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'there may be a greater prevalence of head injuries in the American game because the players hit each other with forces up to 100% greater. "If they didn't have

'there may be a greater prevalence of head injuries in the American game because the players hit each other with forces up to 100% greater. "If they didn't have helmets on, they wouldn't do that,"' The second part of that is dead wrong. When millions of dollars and hall of fame spots are on the line, people will sacrifice their bodies. Boxers and MMA fighters knowingly take up a sport where their retired legendary heroes can barely form a coherent sentence after age 50. They know going in they're going to get their brain damaged and they do it anyway, and boxing's not half as prestigious as football here. Football is America's premier sport, and the Super Bowl is America's most prestigious sporting event. People will collide just as hard without helmets as they do with in order to win a Lombardi trophy regardless of the cost to themselves. It's silly to think that if millions of young Americans will put their life on the line to defend our country, that hundreds won't put their life on the line to achieve fame and fortune.

sasvari 16y ago
Football is America's premier sport, and the Super Bowl is America's most prestigious sporting event. People will collide just as hard without helmets as they do with in order to win a Lombardi trophy regardless of the cost to themselves. Isn't it that when you hit your head without a helmet, it's going to hurt much more and thus you avoid getting hit (at least that's the argument used here)? As far as I understood, the problem with the helmets is the hits you don't feel as painfully with the helmet as you would feel without, but which are very dangerous if they occur very frequently. I don't know if you can compare that to MMA or boxing the way you do, but I'm not a professional football player either.
- baddox 16y ago
  As mattmaroon just said, American football players will sacrifice themselves (i.e. tolerate the pain) for the game.
  - aliston 16y ago
    I think the argument is that, by and large, Australian football is no less violent than American football. However, helmets incentivise poor tackling technique (i.e. leading with the helmet). If you took off the facemask, the game would be just as quick/painful etc. but you wouldn't see defensive ends driving quarterbacks into the ground with their helmets... instead, they'd be wrapping up and tackling the way they did back in the day, before the "human bowling ball" approach became popular. EDIT: by the way, kids in peewee football are taught from day 1 to tackle with the head up. The "big hits" you see on ESPN are fundamentally poor tackles... they just seem to get the "oohs and ahss" because they look cool to people who don't understand football.
    - zach 16y ago
      Maybe this is why this quarterback tackle from last weekend was such a "big hit" -- QBs never practice tackling. It's the old thing about the most dangerous opponent for a swordsman, apart from a master, is one who is completely untrained. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5STc2_bM7k http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5STc2_bM7k
Travis 16y ago
Just curious -- how do you explain away the many fewer head injuries in the australian football leagues?
- jfager 16y ago
  Aussie rules football is a completely different game. American football builds in a guaranteed 6+ head contacts per play, from linemen colliding with each other when the ball gets snapped each down. In Aussie rules, players distribute across the field, and the game isn't built around downs. And in American football, when you tackle someone, the play is over. Aussie rules is much more fluid, and every time you tackle someone, you simultaneously risk taking yourself out of the play. In that regard, it's much more similar to hockey, where laying out a hard check might cost you a goal because it means you're sprawled out on the ice rather than getting back on defense. Edit: also, a bunch of the worst hits in American football come thanks to the forward pass - a QB leads a crossing route too much, and the defenseless receiver gets jacked stretching out for the ball. There are no thrown passes in Aussie rules football.
  - hugh3 16y ago
    Indeed. Aussie rules is probably the least tackle-intensive of the non-round-football games. A better comparison would be to Rugby League, which is tackle-stops-play much like Grid Iron (which is what we call American Football). But there's still less tackling, because you're only allowed to tackle the guy with the ball, whereas Grid Iron seems to be an everybody-tackles-everybody-all-the-time sort of situation.
    - anigbrowl 16y ago
      Quite. In American football the basic play is to prevent the entire team from following the ball around. In rugby the only time you have this pushing behavior is in a scrum (aka scrimmage), where most of the team members get into a group blocking position against the other team and the referee throws the ball into the middle between their legs. Then the teams try to push each other backwards so one of them can get over the ball and kick it out to the rear of their scrum, where another player can pick it up and start running. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/rugby_union/rules_and_equipment/4205334.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/rugby_union/rules_and_equipm... has an explanation and a useful picture) Even though this scrum is a test of brute strength, there's no impact involved because the scrum is carefully arranged and supervised by the referee before the ball is thrown in, not least to minimize the risk of injury. Pushing is one tactic, especially beloved of teams like the New Zealand All-Blacks who have a lot of big Polynesian players, but an equally valid approach is to rotate the scrum to one side or the other and use an opposing team's forward momentum against them. The main injury risk is a broken neck or torn ear, but these are mercifully rare. About 10% of rugby injuries involve concussions, but the overall rate of injury is much lower, and you could play many games without ever getting a bang on the head. Strength is important, but no more so than speed or agility. I weigh only 140 pounds but I was a fairly good rugby player in school because I was nimble, and there are quite a few small professional players. If you are interested and have 4 minutes to spare, this video shows the highlights of a game with two excellent, versatile teams doing 'a bit of everything': http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heoO_5MvZ0w&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heoO_5MvZ0w&feature=relat...
bwanab 16y ago
I'm dubious about your assertion. Yes, players would be willing to put their life on the line, but the way fame and fortune are achieved in football is winning the game, and a team whose best players have sacrificed themselves isn't going to win many games. The football field tactics would necessarily change to protect the most valuable assets, the players.
- MartinCron 16y ago
  Just like how individual baseball pitchers would be willing to put their life on the line by overworking themselves, but a good coach is smart enough to pull them out as needed to avoid injury.
anigbrowl 16y ago
I think you're assuming a lot here. Many countries around the world play rugby, from which American Football is derived. The only use of helmets in that sport is for covering players' ears if they stick out and are vulnerable to getting torn. It's just as aggressive as AF, but (preferably) played at something closer to the speed of soccer, without all the committee meetings and personnel changes (which everyone outside the US finds mystifying and dull). Obviously the players are not as big or colliding with such force as a result, but the game isn't any less popular for that; and happily, it's not highly correlated with brain damage (unless you count rugby fans' notorious appetite for beer). In short, you can have sporting machismo for fun and profit without necessarily needing all the players to look like the Hulk. Football is America's premier sport, and the Super Bowl is America's most prestigious sporting event. The super bowl is certainly a big deal because it all comes down to one match, but I think it might be interesting to aggregate the interest and profits in the World Series of baseball (best of seven games between the top two teams), rather than compare a single baseball game with a single football game. Baseball is arguably a more successful export than American football, and has greater long-term growth potential. Although NFL is about 2x more profitable, and attracts bigger crowds, there are 10 times more baseball games than football games per season, so overall attendance at baseball stadia is actually 5x higher than at football stadia (http://www.plunkettresearch.com/Industries/Sports/SportsStatistics/tabid/273/Default.aspx http://www.plunkettresearch.com/Industries/Sports/SportsStat...). Boxers and MMA fighters knowingly take up a sport where their retired legendary heroes can barely form a coherent sentence after age 50. They know going in they're going to get their brain damaged and they do it anyway, and boxing's not half as prestigious as football here. But boxing used to be hugely popular; our greater understanding of the long-term damage which results, and exactly how it results, are IMHO a significant reason for the decline in popularity. When I was a kid Muhammad Ali was a megastar; he may not have made as much money in $ terms as someone like Tiger Woods today, but he was arguably the first globally famous sporting figure. The heavyweight boxing championship was considered a must-see event, like the premier Olympic events or a world cup final. Now, not so much. MMA or ultimate fighting or whatever it's called is well marketed and profitable, but it doesn't have anything like the prestige that boxing used to do. If you stopped 10 people on the street I doubt that more than 1 could tell you who the MMA champion is, whereas anyone over 35 could name some former heavyweight boxing champs. I'd bet $100 that American football will go the same way over the next 40 years. Not because the NFL or even a single NFL team will decide to adopt a more delicate style of play, but because parents are not going to be enthused about the risk of their kids getting brain damage in high school or college while they're aiming for the NFL. Once a player goes pro, football pays so much that they'll probably be able to cover their future medical expenses. But brain injury to a non-pro player has the potential to be just as expensive, and if the injured player never gets near the pro salary then the cost lands back on their family or possibly the taxpayer. Lately the NFL has been marketing itself heavily to women because they consider the male sports audience to be saturated at this point. I think greater female interest in the sport will boost it in the short term, but as more of these fans become parents there will be a correspondingly greater brake on new entrants to the sport. Personally, I think NFL has already peaked, and can only go downhill from here.
deleted 16y ago
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sasvari 16y ago

Football is America's premier sport, and the Super Bowl is America's most prestigious sporting event. People will collide just as hard without helmets as they do with in order to win a Lombardi trophy regardless of the cost to themselves. Isn't it that when you hit your head without a helmet, it's going to hurt much more and thus you avoid getting hit (at least that's the argument used here)? As far as I understood, the problem with the helmets is the hits you don't feel as painfully with the helmet as you would feel without, but which are very dangerous if they occur very frequently. I don't know if you can compare that to MMA or boxing the way you do, but I'm not a professional football player either.

baddox 16y ago
As mattmaroon just said, American football players will sacrifice themselves (i.e. tolerate the pain) for the game.
- aliston 16y ago
  I think the argument is that, by and large, Australian football is no less violent than American football. However, helmets incentivise poor tackling technique (i.e. leading with the helmet). If you took off the facemask, the game would be just as quick/painful etc. but you wouldn't see defensive ends driving quarterbacks into the ground with their helmets... instead, they'd be wrapping up and tackling the way they did back in the day, before the "human bowling ball" approach became popular. EDIT: by the way, kids in peewee football are taught from day 1 to tackle with the head up. The "big hits" you see on ESPN are fundamentally poor tackles... they just seem to get the "oohs and ahss" because they look cool to people who don't understand football.
  - zach 16y ago
    Maybe this is why this quarterback tackle from last weekend was such a "big hit" -- QBs never practice tackling. It's the old thing about the most dangerous opponent for a swordsman, apart from a master, is one who is completely untrained. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5STc2_bM7k http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5STc2_bM7k

Travis 16y ago

Just curious -- how do you explain away the many fewer head injuries in the australian football leagues?

jfager 16y ago
Aussie rules football is a completely different game. American football builds in a guaranteed 6+ head contacts per play, from linemen colliding with each other when the ball gets snapped each down. In Aussie rules, players distribute across the field, and the game isn't built around downs. And in American football, when you tackle someone, the play is over. Aussie rules is much more fluid, and every time you tackle someone, you simultaneously risk taking yourself out of the play. In that regard, it's much more similar to hockey, where laying out a hard check might cost you a goal because it means you're sprawled out on the ice rather than getting back on defense. Edit: also, a bunch of the worst hits in American football come thanks to the forward pass - a QB leads a crossing route too much, and the defenseless receiver gets jacked stretching out for the ball. There are no thrown passes in Aussie rules football.
- hugh3 16y ago
  Indeed. Aussie rules is probably the least tackle-intensive of the non-round-football games. A better comparison would be to Rugby League, which is tackle-stops-play much like Grid Iron (which is what we call American Football). But there's still less tackling, because you're only allowed to tackle the guy with the ball, whereas Grid Iron seems to be an everybody-tackles-everybody-all-the-time sort of situation.
  - anigbrowl 16y ago
    Quite. In American football the basic play is to prevent the entire team from following the ball around. In rugby the only time you have this pushing behavior is in a scrum (aka scrimmage), where most of the team members get into a group blocking position against the other team and the referee throws the ball into the middle between their legs. Then the teams try to push each other backwards so one of them can get over the ball and kick it out to the rear of their scrum, where another player can pick it up and start running. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/rugby_union/rules_and_equipment/4205334.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/rugby_union/rules_and_equipm... has an explanation and a useful picture) Even though this scrum is a test of brute strength, there's no impact involved because the scrum is carefully arranged and supervised by the referee before the ball is thrown in, not least to minimize the risk of injury. Pushing is one tactic, especially beloved of teams like the New Zealand All-Blacks who have a lot of big Polynesian players, but an equally valid approach is to rotate the scrum to one side or the other and use an opposing team's forward momentum against them. The main injury risk is a broken neck or torn ear, but these are mercifully rare. About 10% of rugby injuries involve concussions, but the overall rate of injury is much lower, and you could play many games without ever getting a bang on the head. Strength is important, but no more so than speed or agility. I weigh only 140 pounds but I was a fairly good rugby player in school because I was nimble, and there are quite a few small professional players. If you are interested and have 4 minutes to spare, this video shows the highlights of a game with two excellent, versatile teams doing 'a bit of everything': http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heoO_5MvZ0w&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heoO_5MvZ0w&feature=relat...

bwanab 16y ago

I'm dubious about your assertion. Yes, players would be willing to put their life on the line, but the way fame and fortune are achieved in football is winning the game, and a team whose best players have sacrificed themselves isn't going to win many games. The football field tactics would necessarily change to protect the most valuable assets, the players.

MartinCron 16y ago
Just like how individual baseball pitchers would be willing to put their life on the line by overworking themselves, but a good coach is smart enough to pull them out as needed to avoid injury.

anigbrowl 16y ago

I think you're assuming a lot here. Many countries around the world play rugby, from which American Football is derived. The only use of helmets in that sport is for covering players' ears if they stick out and are vulnerable to getting torn. It's just as aggressive as AF, but (preferably) played at something closer to the speed of soccer, without all the committee meetings and personnel changes (which everyone outside the US finds mystifying and dull). Obviously the players are not as big or colliding with such force as a result, but the game isn't any less popular for that; and happily, it's not highly correlated with brain damage (unless you count rugby fans' notorious appetite for beer). In short, you can have sporting machismo for fun and profit without necessarily needing all the players to look like the Hulk. Football is America's premier sport, and the Super Bowl is America's most prestigious sporting event. The super bowl is certainly a big deal because it all comes down to one match, but I think it might be interesting to aggregate the interest and profits in the World Series of baseball (best of seven games between the top two teams), rather than compare a single baseball game with a single football game. Baseball is arguably a more successful export than American football, and has greater long-term growth potential. Although NFL is about 2x more profitable, and attracts bigger crowds, there are 10 times more baseball games than football games per season, so overall attendance at baseball stadia is actually 5x higher than at football stadia (http://www.plunkettresearch.com/Industries/Sports/SportsStatistics/tabid/273/Default.aspx http://www.plunkettresearch.com/Industries/Sports/SportsStat...). Boxers and MMA fighters knowingly take up a sport where their retired legendary heroes can barely form a coherent sentence after age 50. They know going in they're going to get their brain damaged and they do it anyway, and boxing's not half as prestigious as football here. But boxing used to be hugely popular; our greater understanding of the long-term damage which results, and exactly how it results, are IMHO a significant reason for the decline in popularity. When I was a kid Muhammad Ali was a megastar; he may not have made as much money in $ terms as someone like Tiger Woods today, but he was arguably the first globally famous sporting figure. The heavyweight boxing championship was considered a must-see event, like the premier Olympic events or a world cup final. Now, not so much. MMA or ultimate fighting or whatever it's called is well marketed and profitable, but it doesn't have anything like the prestige that boxing used to do. If you stopped 10 people on the street I doubt that more than 1 could tell you who the MMA champion is, whereas anyone over 35 could name some former heavyweight boxing champs. I'd bet $100 that American football will go the same way over the next 40 years. Not because the NFL or even a single NFL team will decide to adopt a more delicate style of play, but because parents are not going to be enthused about the risk of their kids getting brain damage in high school or college while they're aiming for the NFL. Once a player goes pro, football pays so much that they'll probably be able to cover their future medical expenses. But brain injury to a non-pro player has the potential to be just as expensive, and if the injured player never gets near the pro salary then the cost lands back on their family or possibly the taxpayer. Lately the NFL has been marketing itself heavily to women because they consider the male sports audience to be saturated at this point. I think greater female interest in the sport will boost it in the short term, but as more of these fans become parents there will be a correspondingly greater brake on new entrants to the sport. Personally, I think NFL has already peaked, and can only go downhill from here.

deleted 16y ago

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