New Post: Ripping Goodell for fining Ed Reed

[Ravenswintitle]

I bet he'd be a lot happier if Reed wrapped him up tackled him and took him to the ground. :D

He went down immediately as a result of the HIT.

[lobachevsky]

The occasional and minute exposure to radiation on an airplane does not rise to the level of almost a constant threat of severe injury a football players is subjected to. IMO, a very poor analogy.

I guess no analogy survives contact with the skeptical.

What is it about "what if" that you're having trouble with? Obviously the risks don't "rise to that level," as I clearly pointed out--else I'd be booking cruises (instead of flights) for my yearly European holiidays. (FWIW the companies who run the day tours from Kiev to Chernobyl advertise them as "perfectly safe" because the additional radiation is about as much as a transatlantic round-trip. But you still don't buy produce from street vendors anywhere within 150 km of the Exclusion Zone if you know what's good for you.)

The situations are analogous if (& only if) you make the hypothetical adjustment of increased risk.

Second, the know risks of concussion and the alleged "cover up" is still being dealt with in the courts. So any claim that issue is settled is inaccurate and shows a bias towards the plaintiffs. And to that point, since when is the NFL and its ownership group responsible for concussion science, a science that's still in its infancy?

Fair enough, but I would think that the connection between hard hits to the head in the NFL and brain problems later in life could have been detected statistically many years earlier--if anyone had bothered to collect & analyze the data. The league may simply have not wanted to know--by analogy with (pace Godwin) Albert Speer's noting that he (& presumably other Nazi leaders) justified to themselves not taking a stand on Nazi atrocities by deliberately avoiding knowledge of the details. (And therein lies the question, were those who suspected something was amiss but did not investigate it less culpable than those [e.g., in the tobacco industry] who did investigate & then suppressed the results?)

Third, there's hundreds of other injuries an NFL player could possibly get and are well known before a player suits up. Those injuries are well known risks that go back all the way to pee wee football.

But those injuries are abrupt and clear. The cerebral damage from repeated non-severe head trauma ("having your bell rung") is insidious--it builds up gradually over time even if you think you've recovered completely.

[lobachevsky]

Huh?

My apoolgies, 'hater--I thought I'd included a link to an explanation of that rather obscure idiom. Here it is for your edification (the top llink returned by googling "grandmother suck eggs", FWIW).

[Thyrl]

The airline analogy might be a bad one, but in my opinion the Stingley and Theisman analogies are too. The issue isn't about football being a dangerous sport, no one has ever denied that. The issue is specifically about concussions and their impact on long term brain health. In that regard, much of the information that we're getting is new.

Owners have known for years (because of commissioned studies) about the potential for concussions (and especially second concussions before the first is truly healed) to lead to brain diseases, debilitation, depression, suicide etc. They knowingly chose not to implement easy safety measures (such as baseline testing) and also neglected to tell the players about these findings.

With or without helmet to helmet contact football will remain a dangerous sport, but pulls, breaks, joint replacements, arthritis etc are nothing compared to the potential for a man's brain to turn to goo. That's what they're trying to regulate out of the game. A failure to see that is just a refusal to see it.

Sadly, the game is changing because it has to. It saddens me but it's not avoidable. Sooner or later some forward thinking government agency will connect the dots and realize that it's incredibly dangerous to allow kids of a certain age whose brains are still formative to even play tackle football. Wait for the outcry that follows that decision.

[lobachevsky]

I shan't speak for everyone, but I probably would have taken your analogy a bit more seriously had you not been so condescending.

Well y'know, you can always make up for that by taking it seriously now. You can argue with it (as HR has), extend it, suggest alternatives, but dismissing out of hand something offered to clarify a point of view is IMO not terribly productive.

FTR I get a little short-tempered when I see otherwise intelligent posters rushing to the defense of the owners (who risk nothing but their bottom line) & trashing the players (who risk life & limb so fans can live vicariously through them). Maybe that's because I watched a close relative who was a professional athlete get thoroughly screwed over by arbitrary & capricious ownership. Maybe it's because I realize how much jealousy & resentment is twisted up with the more-than-casual fan's attachment to the players on his/her team. Maybe a bit of both.

[lobachevsky]

Thyrl, thanks for this thoughtful response.

Owners have known for years (because of commissioned studies) about the potential for concussions (and especially second concussions before the first is truly healed) to lead to brain diseases, debilitation, depression, suicide etc. They knowingly chose not to implement easy safety measures (such as baseline testing) and also neglected to tell the players about these findings.

I agree with you, but I believe HR & others will dispute this. As HR has pointed out, this issue is now making its way through the courts for determination.

With or without helmet to helmet contact football will remain a dangerous sport, but pulls, breaks, joint replacements, arthritis etc are nothing compared to the potential for a man's brain to turn to goo. That's what they're trying to regulate out of the game. A failure to see that is just a refusal to see it.

This is the nub of it. I would question how much of the regulation comes from genuine concern for player safety & how much from a desire to minimize financial liability. I rather think it's more the latter--in which case lawsuits from "whiny bitch players" were the prime mover. (Consider the analogy [imperfect, I acknowledge] with the Catholic Church's pedophile-priest scandals. Recall that the Church--a much more morally sensitive institution [so one would think, or hope] than the NFL--by & large ignored, denied &/or obfuscated the problem until such time as the willingness of victims to file lawsuits seeking compensation for abuse threatened financial ruin unless the attitude of the hierarchy changed.)

Sadly, the game is changing because it has to. It saddens me but it's not avoidable. Sooner or later some forward thinking government agency will connect the dots and realize that it's incredibly dangerous to allow kids of a certain age whose brains are still formative to even play tackle football. Wait for the outcry that follows that decision.

Two words: Soccer moms. That sport is not without its hazards (I can easily see headers being banned within a generation [now there's an earthshaking outcry waiting to happen!] or at least anti-concussion headgear made mandatory) but it is a damn sight less traumatic for the not-completely-grown.

[Irish Raven]

There is a lot of technology that goes into soccer balls.

Before major tournaments a model will be selected and issued to teams so they can practice with it.

If you watch youtube clips of soccer back in the 50's, on a wet day the ball would weigh a serious amount. A weight that would never be acceptable nowadays.

The problem of soccer balls and heading has been solved for a long time now. Even for the youth

[lobachevsky]

This is your analogy? A what if? Sorry, but this is apples to oranges.

Sorry, but you clearly don't understand the uses or the customs of analogy.

NFL players know and accept the risk, which they are well compensated for.

Sorry, I disagree. They have known some of the risks--the most obvious ones, like the airline crew in my analogy. They have not understood that a career of giving & receiving hard hits would be likely to turn them into zombies. The question is to what extent the owners knew & said nothing about it.

So, if you really have been watching football since before I was born, then you've been "kissing up" to the owners longer than most of us, as you keep buying their product.

I watch the product in return for allowing myself to be subjected to paid advertising. I am (more often than not) proud of how they carry my home town's name & represent it to a nationwide audience. I appreciate what the Unitases and Lewises can do & have done on the field. And I recognize that it is what they do on the field--not what the owner does up in his box or in his office--that draws me to the game and entertains me. So, other things being equal, I will always side with the players versus the owners--& I will always be disappointed when the fans allow the owners to use them against the players.

You also realize that many owners love the game and actually played it at some level, right?

Money isn't always the end. Money is often the means to an end. To the extent that an owner makes the effort to field a quality team, give fans their money's worth in entertainment & achievement, and be a force for good in the community his organization represents, while achieving his personal goals (of profit, glory, etc.) that's admirable & outstanding. But there is nothing to compel an NFL owner to behave that way--it's a choice. Players OTOH have a vested interest in performing as well as they can, for reasons intangible as well as financial.

[PerpetuallyBored74]

Owners have known for years (because of commissioned studies) about the potential for concussions (and especially second concussions before the first is truly healed) to lead to brain diseases, debilitation, depression, suicide etc. They knowingly chose not to implement easy safety measures (such as baseline testing) and also neglected to tell the players about these findings.

It's the old adage that goes back to Watergate, at least.

It's not the crime that gets you, it's the cover-up.

Owners/NFL are going to lose the current lawsuits along with any future ones brought by players who played before the NFL finally (was forced) to come clean with what they really knew about the long-term effect of concussions/brain trauma.

[alien bird]

As usual, the billionaires' apologists are out in force.

But go ahead, keep kissing the billionaires' asses for all I care.

As a point of accuracy, and class warfare aside, fewer than half the NFL owners are actually billionaires.

[lobachevsky]

As a point of accuracy, and class warfare aside, fewer than half the NFL owners are actually billionaires.

According to this Forbes article from last September, 20 of the 32 NFL franchises are valued at over $1 billion, and the least valuable (JAX) is worth $770 million. I use "billionaire" as an immediately recognizable approximation for the egregiously wealthy who own every one of them except Green Bay.

But thanks for playing, I guess.

[blah3]

FTR I get a little short-tempered when I see otherwise intelligent posters rushing to the defense of the owners (who risk nothing but their bottom line) & trashing the players (who risk life & limb so fans can live vicariously through them). Maybe that's because I watched a close relative who was a professional athlete get thoroughly screwed over by arbitrary & capricious ownership. Maybe it's because I realize how much jealousy & resentment is twisted up with the more-than-casual fan's attachment to the players on his/her team. Maybe a bit of both.

This post shows a good reason why few are taking you seriously. You are clearly biased.

FTR the players don't play for the fans to get a vicarious thrill. The players play the game for a mulitude of reasons, MONEY being the primary one.