<p>I wish they would ban boxing, though, since the point of that sport isn’t to put a ball in a net but just to knock your opponent unconscious. Now that’s sporting.</p>
<p>VeryHappy, haven’t you noticed that Boxing in the U.S. is on life support? Oh, it will linger for a very long time and perhaps will never truly die. But as for popularity (i.e. media coverage, revenue from media outlets), Boxing is passe, unfortunately overtaken by the dreadful Ultimate Fighting nonsense. UFC is so popular these days, it’s on TV despite being banned New York, the second largest state and the largest media market) in the Union!!!</p>
<p>As much as I love watching some Sunday football, I think that it would be disingenuous to deny the dangers of the game. </p>
<p>As further studies show that the game is leaving its players debilitated after retiring and gruesome injuries keep mounting, few mothers are going to feel comfortable sending their children out there.</p>
<p>This certainly isn’t being said in a vaccuum. I listen to sports talk radio regularly–big market stations–and the subject comes up frequently among athletes and commentators. When the Junior Seau results were released, I heard coaches and athletes speculating that this may indeed happen.</p>
<p>Pollard may be an idiot, but he could be on to something.</p>
<p>There may come a time when fans decide that watching people get permanent brain injuries in real time stops being fun. I don’t say this to criticize: I’m not a football fan, but I am a hockey fan. But how long can we pretend CTE is not a thing?</p>
<p>If the game has to change to reduce injuries, particularly those of the brain, will there be an audience? I wouldn’t know how to call it. </p>
<p>I 'm with Obama (as quoted in the article) on this one. I, too, would have to think long and hard about a kid playing football. A brain is a terrible thing to lose, especially prematurely. There are so many ways to be active that wouldn’t involve this level of risk and since kids seem to get serious about their passions early, I would probably be steering them away from football. Never faced this as a parent though and have had kids pursue sports with a higher than average risk. Those passions are hard to dial down and hopefully the sport will respond quickly to current health information.</p>
<p>I have to wonder whether educated, middle to upper class parents pulling their kids out of football will make any significant difference in number of people playing. In the league I’m on the board for in a blue collar factory town, there was outrage when we had to delay the season last year by a week in order to get the new required helmets. No amount of scholarly publications are going to keep those parents from putting their kids in the game. </p>
<p>The sport seems to be more popular to play among this demographic than among the one that frequents CC.</p>
<p>It’s an interesting question with many angles. The NFL really got going in the 1930’s and only became a bigtime national sport at the end of the 1950’s. The people who played in the early years have been dying out but some are still alive. That means we don’t have a ton of history with the sport - or with the NHL - and even less when we consider how no one thought about old players and their head traumas. It’s not like we have an institution of many generations with an acknowledged history of risk. </p>
<p>I’m saying the same thing many people are about head trauma but approaching it from the historical perspective. We knew very little then. Heck, we wouldn’t have exposed people to asbestos if we knew what it cost in life and money. Do we continue as we know more? </p>
<p>I also think underlying our thoughts is that we will continue to know more, that the dangers of repeated head trauma will become more frightening, not less. </p>
<p>And against that are things like equipment changes. Can we make helmets that isolate the brain enough? I don’t think so, but I’m open to the idea.</p>
<p>I don’t think rule changes are enough. So we ban intentional hits to the head on defenseless receivers. That doesn’t cover the hard slaps to the head on the line or the ramming of heads on the line or with running backs. It can’t prevent the natural reaction people have of lowering the head and curling up to be hit and of lowering the head to hit.</p>
<p>As a Princeton football alum once said, the sport is considered a working-class activity by many educated and upper income people. I think severe restrictions, let alone outright bans, would produce rebellion in some communities,whether metropolitan, small town or rural. It’s the macho aspect of it all. It wasn’t that long ago when coaches admonished injured schoolboy players to “just walk it off.” Even in the NFL, have you noticed how many receivers do not wear knee or leg pads? I though such protection was was mandated.</p>