As a person who appreciates rugby, Australian Rules football and American football in that order, it think that there is two simple changes that would make American Football ‘safer’.
1. Get rid of the pads and helmets. Keep the mouth guards. Amateur boxing has just removed headgear from competition because they saw an increase in frequency and severity head injuries. Head gear gives a false sense of security that gave permission for fighters to both hit harder and to relax their guard and take more hits to the head. I suspect the same thing goes on with football. I watch a lot of rugby and the tackling technique is highly specialised and almost tidy. You’re not allowed to grab clothing, necks or knees or arms. You’re generally not allowed to pick players up and slam them into the ground and the speed of the game disincentivises pinning a player down or pile ons. I watch American football and I am actually horrified by the tackles. Any one in rugby would get you banned for an entire season and probably fined as well or sent off for the game. The padding protection gives psychological permission to be rougher than the protective capacity of the padding and hence more injuries.
2. Get rid of fake grass. Australians NEVER play football on fake turf. Real ground and grass is kinder on bodies. It also disincentivises GINORMOUS stadiums in favour of making sure all the small club grounds are used in the season and keeping the rugby clubs rooted in their local community and rest fields in between games.
But, your never going to get rid of contact sports like this. Men NEED an outlet with the socially oriented physicality of rugby and football. The risk of injury is part of the appeal. It’s really the closest thing to play warfare which a proportion of men are biologically wired for and need a pro-social outlet to express.
The racial disparities between players and management are more about class than strictly race. It happens here in Australian Rugby. In Australia, a disproportionate number of highly successful players are Pacific Islander and often come from very working class backgrounds. Very few coaches and upper management are. The Pacific Islander player’s physicality and their familial encouragement and pride is a huge incentive to pursue an elite level at the expense of education or acquiring post-football skills. A lot of mothers are happy their kids are playing football instead of joining gangs. Upper middle class families don’t have those stark choices and the elite footballers produced from that social class are far more likely to be successful in wrangling post-pro careers in football or finding a completely different profession. They also don’t tend to have large extended families to support and who’s circumstances are dire enough to roll the dice of pro football. That class problem will always persist so long as football is a profession instead of a well-organise community pastime like it used to be.
This certainly puts into perspective the devastating effects of the game and the injustices borne largely by black athletes. Yet many others such as service people and first responders put their bodies in far more harm and often pay the ultimate price for far less compensation. Maybe this is the price of being an elite athlete. You could tell them all of this is a certainty and they would still line up by the thousands to compete and kids will still dream of becoming pro football stars. I’m not saying it’s ok to abuse bodies and minds like this but it seems that risk and harm are the realities of the world we live in.
Regarding the recent coaching situation, I have a problem with the logic that given how much is at stake, the very teams that have, on average, 70% of players who are black, would pass on a better coaching candidate because of the color of their skin. If in fact the black coaches were being held to higher standards, you would logically expect some other team to jump at the opportunity to hire them.
It was economist Gary Becker, Nobel Prize winner, who addressed the cost of discrimination. The greater the degree of competition, the higher the cost of discriminating. Those teams in MLB that were slower to hire black players paid a price so high that it was a price they were no longer willing to pay. I point out that unions in the U.S. and white people in apartheid South Africa have supported "minimum wage" laws and the Davis-Bacon Act---in the U.S. only- have specifically been used to lower the cost of discriminating.
Admittedly, maybe some NFL owners are so wealthy they are willing to pay the cost of irrationally discriminating but I doubt that is the case. It would seem less costly for such a discriminator to have a white corner back but I don't see evidence for that. As always, I stand ready to be corrected.
This piece was all over the place and runs and reruns a common fallacy (the left is often guilty of) that disparity reason are assumed to be at the hands of discrimination, when it’s not necessarily the case.
People like the author lack genuine CURIOSITY, and it makes me balk at if they truly care about the issue they write about.
I don’t really see a problem with adults deciding to play football, adults do all kinds of hazardous jobs working crab boats and high steel and coal mines and on and on. But kids are a different story, especially if they are pushed into it by their parents as they’re not capable of making independent judgments about something that may affect them later in life. I think kids should maybe be limited to flag or perhaps flex football where you can block but tackling is still with flags.
I would like to see total team weight limits at all levels. At the pro level, a team could not have more than 2200 pounds on the field at a time. In college, the limit might be 2000 pounds. In high school, 1750 pounds. I am by no means certain that this would reduce serious injuries. But if there is no way to reduce serious injuries, then I wish that the sport would disappear. The best black athletes can succeed in other sports.
Thanks for the article. There are some parallels with soccer, which I know. High injury rate. Current attention on head injuries from heading ball. Large numbers of youngsters investing huge amount of time to achieve professional status but very few do. Massive financial rewards for the elite players.
IMO big money in sport, media, or any walk of life amplifies inequalities hugely, inc. racial ones. The thing is that they also get a lot of coverage and so the scale of racism across society can be exaggerated.
Interestingly in the UK, attention to CRT and BLM seems to have dropped away in the last year or so as our economy has struggled, with more ordinary people struggling to make ends meet.
As a person who appreciates rugby, Australian Rules football and American football in that order, it think that there is two simple changes that would make American Football ‘safer’.
1. Get rid of the pads and helmets. Keep the mouth guards. Amateur boxing has just removed headgear from competition because they saw an increase in frequency and severity head injuries. Head gear gives a false sense of security that gave permission for fighters to both hit harder and to relax their guard and take more hits to the head. I suspect the same thing goes on with football. I watch a lot of rugby and the tackling technique is highly specialised and almost tidy. You’re not allowed to grab clothing, necks or knees or arms. You’re generally not allowed to pick players up and slam them into the ground and the speed of the game disincentivises pinning a player down or pile ons. I watch American football and I am actually horrified by the tackles. Any one in rugby would get you banned for an entire season and probably fined as well or sent off for the game. The padding protection gives psychological permission to be rougher than the protective capacity of the padding and hence more injuries.
2. Get rid of fake grass. Australians NEVER play football on fake turf. Real ground and grass is kinder on bodies. It also disincentivises GINORMOUS stadiums in favour of making sure all the small club grounds are used in the season and keeping the rugby clubs rooted in their local community and rest fields in between games.
But, your never going to get rid of contact sports like this. Men NEED an outlet with the socially oriented physicality of rugby and football. The risk of injury is part of the appeal. It’s really the closest thing to play warfare which a proportion of men are biologically wired for and need a pro-social outlet to express.
The racial disparities between players and management are more about class than strictly race. It happens here in Australian Rugby. In Australia, a disproportionate number of highly successful players are Pacific Islander and often come from very working class backgrounds. Very few coaches and upper management are. The Pacific Islander player’s physicality and their familial encouragement and pride is a huge incentive to pursue an elite level at the expense of education or acquiring post-football skills. A lot of mothers are happy their kids are playing football instead of joining gangs. Upper middle class families don’t have those stark choices and the elite footballers produced from that social class are far more likely to be successful in wrangling post-pro careers in football or finding a completely different profession. They also don’t tend to have large extended families to support and who’s circumstances are dire enough to roll the dice of pro football. That class problem will always persist so long as football is a profession instead of a well-organise community pastime like it used to be.
This certainly puts into perspective the devastating effects of the game and the injustices borne largely by black athletes. Yet many others such as service people and first responders put their bodies in far more harm and often pay the ultimate price for far less compensation. Maybe this is the price of being an elite athlete. You could tell them all of this is a certainty and they would still line up by the thousands to compete and kids will still dream of becoming pro football stars. I’m not saying it’s ok to abuse bodies and minds like this but it seems that risk and harm are the realities of the world we live in.
Regarding the recent coaching situation, I have a problem with the logic that given how much is at stake, the very teams that have, on average, 70% of players who are black, would pass on a better coaching candidate because of the color of their skin. If in fact the black coaches were being held to higher standards, you would logically expect some other team to jump at the opportunity to hire them.
It was economist Gary Becker, Nobel Prize winner, who addressed the cost of discrimination. The greater the degree of competition, the higher the cost of discriminating. Those teams in MLB that were slower to hire black players paid a price so high that it was a price they were no longer willing to pay. I point out that unions in the U.S. and white people in apartheid South Africa have supported "minimum wage" laws and the Davis-Bacon Act---in the U.S. only- have specifically been used to lower the cost of discriminating.
Admittedly, maybe some NFL owners are so wealthy they are willing to pay the cost of irrationally discriminating but I doubt that is the case. It would seem less costly for such a discriminator to have a white corner back but I don't see evidence for that. As always, I stand ready to be corrected.
This piece was all over the place and runs and reruns a common fallacy (the left is often guilty of) that disparity reason are assumed to be at the hands of discrimination, when it’s not necessarily the case.
People like the author lack genuine CURIOSITY, and it makes me balk at if they truly care about the issue they write about.
I don’t really see a problem with adults deciding to play football, adults do all kinds of hazardous jobs working crab boats and high steel and coal mines and on and on. But kids are a different story, especially if they are pushed into it by their parents as they’re not capable of making independent judgments about something that may affect them later in life. I think kids should maybe be limited to flag or perhaps flex football where you can block but tackling is still with flags.
I would like to see total team weight limits at all levels. At the pro level, a team could not have more than 2200 pounds on the field at a time. In college, the limit might be 2000 pounds. In high school, 1750 pounds. I am by no means certain that this would reduce serious injuries. But if there is no way to reduce serious injuries, then I wish that the sport would disappear. The best black athletes can succeed in other sports.
Sportsball is the bread and circuses of clown world. It replaces religion and distracts from self improvement in the name of consoomerism. https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-root-for-pro-sportsball
Thanks for the article. There are some parallels with soccer, which I know. High injury rate. Current attention on head injuries from heading ball. Large numbers of youngsters investing huge amount of time to achieve professional status but very few do. Massive financial rewards for the elite players.
IMO big money in sport, media, or any walk of life amplifies inequalities hugely, inc. racial ones. The thing is that they also get a lot of coverage and so the scale of racism across society can be exaggerated.
Interestingly in the UK, attention to CRT and BLM seems to have dropped away in the last year or so as our economy has struggled, with more ordinary people struggling to make ends meet.