The National Football League was formed on August 20, 1920. Players wore pads, not quite as protective as the ones today, helmets and legs pads. Even though their protective gear was not as advanced as the gear today they still made contact with the players of the opposing teams. As the years progressed the league made several changes to the rules due to player safety. They invented better protective gear for the players and they also made stricter rules regarding playing guidelines. The main goal of those rules, like the targeting rule that is so controversial today, is to protect the players. The targeting rule itself states that no player shall target and initiate contact against an opponent with the crown of his helmet, when in question, it is a foul (Targeting). Although helmet to helmet hits come along with the game of football, the targeting rule is an attempt at making the game safer without changing its integrity.
With that being said, helmet to helmet hits are becoming a major concern in the National Football League because they can severely injure both the deliverer and receiver of the hit. These collisions
The players that are receiving these hits are considered to be defenseless, someone who is not in position to defend himself from an oncoming hit (NFL Rules and Regulations). Some examples include: a player in the act of or just after throwing a pass, a receiver attempting to catch a pass or one who has completed a pass and has not had the time to protect himself or has not clearly become a ball carrier, a player on the ground, a kick returner attempting to catch or recover a kick, a player already obviously out of the play, a quarterback any time after a change of possession, and a ball carrier whose forward progress has been stopped (Targeting). These types of hits, as of 2010, are automatically ruled a penalty whether the hit was intentional or
The average NFL player takes up to 1,000 blows to the head throughout their football career. Some of those blows can have the force of a sledgehammer (“RealNatural”). Based on a research study by Dr. Jesse David, there were 265 concussions reported in the 2012 season, during the 2011 season there were 266 concussions, and 270 concussions in 2010 season (Kacsmar). It has been known that repeated blows to the head can cause long-term brain damage since at least the 1950’s, long before most of the NFL players had begun their careers (“RealNatural”). Past infractions of the NFL have already resulted in over 4,500 forme...
At the same time players like Matt Forte, running back for the Chicago Bears, believes that all of these rules are becoming an issue (Dunkak). Dunkak can argue that every rule is contradicting to what the offense does and what the defense does. For instance Ndamukong Suh, Detroit Lions Defensive Tackle, was sued for a hit on quarterback, Brandon Weeden, from the Cleveland Browns. The hit appeared to be a “clean hit,” as Suh put his helmet in the middle of Weeden’s chest to take him down. Nonetheless, the NFL made it illegal to use any part of a players’ helmet to violently take down an opponent. Also, Detroit Lions Kicker, David Akers, compares the NFL to a golden goose by saying if you change it too many times, all of the sudden you do not have that great of a product
First, the rules that are enforced are a great way of making the game safe for the players. There are rules like, not being allowed to tackle certain ways. For example, if you tackle someone from the back by pulling them, then that is said to be an illegal tackle. It is also said that it is illegal for someone to pull on others facemask when tackling. There are many others rules that are enforced in the game. Another one is the rule that says, Head to Head is not allowed. What that basically is that you cannot tackle someone by contacting your helmet to the opposing player. This rule makes it greatly safe because it reduces the numbers of injuries that occur to the head and the neck. The head is the key part of the human body. When someone hits another player with the helmet in the head, it reduces the risks of concussion and that can result to serious and severe body failures, including being...
For the safety of the players in the present and future, a stricter concussion protocol should be required at all levels of football. Though improvements have been made, the game of football is constantly changing and the protocol needs to keep up with the changes. Today’s athletes are bigger, stronger, and faster than ever before: "Size and physical conditioning techniques in sports at all levels have evolved to create an intense athlete. They 're able to create more force, power and speed than ever before and that leads to harder hits and a greater number of hits" (Neporent). These advances in training have led to a more dangerous sport. The protocol has improved in recent years along with an emphasis on player safety, but the increasing numbers of players with long-term effects of concussions show there is still work to be done.
Players are using their heads as a weapon which is careless, dangerous, and should be banned from the sport. A lot of time and money has been invested in improving football helmets. Quinn and Brachmann emphasizes that “There’s a strongly held belief that no matter how much time and money is invested into research and development there will never be a helmet that is truly concussion-proof ” (Quinn and Brachmann). Helmets have been effective in preventing skull fractures, but not concussions. Helmet manufacturers are researching and trying to develop safer protective head
American football is full of exciting competition, but do we realize the danger! Helmet safety in football remains an immense problem as the sport accounts for the highest incidence of concussions. Since leather football helmets, the technology for safer helmets has improved drastically and continue to improve. The development of newly designed helmets and technology has lowered the risk of head injuries for players. Furthermore, improvements in helmet testing methods have led to better understanding head injuries and the protectiveness of the helmet. In respect, football helmet safety still remains a challenge, such as a necessity of a proper categorization system to rank helmets and regulations to improve helmet safety. Regardless, standards and regulations attempt to address helmet safety through government intervention and a proper measuring system for football helmets. Despite the cultural perception of football, measures are taken to ensure safety, such as the reforms and education with regards to playing safer football. I intend to address the technological advances and regulation of football towards the discussion of helmet safety. Therefore the aggresivity in football’s culture should embrace stronger helmet standards and regulation that are promoted through improved testing methods and innovations because of the need to prevent further dangerous head injuries, especially concussions.
The targeting rule will help to reduce the number of head injuries received by football players, both in college and the NFL, that lead to lifelong health issues. As Geoff Calkins from The Commercial Appeal notes in his article about Brian McCrary, there are many former college football players who suffer from moderate to severe brain damage later in life due to playing college football and having received targeted hits. The long-term effects of these head injuries suffered in the game are just being understood and acknowledged (Johnson). Andy Staples, from Sports Illustrated, notes that the targeting rule is the committees attempt to recognize the problem and help to make football a safer sport. The main purpose of the rule is to “save players’ brains” from permanent damage, with the secondary purpose to help make the sport safer (Couch). Football is a contact sport, but with this ...
The use of head to head contact at any level in football, should be illegal. There is no reason as to why you cannot keep your head up your body square and make a proper tackle. Coaches teach you how to make the proper big hit, without using your head at all. You put yourself at risk and the person you are hitting by lowering, or keeping your head straight up to make head to head contact. The proper way to tackle is made up of a 6 step process. Step 1 is to breakdown, buzz means to set your feet in a good balanced position, correct body posture for the hit, shoot into the hit, wrap up, and finally drive your target into the ground. But, players like to hit head to head to injure, or just look “cool.” Although it’s impossible to completely eliminate injuries from the game of football, helmet to helmet contact should not be allowed for three main reasons: it causes too many life threatening injuries, players are trying to hurt other players so they can’t finish the game, and it causes brain damage.
The number of concussions in professional and amateur football has been rising and has sparked much controversy in recent years. These concussions are most likely linked with disease and even the deaths of some pro and semi-pro football players. New research is attempting to solve the problem but the issue is still prevalent in football today.
The National Football League was formed on August 20, 1920. Players wore pads, not quite as protective as the ones today, helmets and legs pads. Even though their protective gear wasn 't all that protective they still made contact with the players of the opposing teams. As the years progressed the league made many changes to the rules due to player safety. They invented better protective gear for the players and they also made more strict rules regarding playing guidelines. The main goal of those rules, like the targeting rule that is so controversial today, is to protect the players. The targeting rule itself states that no player shall target and initiate contact against an opponent with the crown of his helmet, when in
The NFL has already had changes to the way the players are allowed to come in contact with a defenceless player, but it does not address the problem as well as it needs to (“NFL” n.p.). There should changes that affect how long an athlete must sit out after receiving a head injury to avoid more brain trauma. Also, there should be trained personnel at every game to decrease the amount of undiagnosed concussions which will increase the player’s safety. These changes would make big strides in protecting the players while also appealing to Americans by not further changing the contact rule which would ease this
Next, on November 12, 1892 came the first professional level game played between the Allegheny Athletic Association and the Pittsburgh Athletic Club. Finally, in 1920, the American Professional Football Association became the country’s first organized football league. Back then, the game resembled rugby more than the current game of football. Over time, the rules have been constantly changing in order to boost the excitement level and increase the game’s safety. The first of safety rules came in 1938 when they established roughing the passer, which prevented the defense from hitting the passer after he threw the ball. This was directly to protect the quarterback. Next, in 1943, helmets became mandatory for all players on the field. This was the first step to helping protect the wellness of the players’ heads, even though they were unaware of the seriousness of hits to the head and any long term
A. Subpoint: Many people do not like to focus on the violent nature of the game. Big hits and tackles are frequently praised and seen on top plays. But there are too many cases where these big hits result in serious concussions.
While the use of helmets does aid in protecting players from brain trauma, they also increase the risky behavior of players; this is called risk compensation. Risk compensation is the adjustment of individual behavior, responding to the perceived changes in risk (TheFreeDictionary.com). Most people that wear helmets have a pre-conceived idea that, because they have a helmet on, they can possess more daring behaviors and be fine. The helmet is basically thought of as a tool to hit harder, or improve performance in today’s culture. Adventure writer and pilot, Lane Wallace (2011) accurately understands the dangers of helmets being used incorrectly, and how they are used as weapons instead of safety. Wallace also theorizes like the NFL, a change in football culture and of viewpoints towards helmets would vastly reduce trauma to the
When it comes to physical contact sports, there are two categories, collision sports and tackling sports. American football, ice hockey, lacrosse, boxing, and many more are considered collision sports. Tackling sports would consider rugby, Gaelic football, Australian rules football, and even soccer as some of the world’s tackling sports. A collision sport is way more dangerous than a tackling one. For example, in a football game, it is pretty typical to see players lose their helmet’s, ripped out of their jersey’s, and be taken off the field by ambulance. Reason being is because nowadays players feel like they are Iron Man...