Is College Football Going To Get Banned?

[MUDPT]

You can see decline in brain function pre death.  Here is one study in the premier Orthopedic and Sports Physical Therapy journal (chief edited by our ortho professor at Marquette)

http://www.jospt.org/issues/articleID.2775/article_detail.asp

32 of 45 Division 1 football players had a measurable decline in either balance or an ImPACT test after the season.  All 45 were NEVER diagnosed with a concussion. If that doesn't concern you as a parent, I don't know what can.  Now you can debate the validity of ImPACT or the balance test that they used, but you cannot debate brain scans of sub-dural hematomas in youth football players.  Tackle football in developing brains is dangerous, and really negligent.  My wife (an advanced practitioner in pediatric neurology) and myself (a physical therapist with advanced training in concussion management) will never, ever allow a future son to play football.  It helps that we have a combined weight of 260 pounds and we both were very disinterested in football as children.

[forgetful]

Yes and no.
You're likely referring to CTE, which cannot be determined until post-mortem.
But there are other brain conditions that can be suffered by athletes that are diagnosed before death, such as Alzheimer's and ALS.

Thanks Pakuni, I was indeed referring to CTE.  You are right there are other types of damage that can be seen before death and as MUDPT indicates it is pretty universal.

[ZiggysFryBoy]

You can see decline in brain function pre death.  Here is one study in the premier Orthopedic and Sports Physical Therapy journal (chief edited by our ortho professor at Marquette)

http://www.jospt.org/issues/articleID.2775/article_detail.asp

32 of 45 Division 1 football players had a measurable decline in either balance or an ImPACT test after the season.  All 45 were NEVER diagnosed with a concussion. If that doesn't concern you as a parent, I don't know what can.  Now you can debate the validity of ImPACT or the balance test that they used, but you cannot debate brain scans of sub-dural hematomas in youth football players.  Tackle football in developing brains is dangerous, and really negligent.  My wife (an advanced practitioner in pediatric neurology) and myself (a physical therapist with advanced training in concussion management) will never, ever allow a future son to play football.  It helps that we have a combined weight of 260 pounds and we both were very disinterested in football as children.

how much is the old lady?  PTM would really be happy if you weighed 60 lbs.

[Pakuni]

One page ago

http://www.muscoop.com/index.php?topic=32449.msg424755#msg424755

the NFL (if measured by ratings) peaked in the late 1970s.

The 1978 Superbowl had 78 million viewers
The 2005 Superbowl had 86 million viewers
The 2012 Superbowl had 115 million viewers

Or

1983 Superbowl viewed by 40 million households
2001 Superbowl viewed by 40 million households
2012 Superbowl viewed by 55 million households

So the NFL stagnated for a long time until it started back up.

You're doing some cherry picking here.
Could it be that you chose 1978 because it had the largest viewership of any of the first 25 Super Bowls? And why '05 (86 million) and not '04 (Just under 90 million) or '06 (over 90 million)?
There's no stagnation. Some years have drawn better than others based on matchups (doesn't hurt, for example, to have big markets Boston vs New York or popular teams like Dallas vs Pittsurgh), but by and large there's been consistent growth.

10-year averages
1972-81 = 63.6 million
82-91 = 82.5 million
92-01 = 87.2 million
02-12 = 94.9 million

As I said, consistent growth. Particulary so over the past 30 years.

Here are the numbers
http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2012/02/04/will-super-bowl-xlvi-tv-viewership-set-another-record-poll-ratings-history/118656/

[Pakuni]

I don't mean the same sports wax and wane, I mean sports rise and fall in popularity. And if you think there's a legitimate argument that boxing hasn't fallen massively in popularity...well, cite any Internet law you like, but I don't think you'll find many people to support you on that one.

Re-read my earlier post, Brew. Here's exactly what I wrote about boxing:

"Yeah, it's (boxing) popularity has fallen off, but that's not result of some magical sports cycle. It's the result of specific decisions by the people who run the sport to make it less accessible and interesting to the general public (i.e. PPV, competing organizations, crappy fights, etc.)."

So, where are you getting the idea that I said boxing's popularity hasn't fallen.
My point is that it's fall isn't the result of some natural cycle of sports popularity, as you seem to be suggesting. It's the result of the way the sport has conducted itself.
Could the NFL's popularity fall? Sure. But it's not fait accompli because of some imaginary cycle.

[ChicosBailBonds]

The type of damage that everyone refers to with sports athletes cannot be determined ante-mortem.  It has to be determined from autopsy.

I don't disagree with you that post mortem is when you are going to likely get the clearest view, at least based on today's technology.  But there are tests done when the patient is living that can determine brain damage and these tests have gotten better through time.  My wife's mother died several years ago from Alzheimer's and it is amazing what they can determine with testing now. 

Many of the very NFL former players suing the NFL are doing so based on the results of tests now, while they are living, that conclude they have suffered some brain trauma....which led to dementia, early Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, etc. 

[ChicosBailBonds]

You're doing some cherry picking here.
Could it be that you chose 1978 because it had the largest viewership of any of the first 25 Super Bowls? And why '05 (86 million) and not '04 (Just under 90 million) or '06 (over 90 million)?
There's no stagnation. Some years have drawn better than others based on matchups (doesn't hurt, for example, to have big markets Boston vs New York or popular teams like Dallas vs Pittsurgh), but by and large there's been consistent growth.

10-year averages
1972-81 = 63.6 million
82-91 = 82.5 million
92-01 = 87.2 million
02-12 = 94.9 million

As I said, consistent growth. Particulary so over the past 30 years.

Here are the numbers
http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2012/02/04/will-super-bowl-xlvi-tv-viewership-set-another-record-poll-ratings-history/118656/

I would add further that the Super Bowl has kept these ratings, share, etc when most other programs have not been able to do that.  It is phenomenal what the NFL continues to do with television ratings, despite a fractured television viewing market that now offers hundreds of alternatives.

Part of this is the event itself, which the NFL has marketed so very well to make it an event not just for football fans, but Americans of all walks.  The fact it is one game helps tremendously.  Games over a 7 game series cannot compete in ratings unless it comes to a drama filled game 7 for all the marbles. 

[Tugg Speedman]

I see strong growth in the 1970s, stagnate growth for 30 years and strong growth in the last five years.

[Benny B]

I see strong growth in the 1970s, stagnate growth for 30 years and strong growth in the last five years.

Hmmmm.... what trends did we see in the television world starting around 1968 and then again around 2007?





So if you use Super Bowl audience figures as a proxy for football's popularity, then football's popularity is pretty damn well correlated with the adoption of major technological advances in television.  In other words, football isn't more popular... we just watch more games on TV because we're enamored with how much better the games look on the magic picture box than they did a few years ago.

[🏀]

how much is the old lady?  PTM would really be happy if you weighed 60 lbs.

Almost missed this one. Almost.

[Henry Sugar]

I'm surprised this wasn't linked yet. Actually includes a quote by MU law professor John Kircher

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/11/sports/football/insurance-liability-in-nfl-concussion-suits-may-have-costly-consequences.html?hp

[ChicosBailBonds]

Benjamins.  It's all about the Benjamins.

The amount of money in college football is huge on the television side.  Just as the money with boxing, UFC (equally punishing, if not moreso) isn't going away.  I could be dead wrong, but because of the money involved (much of it tied up in contracts for the next decade plus) I don't see any declines on the horizon. 


High school football is bigger than ever despite the risks.   http://www.foxnews.com/sports/2012/09/08/football-continues-to-dominate-high-school-sports-despite-concussion-risk/

[Tugg Speedman]

Dennis Miller: ‘Football should be shut down by Congress and I think they should build a new game’

http://dailycaller.com/2012/12/10/dennis-miller-football-should-be-shut-down-by-congress-and-i-think-they-should-build-a-new-game-audio/#ixzz2EqBiI64j

On his program Monday, comedian and radio talk show host Dennis Miller took on the NFL for micromanaging the game in the name of safety.

Miller’s comments were inspired by a cover story in Time magazine in which NFL commissioner Roger Goodell discussed a proposal to eliminate the kickoff to reduce neck injuries.

To Miller, the NFL’s adjustments have gotten out of hand. And it may be time, he said, to stop tinkering with the rules and just start all over with a new game.

“I think we should reboot this whole thing,” Miller said. “I think American football should be shut down by Congress. And I think they should build a new game so people who, and players too, I’ll be candid with you — I know a few players who think that it’s gotten so crazy and so politically correct and so out of its way and you can’t touch a quarterback, now they’re not happy with it.”

“So why don’t we reboot?” he continued. “Why not let football remain in our memories as something — I don’t think it’s ever the ‘great American game’ like baseball, just because baseball is probably a better game and football innately does have the violence in it — but let’s stop it and leave it at that. Because it turned out that, as guys like [Bob] Costas and [Peter] King were the first to notice, it is a flawed exercise. And come up with a new game where people aren’t constantly thinking, ‘Oh my God. They are just contorting themselves to get around the fact that it is an innately violent game.’”

Miller took on the NFL’s 16-game season too, saying that if NFL commissioner Roger Goodell were anything more than a puppet of the owners, he would shorten the season to 12 or 10 games in the name of “safety.” Short of that, Miller argued, little can be done to change the game and make it safer. “I know that, within the parameters of the game, I don’t think you can change much of it,” he said.

“If you don’t see the encroachment of what you see generally in the society seeping into football — an innately violent game that has built its popularity on that controlled violence, just slightly controlled violence — I don’t know what to tell you,” Miller added. “They’re going to make you feel guilty now that you’re watching it.”

“And if you just say, ‘Kickoffs, you’re going to get rid of kickoffs?’ — ‘What, do you like the neck injuries?’ That will be the play. You either get the one-percent bomb dropped on you, you get the race bomb dropped on you in other fields. In football you’re going to get the ‘Oh, you want to see young men break their necks for your [entertainment].’ That’s how crazy things have gotten.”

“Just get rid of football. Come on, I’ll be OK with it.”

[Tugg Speedman]

Here's Bob Costas on Piers Morgan Tonight Monday night.

COSTAS:  I don't know if it approaches crisis, perhaps it does, but it's at a crossroads because there's an issue about the fundamental nature of the game.  It's so popular and so profitable, but it takes a tremendous toll on many of those who play it. Not just body, but as we're now learning, mind and emotions, and it's a legitimate question to ask whether, for some players at least, the toll that the game takes -- brain trauma, medications that they may take either to enhance performance or deal with pain, all those things, if the culture of the league increases the likelihood of aberrant behavior, it's possible.

-----

The culture of the league increases the likelihood of aberrant behavior  ... they are guilting us into taking too much pleasure from watching this bloodshed and these young men destroy themselves, and wait 'til they throw the race angle in there, which will happen, too.  

It's only a matter of time.

[ChicosBailBonds]

Here's Bob Costas on Piers Morgan Tonight Monday night.

COSTAS:  I don't know if it approaches crisis, perhaps it does, but it's at a crossroads because there's an issue about the fundamental nature of the game.  It's so popular and so profitable, but it takes a tremendous toll on many of those who play it. Not just body, but as we're now learning, mind and emotions, and it's a legitimate question to ask whether, for some players at least, the toll that the game takes -- brain trauma, medications that they may take either to enhance performance or deal with pain, all those things, if the culture of the league increases the likelihood of aberrant behavior, it's possible.

-----

The culture of the league increases the likelihood of aberrant behavior  ... they are guilting us into taking too much pleasure from watching this bloodshed and these young men destroy themselves, and wait 'til they throw the race angle in there, which will happen, too.  

It's only a matter of time.

Bob Costas.....sorry, I just snorted a bit.

[Tugg Speedman]

These calls just do not stop.  They remind me of the calls to ban smoking in the 1980s.  The back then was similar to football now ... smoking is too popular to change.  The tobacco companies make so much money that they will buy off the critics.  Sound familiar? 

So, while I do not believe football SHOULD come under heavy regulation or significant changes, I fear it WILL see exactly that happen.

-----------------------

UNL professor: Time to change football

http://journalstar.com/news/local/education/unl-professor-time-to-change-football/article_f6054bc0-6b72-5129-add4-e449cb2a788b.html



Tim Gay has a problem.

He loves watching football -- the quarterback sacks and bruising blocks -- and even shows replays of what he considers classic college and NFL collisions before his presentations, including the one he gave Friday at Memorial Stadium.

“What an incredibly beautiful block that was, and that’s what football is all about,” he said after showing a clip of Nebraska’s Kenny Bell hammering Wisconsin’s Devin Smith during last season’s Big Ten championship game.

The University of Nebraska-Lincoln physics professor also understands the long-term physical impacts of those entertaining tackles and collisions, and thinks it’s about time football promoters get serious about protecting players.

“I think we need to worry about how it’s going to affect a player in the future,” he said.

Gay spoke about the physics and future of football, a sport under some fire after more than 4,000 former players filed a class action lawsuit against the NFL, accusing the league of concealing information about brain injuries caused by playing football. Players and scholars, who have begun studying the long-term impacts of football, have put pressure on league officials to improve equipment and tighten regulations, Gay said.

In the past year, nine former NFL players committed suicide, a trend that could be tied to high rates of depression among former professional players, Gay said. Football players also are four times more likely to die of Alzheimer’s and ALS, he said.

Repeated hits on the field translate into chronic pain and headaches, loss of motor skills and joint pain later in life, he said.

“This is a real problem for the organized game of football,” he said.

UNL has taken a lead role in national research efforts to understand and mitigate injuries. The university plans to open the Center for Brain, Biology and Behavior and the Nebraska Athletic Performance Lab -- institutions that will focus largely on studying athletic injuries, especially concussions -- in the new East Stadium addition that will be completed this summer.

“These are really cutting-edge developments,” he said.

Gay became a familiar face to Husker fans during the 1999 and 2000 seasons when his “Football Physics” lessons were shown on HuskerVision during games. The one-minute videos featured UNL football players demonstrating basic physics concepts, such as how Newton’s law of physics applied to blocking and tackling.

He spoke Friday about the dangerous trend of having increasingly bigger and faster players colliding on the field. From 1920 to today, players’ weights have increased 57 percent. From 1920 to 2005, their speeds increased 9.4 percent. That has resulted in nearly 85 percent more energy being dumped on players during plays, he said.

“It’s kind of obvious why we have concussion problems and injury problems,” he said.

He offered several solutions to improving the safety of football, including better padding and helmets, and requiring players to wear certain protective gear like horse collars, which reduce head rotation during impacts. He said mouth guards also have been shown to reduce concussions.

He said football league officials should aggressively test players for performance enhancing chemicals and could start requiring players to sign waivers preventing them from suing football leagues for later medical problems they may encounter. He said football league officials also could reduce the number of games teams play each seasons.

While he dislikes the idea of losing them, Gay also suggested getting rid of “greatest hits” videos that glorify particularly gruesome football tackles and collisions.

One solution put forth by others that Gay didn’t endorse Friday was ending organized football.

“It’s our game, and we love it and we’re not going to let it go,” he said.

[ZiggysFryBoy]

Bob Costas.....sorry, I just snorted a bit.

The ultimate beta-male!

[ChicosBailBonds]

Wanted to share a story of how over the top this has gotten at the high school level as my son's school.  One of his buds is an offensive lineman on the freshman team and he was double teamed and slammed to the ground in their final preseason scrimmage.  Helmet came off, he was a little woozy.

He was taken out of the scrimmage and administered a concussion test.  Nothing conclusive, so sent to ER for more tests.   He passed the test, no concussion.

Fast forward one week, he is not allowed to play in first game because his concussion test by the school doctors was inconclusive, even though the ER said he was cleared.

Fast forward to week two, still not allowed to play, despite 2nd opinion from another doctor that he has no concussion.

Fast forward to week three, still not allowed to play....district not comfortable. 

For Freshman football, there are only 6 games, the kid worked his tail off all Summer and has already missed half the season due to a concussion policy and....drumroll....HE DIDN'T HAVE A CONCUSSION!!!   The school district is so scared of being sued they are on overdrive.  The parents, good friends of ours, have offered to sign a complete waiver indemnifying them....no go.   Hearing next week, in which case he misses his 4th game before the hearing.

Unintended consequences....always the unintended consequences that nobody accounts for when things are really put into the real world.

[Tugg Speedman]

Wanted to share a story of how over the top this has gotten at the high school level as my son's school.  One of his buds is an offensive lineman on the freshman team and he was double teamed and slammed to the ground in their final preseason scrimmage.  Helmet came off, he was a little woozy.

He was taken out of the scrimmage and administered a concussion test.  Nothing conclusive, so sent to ER for more tests.   He passed the test, no concussion.

Fast forward one week, he is not allowed to play in first game because his concussion test by the school doctors was inconclusive, even though the ER said he was cleared.

Fast forward to week two, still not allowed to play, despite 2nd opinion from another doctor that he has no concussion.

Fast forward to week three, still not allowed to play....district not comfortable.  

For Freshman football, there are only 6 games, the kid worked his tail off all Summer and has already missed half the season due to a concussion policy and....drumroll....HE DIDN'T HAVE A CONCUSSION!!!   The school district is so scared of being sued they are on overdrive.  The parents, good friends of ours, have offered to sign a complete waiver indemnifying them....no go.   Hearing next week, in which case he misses his 4th game before the hearing.

Unintended consequences....always the unintended consequences that nobody accounts for when things are really put into the real world.

Good story

Let me guess as to why this is.  The district's insurance premiums are crushing now and if they do not hold him out, and something happened, next year's insurance premiums are 5x to 10x.  Further, if they did not hold him out and something happened and his parent sued the district, the insurance company would deny coverage.

Most of the time these are financial decisions driving by compliance with insurance policies.