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110 N.F.L. Brains

nytimes.com

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Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#151

Post by Retric »

tedunangst wrote: post #116
slg wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or the fact that an overwhelming majority of football players don't ever collect a paycheck. It isn't like all of these NFL players just started receiving brain damage once they reached the NFL at the age of 22. They probably started playing football in their early teens. Odds are no one else on that player's middle or high school teams and only a hand full of people on their college team made the NFL. Yet they were…

Something like 6% of HS students play football. If 9% of them get CTE, that'd be a huge number of people.

Well presumably the risks are much less after 1-3 years vs 10+.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#153

Post by kendallpark »

beebmam wrote: post #15

My dad played both college and professional football. He had early signs of dementia 15 years ago, but it became really bad about 10 years ago. After a long struggle, he died just earlier this year. It's hard to deal with

It was just this past week that was reading up on Alzheimer's and texted my brothers (all of us played football) that I'm glad we all stopped when we did. I think there are twenty-six cumulative football-years between us, all on the line too.

That being said, football is football. After seven seasons I knew my IQ had dropped some points. But if I could go back in time, I'd do it all over again. What I would give for just one more play. When people say football will eventually become this archaic sport because of the risks, I just laugh.

Head injury concerns are the single reason I am not playing right now. I've had a good run, but it's important to know when to stop and prioritize the latter half of your life.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#154

Post by ericd »

endorphone wrote: post #122
ericd wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe the aggressive compressions of slalom cause the brain to bounce around a bit? In any case, I'm sure it's much less than the sudden stops caused by running into a 300 pound lineman.

The Earth weighs a good deal more than a 300lb lineman, and it's the Earth that skiiers are repeatedly running into while carrying an enormous amount of inertia.

That's the forward component of the velocity vs the component that's normal to the ground, though - the collision with the Earth is much lower speed than the lateral motion (sliding along the surface after the fall). If you're skiing aggressively, you're frequently quite close to the ground, and a fall is frequently where you end up grazing it because you lean further than the centripital force can maintain. You fall a much shorter distance toward the Earth than a timid skier does.

If you're skiing at the level I'm talking about, falls are probably not that frequent, though.

In my earlier comment I was talking more about the explosive vertical compression-expansion cycle that characterizes skiing really hard with very tight turns on short radius skis. Those are much less violent than hitting a lineman though.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#155

Post by endorphone »

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #142
endorphone wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Earth weighs a good deal more than a 300lb lineman, and it's the Earth that skiiers are repeatedly running into while carrying an enormous amount of inertia.

Have you ever been skiing? It's your feet that are running into the earth, and hardly even that - they're skating smoothly over it unless you really mess up. On good mogul run,your head hardly moves off a straight line while your legs and hips adjust to keep your skis moving smoothly. In a similar comparison, walking does not produce head trauma.

I've been skiing plenty of times. Runs where I'm at a high rate of speed and hitting countless variation changes (not moguls, just normal skiing) and my head is shaking so much that my vision is blurry. Landing a jump at best (when you absorb with your legs) is a 19G+ event. Every minor mistake in absorbing can tenfold increase that. Walking is not a relevant comparison.

We evolved to walk with a limited brain suspension that just wasn't adapted for 100kph wax shoe runs.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#156

Post by endorphone »

urda wrote: post #134
endorphone wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What an ignorant, obnoxious reply. HN isn't for you.

I'm not sure if you're new here, or just in a foul mood, but myself and others have been pretty calm commenting on your original post. Your comparison was weak, completely off topic, and you get upset when it's pointed out? Where do you think you are? Take a moment and review the HN Guidelines please: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html > Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say in a face-to-face conv…

It is humorous to me that the miscreants are always first to cite the HN Guidelines, as if it's their shield for their utter obnoxiousness.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#157

Post by Frondo »

Goladus wrote: post #59
saulrh wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

9% chance, the best possible case given the current data, of a horrible, slow, lingering death 20 years later is still unacceptable . What's the rate for getting mesothelioma after working with asbestos?

Unacceptable to whom? Is the US a free country or not?

This response, "is the US a free country?" is a thought-terminating cliche.

It doesn't actually contribute to the discussion, it just derails it. "free country" is too vague to be meaningful; we have our freedoms curtailed in big and small ways all day every day. Wanna test this? Go ignore traffic lights. Go walk into someone else's house. Traffic laws and property rights are acceptable constraints on freedom, but they are still constraints on freedom.

Please, if you're going to contribute, make it a useful contribution.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#158

Post by vkou »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #133
alistproducer2 wrote: post #87

Historians will look back at American Football as our analog to the Roman's gladiatorial games. A lot of people don't realize that during the Imperial era of Rome fights to the death had become uncommon.[0] The games were watched in an arena and primarily sold hard-hitting violence between members of the lower castes of society and sometimes people got killed or horribly maimed....sound familiar? I stopped watching A…

There's a big difference between cheering on people killing each other and a popular sport remaining popular after the long term consequences became known.

Most of the time, they didn't kill eachother.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#159

Post by vkou »

grillvogel wrote: post #123
mikeh1010 wrote: post #12

I want to push back on the "every sport is dangerous" argument I'm seeing in here. There's a difference between "you might die right in the middle of this very fun activity" and "you might die slowly and horribly years from now when you're retired and in the midst of raising a family." I ski pretty aggressively, and of course I might die doing that. But every day I go home and know, "well it wasn't today! Today was j…

>"but today might give me a mental disorder in 20 years" then I'd be much less inclined to participate in the sport. what if you were paid millions of dollars to do it and treated as a living god? i think a lot of people would still take that deal even knowing the risks.

Most serious football players never get paid millions of dollars, or are treated like a living god. They do get the injuries, though.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#160

Post by alistproducer2 »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #133
alistproducer2 wrote: post #87

Historians will look back at American Football as our analog to the Roman's gladiatorial games. A lot of people don't realize that during the Imperial era of Rome fights to the death had become uncommon.[0] The games were watched in an arena and primarily sold hard-hitting violence between members of the lower castes of society and sometimes people got killed or horribly maimed....sound familiar? I stopped watching A…

There's a big difference between cheering on people killing each other and a popular sport remaining popular after the long term consequences became known.

I don't feel like you read my comment before posting.....
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