ESPN Football Analyst Walks Away, Disturbed by Brain Trauma on Field • Hacker News Board

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

#51

Post by Bud » Thu, Aug 31, 2017, 5:55 PM UTC

cmurf wrote: post #34

Bud wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except they aren't getting paid a million bucks. College football (and even high school football) account for a very large slice of all football revenue. NCAA football is a multi-billion-dollar business. Those athletes are spending 50% or even more than 50% of their entire productive football careers playing college ball, they are incurring a very high risk for permanent brain injury, and they are NOT getting paid. (…

Sure, and the excuse here will be "but they will get an instant pay out on day 1 when they're finished with school and get a contract!" There is no possible rational conversation you can have with a fan of college football about the disproportionate blood sucking they're responsible for. These spectators are parasites. Conversing with them rationally is just as likely as conversing with a tick. They're ignorant. They…

Which is of course hilarious bullshit, since a tiny percentage of college players ever see dollar one of NFL money.

I agree that paying them would not make this right, but it'd be better than cynically killing them all at age 40, disabling their brains in their mid 20s if not earlier, and never paying them anything at all. Paying them their real market value would at least help.

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

#52

Post by lern_too_spel » Thu, Aug 31, 2017, 5:55 PM UTC

ethmarch wrote: post #18

dogruck wrote: post #12

I think the headline is much stronger than the story. Cunningham's professional life is still deeply intertwined with football: > At first, Cunningham told ESPN executives that he was leaving to spend more time with his sons, ages 3 and 5, and because of his workload as a film and television producer. He was a producer for “Undefeated,” a documentary about an urban high school football team, and has a string of proje…

“Those are two of the issues,” Cunningham said. He waited weeks before he revealed the third. “The big one was my ethical concerns.”

The confusing part for me is his continued involvement in a documentary that glorifies the sport. As far as abetting the brain injury entertainment industry, that participation seems little different from his former announcer participation.

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

#53

Post by toss1 » Thu, Aug 31, 2017, 5:56 PM UTC

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…

Interesting watching that video of rugby hits, noticing the legs.

Perhaps it's just selection, but I'm wondering if it is rules requiring tackling above the waist, but it seems like every hit on that vid caused no leg injury; no knees got bend backwards, or jammed sideways, and they seemed to invariably fall with bent knees (which is protective as the leg can rotate with the force rather than tear ligaments). The hands, however, seemed to be often at risk.

Is this the case? If so, was the rule ever changed for improved safety, or just ~always that way?

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

#54

Post by Pxtl » Thu, Aug 31, 2017, 5:56 PM UTC

kejaed wrote: post #4

An investigative piece was released yesterday from the Hamilton Spectator in Ontario where McMaster University researchers studied the brains of 20 living former Canadian Football League players. It didn't turn out particularly well. "Study shows ‘disastrous’ damage in brains of retired CFL players" http://3downnation.com/2017/08/30/study-shows-disastrous-dam...

Oof. There are CFL players with day-jobs. These aren't NFL quadzillionaires.

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

#55

Post by kasey_junk » Thu, Aug 31, 2017, 5:57 PM UTC

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…

The issue with those studies is that they don't really account for more modern views about brain injuries. We know that boxers suffer "serious" head trauma more frequently but lots of modern research suggests small repeated head trauma is as dangerous.

Incidents of cte for instance in soccer maybe accounted for by heading drills. Which is why talks about concussions isn't enough.

I'd still expect MMA to be safer in this regard than boxing but there is enough head banging events in things like gaurd practice that don't occur during normal boxing practice that I wouldn't be shocked to learn MMA has as serious a problem with CTE as boxing.

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

#56

Post by Bud » Thu, Aug 31, 2017, 5:57 PM UTC

aaron-lebo wrote: post #47

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…

1. Willingly plays 5 years in the league, makes $10,000,000, has 50% chance of reduced health in the future. 2. Willingly works 5 years in the factory, makes $10,000, has 50% chance of reduced health in the future. Why does the first situation bother us so much more than the second? Most products we use are built via the second, but you're probably still using those products. The NFL seems like better employment than…

You're leaving out the fact that most of these players never get to the NFL, and they have a very high risk of brain injury, but they get paid $0.00, even though their work is generating billions for the NCAA, for ESPN, for basically every large university in the country, etc.

College football players need to be paid fair market value.

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

#57

Post by JustSomeNobody » Thu, Aug 31, 2017, 5:57 PM UTC

I don't watch football for three reasons:

1) The focus on "hitting" instead of proper tackling.

2) The encouragement of obesity for linemen.

3) It's morphed into some sort of live action video game with graphics and sound effects.

It used to be fun to watch, but now I just worry about the future of all the players and can't watch it.

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

#58

Post by guiomie » Thu, Aug 31, 2017, 5:58 PM UTC

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'm on the same side as you about the fights. I'm just not a fan of the hypocrisy of letting people fight their anger away on national TV when someone doing the same in a public space would get arrested. I've played hockey, I get the whole aspect of being emotionally invested in the game, but I still don't think it's the right thing to do.

Otherwise, I always thought the concussion aspect was much less worst in the NHL than NFL, but maybe im wrong about that...

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

#59

Post by ovulator » Thu, Aug 31, 2017, 5:58 PM UTC

alistairSH wrote: post #23

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…

The other difference is rugby limits the contact to the guy carrying the ball to a greater degree than American football. In the US version, the majority of players on the field will have contact on the majority of plays.

Rugby has the same problem with big hits and concussions occurring during them as American Football, but you are right in that it is illegal to block players without the ball in rugby and that is a pivotal part of American Football.

In fact the disease most discussed and studied has been Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy or CTE. The position most likely (nearly 50%) to be affected are the linemen[1], not the guys leveling or receiving the bone crushing hits, but the guys doing the hum drum blocking on every play.

The positions reporting the most concussions though are the guys who are doing the hitting and being hit, the guys with the ball and tackling him[2]. But these guys get the big hits rarely as players are subbed in and out and the ball is given to different players all the time. If they get a concussion it is obvious and are usually pulled from the game.

Linemen on the other hand, are consistently in every play, and are blocking on every single play. They may be getting minor concussions every play, but not something noticeable enough to be pulled from the game.

[1]https://www.si.com/nfl/2017/07/25/boston-university-study-ct...

[2]http://apps.frontline.org/concussion-watch/#positions_2015

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

#60

Post by mcculley » Thu, Aug 31, 2017, 5:58 PM UTC

djKianoosh wrote: post #46

wavefunction wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, I don't see too many 350lb corn-fed rugby players when I've watched compared to American football.

You're looking at the evolution of the sport because of the equipment. If the players didnt wear so much protective gear they wouldnt have to be so big and fast and powerful, as described a few comments above. That said they cant all of a sudden change the gear but they can evolve the rules to adapt.

Why wouldn't they be able to change the gear?