn to pass. But that's just one conditioned preference--those are the types of sports I played.
But I wouldn't for a second question people's love for football, or its excellence as a sport. It's just not my thing. I readily admit I can't follow the arcane strategies that are so much of the satisfaction of the game.
"In football(HS), I was taught to tackle in order to injure."
Really? In high school football (and at a private football camp) we were taught to form tackle with three guidelines in mind: 1) get low; 2) hit & wrap; 3) aim your face at the ball.
"Popular Science ran a piece about five years ago where they described a new helmet being tested in the semi-pro football leagues. It extended down to the shoulders, meaning that the shock of blows wasn't being absorbed by the head, but evenly distributed down the body."
I patented a similar concept years ago. So did a bunch of other folks. Never got my idea past the concept stage though. Mine had the advantages of allowing, but limiting, full mobility of the head, and of not being a "bird cage"-style contraption.
It's a violent sport. Taking off the body armor strikes me as so counter intuitive that I can't get it. Heaver penalities for particular kinds of hits might have some prohibitive value, but guys running around without helmets strikes me as silly. Nobody measured the numbers of concussions in earlier days, and I believe the most vicious hit I ever saw was when L.T. broke Joe Theisman's leg. Let's face it, part of the game is who can hit the hardest. How can you take that out of the game?
@DaveinHackensack
Funny you should mention form tackling, I remember having to be taught how to tackle properly once I got to high school (although I would 'move from low to high, inside out' to your #1), which makes me shudder at the thought of 1) kid's coaches who are teaching this hit 'em as hard as possible and 2) pros who seem to use this to score a highlight hit but don't actually tackle the ball carrier.
Destro,
One of the points of form tackling, as I remember it, was to force some fumbles by hitting the ball with your face mask. Also, since ball carriers usually carried the ball in their outside arms, the point was to get your head to the ball carrier's outside to contain him.
American football is life-sized chess.
That to me is its fundamental beauty, the concept of grace and violence co-existing is the cherry on top.
LT had some injury issues, but he also wasn't as good this year because his team let the best runblocking fullback currently in the league go in free agency. The last four teams that released Lorenzo Neal all had a significant drop (like 150-300+ yard range) in their leading rusher's run production the following year. The first two didn't, but that's because the 90s Saints couldn't possibly get any worse and the Jets signed Curtis Martin.
@DaveinHackensack
Yeah, we never got that point about putting your facemask on the ball (probably cost us more than a few games, haha), but the other stuff is spot on. Move from the ball carrier's inside to his outside to contain him.
"American football is life-sized chess.
That to me is its fundamental beauty, the concept of grace and violence co-existing is the cherry on top."
Agreed. The average football play lasts about three seconds. During those three seconds, the entire offense, every single person on the team, knows exactly what they have to do. After the first half-second, though, everything changes in fractions of seconds as the two teams collide and react to each other.
Unlike most team sports, where the action focuses on sequenced one-on-one battles, football requires every single player doing a specific action at the same time or it doesn't work. The fact that this regimentation exists right alongside the potential for creativity and finesse is what kept me in the game.
Well...that and the fact that I simply loved plowing through people at full speed.
I played street football almost everyday growing up, looking forward to the day I could "suit up" and play full contact HS ball. As luck would have it, in only got to play one season; and due to an injury, only a part of that season.
But this paragraph takes me back to a a moment or two, in practice or on game day that are still with me 25 years later.
And the plowing through people at full speed!
Anyone comparing rugby to football are working with obvious similarities while ignoring the much much larger difference. I believe the best way I have heard it said is that Rugby is a contact support while football is a collision sport.
The reason is fundamental to the game. One yard can be important. Thus, one of the main features of a football tackle is stop forward momentum. If you take away the pads and helmets people will just be killing each other again because it is inherently dangerous to try and stop someones forward momentum when they've built up a head a steam. You can aim your head away, lead with you shoulders but one mistake and you've got a broken neck.
In rugby there is no need to stop someone's forward momentum because yardage doesn't mean much most of the time. The point is to get them to the ground with out them throwing the ball away.
In fact there are probably as many concussions that come from a players head whipping back into the turf after the initial hit as there are from the hit itself. Especially when a lot of teams used to have astro turf instead of field turf.
I agree completely. Astro turf was basically carpet over concrete.
I would suggest that the NFL institute a lifetime ban on anyone testing positive for steroids along with mandatory testing of every player during every week of the year. Shawn Merriman should never be allowed to play football again. Not only would this reduce the size and speed of the players and therefore the force they are able to generate, but it would also increase recovery time when injuries are sustained.
I don't think Americans are liable to take up the most popular sports in the world, like rugby
LOL. Since when has rugby become one of the most popular sports in the world?
The NFL's response is indeed comical, but it's true that we don't know what percentage of former players suffer this kind of damage, and to my knowledge nobody has gone back into the careers of the known cases to determine if there were certain catastrophic events, or if it was just a steady drip of hard contact. That's something we ought to do before coming to any conclusions.
Nothing worse than when egghead academic types try to talk about football (don't mean you TNC). Removal of padding? No facemask? Players play both sides? Are you guys serious? That will never happen. Ever. No, seriously. Ever. ugh...
More roster spots is a good idea, especially in the preseason.
While not a silver bullet, some rule changes I'd like to see come from rugby -- in rugby, it is illegal to hit someone who is in the air, and it is illegal to tackle without wrapping up. This would illiminate leading with shoulders and forarms as well as diving at people's feet and getting kneed in the head. Of course, Brandon Jacobs will have a field day when Terrence Newman has to do more than hope Jacobs trips over him...
While not a silver bullet, some rule changes I'd like to see come from rugby -- in rugby, it is illegal to hit someone who is in the air, and it is illegal to tackle without wrapping up. This would eliminate leading with shoulders and forarms as well as diving at people's feet and getting kneed in the head. Of course, Brandon Jacobs will have a field day when Terrence Newman has to do more than hope Jacobs trips over him...
@Marshall
I respectfully disagree. The biggest difference between rugby and football isn't the collision versus contact analogy. The biggest difference is the forward pass as well as some other rules like not being able to block a defender in rugby (it's called obstruction...I could go on).
Forward momentum is a huge deal in rugby (how do you think the teams score), but so is the retention of the ball. There have been plenty of instances of a rugby player running with a head of steam being tackled and there are plenty of hard hits. But the rules and the lack of padding forces players to play smart and not come flying across the field through air at an opposing player.
As the parent of two former high school FB players, this article was scary, but my feelings were that it mainly is about NFL guys who seem to have shortened lives, compared with the rest of the population.
My older son was a RB and he did sustain one concussion, and he was definitely not crazy aboutthe hits. The other son is a WR, still, and he's never had a concussion or even a bad hit. DBs do the hitting so whoever suggested they have it the worst is wrong.