The Happiness of the Weekend
Did you know that in 2015, 286.4 million people watched football weekly? Football is
America’s Game and for many football is the highlight of their weekend. I am one of the millions of people who look forward to Sundays watching football with my family and friends. However, while football is great entertainment, I have to acknowledge that it comes at a great cost: NFL players are putting their lives on the line, as they play a contact-heavy sport for 60 minutes a week while getting hit in the head multiple times. While I love football, I acknowledge that the NFL should consider changing its rules to ensure the safety of players and to also preserve he future of the game.
Studies show that 99% of players in the NFL have CTE, chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a severe form of degenerative brain disease. According to the Concussion Legacy Foundation, CTE is generally caused by multiple hits to the head, and the disease doesn’t really appear until later in a player’s lifetime. Symptoms of CTE are life changing: It can cause memory loss, difficulty controlling behavior, impaired judgment, behavioral disturbances, and difficulty with balance. Usually NFL players are diagnosed with CTE well after they retire, with little doctors can do to stop the progression of the disease. This diagnosis has destroyed the future lives of a growing number of NFL players and severely impacted the lives of their families as well.
By its very nature, football is a breeding ground for CTE. It is a rough sport, designed for head to head hits that constantly knock players to the ground. For instance, during a week four game, Davante Adams was violently knocked in the head with a dirty hit by Danny Trevathan, a linebacker on the opposing team; Adams was unconscious after the hit. The medical team took Adams off the field on a stretcher and taken to the hospital in an ambulance. Davante Adams regained consciousness a few hours later and was released from the hospital the next day. Trevathan was suspended one game for the hit and hasn’t made a dirty hit since then. Even if this type hit doesn’t happen every single play, they still happen and they are not rare. Some people argue that NFL players, and franchises, should not be allowed risk their lives for the sake of a game, and that in fact, the NFL should be banned for good.
While I agree that football players should not be putting their lives at risk, I don’t think banning the NFL is the answer. Instead, I think the NFL needs to remake the rules of football so that player safety is a top priority. And this needs to be done imminently. Most importantly, the NFL needs new stricter rules banning dangerous hits to head, which included severe penalties and even suspension for violations. Further, the NFL should partner manufacturers of football gear to improve padding on helmets and uniforms, improving protection for players. There are many problems with the safety of football, but I believe that the NFL is also coming to the same conclusions on its own safety.
While safety is a huge issue, it would be wrong to ban NFL football, and allow dangerous sports like professional boxing and wrestling to continue. In boxing and wrestling, the players are paid to fight, punch, kick, and knock each other out, while in football they are tackling, and not all hits are to the head. Sports Science shows that Conor Mcgregor, an Irish professional mixed martial artist and professional boxer who is currently signed to the Ultimate Fighting Championship, has an average punch the equivalent 845 pounds of force; that’s like getting hit by a 10-foot sledgehammer at 20 mph.
Another example is Floyd Mayweather, an American professional boxing promoter, and former professional boxer, was always known for defense and counter-attacks. His signature technique is called a pull counter, or a counter punch. After his opponent punches him, 0.1 seconds later, Floyd is able to punch him right back. The acceleration of this punch is 10.5Gs, and the acceleration of this punch is 338.1 feet per second squared, that’s around 3Gs faster than a viper's strike. The speed of Mayweather’s punch could easily knock out another boxer, a common occurrence in boxing, a sport in which people are constantly hit by strong and quick punches.
In addition, according to AANS.org, the highest number of estimated head injuries treated in U.S. hospital emergency rooms in 2009 are from cycling, nearly double the amount of football. Further, baseball and basketball are not far behind football for head injuries. AANS.org notes, “Every year, more than 500,000 people visit emergency rooms in the U.S. with bicycle-related injuries. In 2009, nearly 85,000 of those were head injuries. There are about 600 deaths a year, with two-thirds being attributed to TBI.”
The NFL should not be banned, and if you were to ban professional football, there are other sports that should also be banned. If the NFL was banned,millions of people would be denied the joyful experience watching football every Sunday with their family and friends, rooting for their teams, and playing fantasy football on DraftKings and NFL.com. With some important improvements in safety, the NFL should continue to thrive.
