BS Report on Concussions- not OT, but Debbie Downer
Bill Simmons had concussion expert Chris Nowinski on this weekend, talking about all the damage being done:
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/simmons/ (top right)
During the podcast, Simmons asked whether in a few years football would turn into boxing, with mostly poor minorities participating because they didn't have much to lose. As soon as he said this, all I could think about was "Pahokee, man". As a well-off non-athlete, how much responsiblity do I bear for watching these kids bludgeon themselves, possibly causing long term damage?
March 10th, 2011 at 10:14 AM ^
Only a self-loathing Michigan fan could spin the event of "Watching Football" into something people should feel guilty of.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:16 AM ^
I would hope that the sport moves in the opposite direction (in terms of health and safety, not SES). The NCAA and NFL have already been making rule changes to try and mitigate head injuries, and there are plenty of equipment companies that are researching better helmet technology (as it is, football helmets are designed to prevent skull fractures, not concussions). And there's been a massive increase in research and interest in the long-term health effects of playing football, which is already starting to inform rules, regulation, and equipment.
That's the idealized (but plausible) direction I hope the sport takes.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:17 AM ^
It doesn't take a scientific study to tell me that running full speed and hitting someone for 10-15 years is probably not good for my health. It's a risk, but they take that risk because there's a possible reward that they will be highly compensated for it monetarily.
If the players are so concerned about these potential head injuries, take your free education, actually take it seriously, and then do something else when you get out of college. I don't believe there's a law that former college football players can't be lawyers, accountants, financial advisors ect....
March 10th, 2011 at 10:23 AM ^
Yeah they start playing football when they're 6-8. Totally their fault.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:26 AM ^
In terms of going on to the NFL.
March 10th, 2011 at 11:44 AM ^
I played football for 10 years (8-19) and loved every minute of it, permanent brain damage or not. Boys like to beat the shit out of each other. Poor kids don't start playing football because they think they're going to go pro, they play because it's a release and it's fun to knock someone's johnson off. Until society finds a way to make the majority of adolescent males happy with being cooped in a classroom, football, wrestling, contact sports, etc. will be popular. Only a bunch of pseudo-intellectual Michigan fans would think the primary driver behind youth participation in football (or any other recreational activity) is economics. Kids play because they enjoy beating each other up without being put on mind altering drugs or told they're sociopaths for it.
March 10th, 2011 at 12:11 PM ^
Although I'm about 6 years removed from playing football, I played for 6 years and it had nothing to do with dreams of glory - I played because I loved football. And even as a dumb kid with a rangy frame that made it obvious I wasn't going to be anything more than a pretty good HS football player, I gave up my body because it was fun. I didn't think about the long term risks, but having trouble fully turning my neck after every season was clue enough that football takes a toll on your body.
Another point though - NFL players who play for 10-15 years play a different game than we did. They hit harder and faster, play 16-20 games/season, and are at a point in their lives where their bodies don't recover like an adolescent's. So when Bill worries about football being a "poor man's sports," he's not realizing that the toll taken on NFL players is NOT the toll taken on HS, or even college football players.
And that toll taken on NFL bodies is a pivotal reason that their may not be an NFL next season - the NFL players are more than capable of taking care of themselves if they feel they're being exploited. They've got the lawyers and leverage to ensure their safety.
And finally, football has always been popular because of the contact - but it has changed and adapted numerous times in its history for various reasons, both with rules changes and equipment changes. If concussions ever become such an issue that the public started to turn away from signing their kids up, the game would adapt. We're seeing it adapt right now. Football's demise is greatly exaggerated - it will endure, in one form or another, as a game of immense strategy and violence. Those are the two reasons I loved playing football, and why I love watching it today. Guilt free.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:24 PM ^
Cool story.
To answer your question (I know it's not a question): "they" is the kids who are put under the supervision of an untrained adult to play a game they could not possibly know the risks of at the age of 6, 8, 12, whatever. The kids who are lined up and told to hit each other repeatedly as hard as they can. The kids who will take a "ding," sit out for the day, and then get back in there for the next practice to keep hitting each other because shit, you're supposed to be tough and really you feel just about fine anyway.
You want kids to roughhouse, play hockey, wrestle, shoot each other with pellet guns, play "smear the queer," whatever, that's fine. I'm just saying we need awareness about the repeated blows of football (and soccer with headers, actually) in particular, and we need to be trying to make the game safer for developing kids via equipment, supervisor training, etc.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:55 AM ^
because if they don't haul ass and get these concussions, they will be victims of oversigning. It's tough though, I am wondering if there will actually be a definite correlation between concussions/football and lower life expectancy.
March 10th, 2011 at 11:44 AM ^
The life expenctancy for a former NFL player is mid-fifties and each year in the NFL supposedly lops 3 years off your life. How much of that is due to the weight they carry and how much to hits is unknown. They also have something like 20 or 50 times higher rates of early-onset dementia.
March 10th, 2011 at 11:11 AM ^
I don't think this mentality really flies at the moment, but will be increasingly valid as time goes on. As it is, there's emerging research about the long-term health effects, but it's mostly preliminary and certainly nothing definitive yet. I don't think a lot of the players are aware of the full risks that they're taking on, especially when you're talking about things like cognitive deficits and depression 20-30 years after your playing career has ended.
That being said, there is ever increasing research that's coming out and catching the public's attention. So I think you have something of a point, but for now I wouldn't consider most football players fully informed of what they're implicitly consenting to, in terms of long-term health.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:24 AM ^
GoBlueinTX- I agree. I hope that in 10 years what constitutes a legal tackle in football has greatly changed. It might also be time to allow more contact with receivers pre-catch. Right now a DB's only weapon (other than perfect coverage) is to launch himself like a missle to dislodge the ball.
pdGoBlue25- As it stands now, players can have severe damage by the time they get out of college. Two Penn players have recently committed suicide- concussions are thought to have played a role in their depression.
March 10th, 2011 at 11:58 AM ^
I always wonder when people post stuff like this: did you ever play football at even the high school level? If so, why did you play it? There's a reason MMA is America's fastest growing sport and it isn't because the concept is all that original. As more mainstream sports get watered down, safe, and boring, MMA gets more popular because it realizes what most guys want isn't a sport that's safe. They want to beat the crap out of each other and have an outlet for instincts that have to be constantly suppressed in modern society.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:25 AM ^
Can see where you are coming from. Pdgo and TX make good points too.
If football wants to be what it is now in 2050 as far as popularity, it needs to start working hard on a combination of rules changes, better equipment, and a change in the coaching and culture of how contact is administered in the game. Otherwise the onslaught of medical issues will undercut the talent base willing to play, as well the average fan's passion to watch.
Football will lose the perception war if changes aren't made.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:31 AM ^
People like watching football. Kids play football. Some percentage of those people are messed up the rest of their life because they played football and suffered long-term damage.
By the time it gets to the college or pro level a lot of the damage has already been done. Frankly at that point at least they have some better medical staff to monitor the situation. Yes it's accelerated because of the size of the athletes etc but it isn't the real problem, in my opinion.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:37 AM ^
The next question is this... how much longer will Football be allowed to go on? A basic understanding of physics calls into quesiton any attempt to try and fully protect the brain. It's a simple case of momentum (for lack of a better term) or inertia. The brain is moving one direction at x speed, then the case carrying it (the skull) stops moving suddenly, the brain keeps going until it stops, (hits the skull). There isn't any way outside of a Star Trekian inertial damper system to stop that from occurring. Therefore brain damage will occur when people are sufficiently fast and big.
At some time people are going to sue and I don't think High Schools will be able to handle that risk. Kids and parents sign of on the liability, but I believe that there is case law which has rendered the sign-off moot as the judges have stated that parents can't sign off on the liablity as they don't understand it.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:42 AM ^
March 10th, 2011 at 11:02 AM ^
Actually more women that you'd think....
Never mind.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:42 AM ^
Athletes have progressed as much as equipment and it's getting scary. I remember watching that first game last season with the Eagles and seeing those guys go down left and right. I believe it's only a matter of time before someone dies from a hit on the NFL field.
As long as the helmet and shoulder pads are two seperate pieces of equipment, there's nothing that can be done to prevent head/neck/spine injuries. I think we should remove facemasks. You don't see as many brutal hits in Rugby as you do in football because those guys have to consider their own safety when making a tackle. The more protective equipment they have, the more fearless they become.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:46 AM ^
However I wonder how much the rugby issue is because while rugby player are great ateletes they are not at the level of the best football players in terms of speed and size. Therefore they can't generate the same level of power and thus aren't as much at risk for the devestating injuries. That's a supposition only, but I would like to think that if my assumptions are correct the overall idea is correct as well.
One thing I know, my son isn't going to play football. People will mock me for that, but that's okay.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:57 AM ^
I disagree with the premise that Rugby players aren't at the level of the best football players in terms of speed and size. Rugby is the permier sport in countries like South Africa and England along with soccer. It pulls their best and I have no reason to believe they aren't pulling similar athletes. There is probably some truth to this in that endurance is more important than burst like it is in football so the same athlete (say a Ray Lewis) will be a bit less muscled and a bit leaner.
I agree that their lack of protection is one driver. Also in Rugby there isn't a reason not to let the ball carrier fall forward. Therefore using the players own momentum to take them down is good technique. It's the sticking type head on collisions that do the most damage in football where you are trying to knock them back to save a yard and/or knock the ball loose to keep a catch from being completed.
March 10th, 2011 at 11:05 AM ^
Rugby is continuous, football is stop start. You just could not be the size of most football players and play rugby. You would have to trim down to keep up from a cardio perspective.
That keeps the size and to some extent the speed down.
In rugby union there are no "crackback blocks" - blocking is illegal. The contact comes from tackling and in the ruck, and there are a ton of rules on how you can hit in the ruck, and your tackle cannot be too low or too high. While football equipment may need to be simplified, let's not argue that it should be as bare bones as rugby - rugby is a different game, with different rules.
March 10th, 2011 at 11:50 AM ^
To be honest, look at that Penn player who killed himself at 21 with brain disease. More scientifically, look at the life expectancy of former NFL players. Football is already killing people. The fact that it is happening away from the camera is great for football's public image, but morally only slightly different. But hell, let's play 2 MOAR GAMES every year!!!
March 10th, 2011 at 10:44 AM ^
I just hope my son prefers Baseball or Basketball.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:50 AM ^
There's a very easy way to do that, you only let him play baseball or basketball.
I think not. Most kids, or at least those with enough competitive spirit to be elite at anything, would channel all of their energy into playing the sport forbidden by their parents.
March 10th, 2011 at 10:47 AM ^
In other news, Bill Simmons just posted a new podcast with Jalen Rose about the Fab Five doc.
March 10th, 2011 at 11:19 AM ^
and decrease the size of the pads. If you watch old college or NFL films back in the pre-face mask era, it's remarkable to see nobody leading with their head when making a tackle. The contact is much less about delivering a huge impact than it is about making a tackle and dragging the guy down. As long as we keep making the equipment more protective, players will amp up their physical violence. There are plenty of people who don't like the plastic face shields worn in hockey because they believe it's led to a huge increase in dangerous stickwork above the neck.
I used to regret that I was far too small to even think about playing college football (aside from not having enough talent...), but now I think I probably saved my brain, such as it is.
kids from the game. Not to mention the eye gouging and BS that goes on in the pile and at the line of scrimmage. I would want some sort of nose and eye protection at least if facemasks were taken off.
March 10th, 2011 at 11:30 AM ^
Considering that more data is emerging on the risks to even the young college players, I wouldn't be shocked if football doesn't last another 20 years.
I know that sounds crazy as a diehard fan myself...but with all the pressures being exerted on college & university football programs (embarrassing recruiting scandals, money losing bowl games, title IX equity, etc.), I would not be shocked if the concussion issue becomes a tipping point that makes university presidents reconsider why they are even bothering with the game.
We should enjoy college football while we can because it may not be here forever.
March 10th, 2011 at 11:31 AM ^
In 2050, 135,000 (after stadium expansion in 2025) rabid UM fans may be cheering a team with flags attached to belt-straps run on to the field to touch the banner. Although I can still envision horrible cranial collisions as defenders dive head-first for the flags dangling from Mike Hart III's waist as he dances down the field.
require that the head be behind the player when tackling.
Yes more players will run through arm tackles, but maybe more players will meet the player at the ball.
March 10th, 2011 at 11:45 PM ^
I'm hoping in the future that instead of tackling the offensive player, the first defensive player to catch the ball runner will ask in a kind, gentle tone... please lie down in a fetal position. To which the crowd will stand in silence...in a joint effort to not cause hearing loss or tinnitus to his/her fellow football fanatics.