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ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field

nytimes.com

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Re: ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field

#321

Post by krallja »

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #243
EpicEng wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Hockey has the advantage that the sport could we reworked into something less violent. Hockey could survive a change to the rules that would reduce blows to the head. Could it? I wonder how many people would continue to watch hockey if fights weren't essentially sanctioned as a part of the game. I imagine only the diehards as it's not the most entertaining sport in the world...

I think hockey would not be affected much, but NASCAR would drop precipitously if they reworked safety, car design, and rules such that there were no more major crashes.

NASCAR is already dropping precipitously.

Re: ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field

#322

Post by philwelch »

kpwags wrote: post #24

Good for him. I stopped following football after watching League of Denial on PBS. If I'm at the bar or something and it happens to be on, I might passively watch it, but I haven't sought it out since. I just can't support the NFL. I do feel torn though because I love hockey. I know they're dealing with similar controversies. My justification, however flimsy it might be is that I don't like the fighting (I might be i…

I always had the impression that hockey fights were nerfed by the fact that you're on ice. Most of the power of a punch comes from planting your feet on the ground.

Re: ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field

#323

Post by tblair »

neaden wrote: post #196
EpicEng wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Hockey has the advantage that the sport could we reworked into something less violent. Hockey could survive a change to the rules that would reduce blows to the head. Could it? I wonder how many people would continue to watch hockey if fights weren't essentially sanctioned as a part of the game. I imagine only the diehards as it's not the most entertaining sport in the world...

I mean, only about a third of hockey games have a fight, and usually it's not that dramatic. Part of the issue though is that fights are partly for players to enforce unwritten rules about sportsmanship, so if you got rid of fights there is some bad conduct that might increase that could also be dangerous.

The answer for the bad conduct is suspensions, but the PA fights hard to keep them toothless. I don't understand why they want to defend their member giving dirty hits instead of the one receiving them, but it certainly seems that way to me.

Re: ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field

#324

Post by philwelch »

phire wrote: post #313
vacri wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rugby is a much better analogue to gridiron - it's essentially the same game. Two lines of players run at each other, with a certain number of attempts to run the ball downfield, and almost every 'play' has contact of players running in opposite directions. Aussie Rules is much more freeform and has fewer 'opposing hits'. However, much as we aussies like to mock gridiron for the pads it requires, without the pads, pl…

Well, if they switched to rugby, then they could play internationally against established rugby teams. But I'm not sure American broadcasters could adjust to a game with only two halfs of 40min each, no stopping of the clock and nowhere to stuff their abundance of ads.

We could just plaster the ads all over the jerseys like Europeans do.

Re: ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field

#325

Post by somecontext »

duncan_bayne wrote: post #304
hota_mazi wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Football is such an intrinsically contact sport that I don't think a safer game would even be recognizable. And yet, rubgy and Australian football have just as much contact and do not suffer from an endemic injury problem. Maybe something related to the padding?

Here in Melbourne there was a news article recently about some AFL players who got high on drugs and alcohol and set a dwarf alight. It may be harder to detect chronic brain trauma in that population.

For some context, here is an article from the aftermath of that incident: https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2013/sep/03/afl-st-kilda-d...

Re: ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field

#326

Post by at-fates-hands »

The documentary on PBS? That just opened a lot of eyes to the dangers of concussions.

You know who else is at an incredibly high risk? Guys who skateboard and do freestyle BMX:

http://www.espn.com/action/story/_/id/15614274/bmx-legend-da...

Doctors say late BMX legend Dave Mirra had CTE

BMX icon Dave Mirra, who died in February, suffered from the type of chronic brain damage that has shown up in the brains of dozens of football players, a University of Toronto neuropathologist has concluded. Multiple neuropathologists confirmed the diagnosis.

Now think of all the skateboarders who DO NOT ride with helmets and eat shit on the pavement all the time. It's only a matter of time before that industry is awash in guys who have CTE.

Football and hockey? Just the tip of the iceberg man. . . .

Re: ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field

#327

Post by philwelch »

rsync wrote: post #278
kpwags wrote: post #24

Good for him. I stopped following football after watching League of Denial on PBS. If I'm at the bar or something and it happens to be on, I might passively watch it, but I haven't sought it out since. I just can't support the NFL. I do feel torn though because I love hockey. I know they're dealing with similar controversies. My justification, however flimsy it might be is that I don't like the fighting (I might be i…

"I stopped following football after watching League of Denial on PBS." The reason I cannot stop watching football is that the combination of enormous economic incentives and ruthless selection process has produced individuals that are performing at near-superhuman levels. It is arguable that when you watch a quarterback or a cornerback play well in 2017 you are watching someone do something better than anyone has eve…

I think the best sport for that is actually basketball. NBA contracts are far more lucrative, and NBA rosters far smaller, and injuries are far less common, which makes NBA players more athletic and talented than NFL players by far.

Consider also the fact that many great NBA players were also standout high school football players who gave it up for basketball. You don't really see that happening the other way. NBA players (and soccer players) also have to exercise more continual decision making skills, since there's no stoppage between plays or radios for the coach to signal plays.

Re: ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field

#328

Post by philwelch »

komali2 wrote: post #37
beachy wrote: post #17

Speaking as someone from a rugby-playing nation, where mostly players wear no protection except mouthguards and shin pads, American Football is spectacular but insane. Wearing protective helmets just ups the ante as players launch into each other with full force. In rugby, you don't tackle someone like that as you'll hurt yourself, and fail to stop the opponent. Rugby is a plenty violent sport, and has its own health…

This is how I feel about boxing vs MMA. Boxing gloves are huge and massively padded, meaning you take hit after hit after hit, bouncing your brain around like a ball. MMA gloves are only padded enough to maybe prevent you from breaking your knuckles, and maybe prevent your knuckles from breaking someone's jaw. If you threw the kind of punches people throw in boxing with MMA gloves on, you'd wreck your hands. That one…

There is no way that MMA is safer than boxing in terms of traumatic brain injury, aside from the ability to win a match by submission rather than knockout. After a boxing knockout (which almost always results in concussion), the boxers are immediately separated. After an MMA knockout, the winning fighter is invariably allowed to jump on the loser and continue pummeling him in the face a few times. This is, incidentally, the worst possible thing that can happen after a traumatic brain injury.

Re: ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field

#329

Post by WesleyLivesay »

baddox wrote: post #241
koolba wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1) No tackle football before a certain age (to be determined by scientists based on brain development and how damaging a concussion would be). You can learn a ton about football, running routes, learning plays, getting in shape, etc. without hitting people. Good luck enforcing this with kids. We played flag football in school but full tackle with zero supervision after school in the park. > 2) Ban hitting. Everythi…

> Good luck enforcing this with kids. We played flag football in school but full tackle with zero supervision after school in the park. Sure, kids will sometimes hurt each other just horsing around too. I think the idea here is for sanctioned children's leagues and school teams to not allow tackling.

This also comes back to the pads and helmets. If you watch kids playing full tackle on a playground the actions are very different than when they are lined up with 20 pounds of gear on. Kids are going to tee off with their heads when it is going to hurt like hell.

Re: ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field

#330

Post by philwelch »

criley2 wrote: post #177
eropple wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The NFL doesn't exist without the legions of unpaid, bodies-broken, brain-scrambled college ( and high school ) athletes who get nothing for their troubles.

I would argue that the NCAA stands in the way of a true professional minor system similar to Baseball. NFL doesn't prevent the minors from existing, NCAA does.

The NBA has been slowly working to cut out the NCAA from their development pipeline. There's no reason the NFL couldn't do the same if they wanted to.
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