The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

American football: One of the country’s favorite pastimes is also one of the most dangerous.

Characterized by hard tackles and intense speeds, the sport is conducive to a number of serious injuries, but there is one that has received a substantial amount of attention: mild traumatic brain injury and concussions. In 2012, the National Football League (NFL) experienced a total of 189 concussions during their regular season, translating to more than 11 concussions each week.

And those are just the statistics for professional players. College players experience an average of 2.5 concussions for every 1,000 “game-related exposures,” and 25,000 players between the ages of 8 and 19 are taken to emergency rooms for concussions each year. With the rates of these head injuries either increasing or stabilizing over the past 50 years, many health experts have started referring to this football trend as the “concussion epidemic.”

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So what is the solution? As more people turn their attention to this problem, an increasing amount of focus has been placed on the football helmet. Many experts claim that it’s failing at its job; not only does the helmet’s design fall short of proper concussion protection, but some say the presence of the head gear may actually encourages players to hit with their heads.

This argument has led some player advocates to offer up a drastic solution: Banning football helmets altogether.

It’s a radical idea, but they claim that discussion on the topic is needed – in order to spark a paradigm shift in the way the game of football is played.

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Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Will never happen!

We have all seen WRs landing on their back after making a catch and the back of their head hitting the turf. A lot of them get a concussion and the defender never touched them; are we going to take their helmets away as well?

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Dumb article. Wack question being posed.

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Is it? The author appears to be every bit as smart as Sherman of the SeaHags.

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Why not just improve the design of a helmet. Taking away a helmet is like breaking a pencil in half instead of sharpening it.

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Better design of a helmet is a good idea and helmets have changed since the early days of football. Helemts will continue to change. I agree with Schmohams.

Game rules have changed and can continue to change such as headbutting/helmet to helmet is a fine, lost of play for that players ' team.

To not have helmets is to have touch football adn to ahve have touch football is to pay players oh maybe, $75,000 a person, tops pay.
LOL!!!! Take about high priced things for the NFL: advertisments, Superbowl week festivities and events, and more.
The NFL would not be as we know it.
Yeah, totally ridiculous. I agree with Smashmouth and rez.

What is disturbing about teh article is that in the little leagues , there are too many injuries.
Blame it on overzealous parents and their shortcomings because they did not make it in life and they have dreams of their kid becoming the next big thing in the NFL some day. Blame it one coaches and refs who are not experienced enough and coaches who have shortcomings too.
College stats do not seem that bad.

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Maybe they could play without pads and a imagery ball too.
Like playing cowboys and indians as a kid.

Or play it like Bloodbowl

Orc QB passes 6 squares, roll dice 6, pass is on target.Orc reciever agilty(3) pass on target +1, need a 4(rolls dice) "6"

SCORE

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Its illogical. The argument that removing protection will make the game safer could be applied to multiple topics. let me know when it makes sense or has proven to make sense in the below. Not picking.. Just asking... Articles like this one come about when people get tunnel vision. Lets keep in mind that the helmet came about because of the dangerous play not vice-versa.


Lets remove motor cycle helmets, that will make riders slow down.
No more seat-belt laws, people will drive more carefully.
Lets make Mc Donalds coffee 350F so people will be more careful.

My favorite... Lets infuse all foods with sodium, cholesterol, and refined sugar... Surely people will eat less?


Football helmets are not flawed, they are not broken. There are limitations on how much they can protect however. Much like a bumper on your car, bumpers on cars do not save lives and no one has thought about removing them to make driving safer. They have limitations...

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Yep! Remove the helmet, may as well remove the pads.. Lets use a bigger softer ball also.

Bam! Rugby

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Fewer concussions and the ability to play for your entire life while remaining healthy? Sounds good to me.

People who wear helmets and pads play with a feeling like they are invincible......which they obviously are not.:bng:

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Then it is no longer American Football.

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

With Roger Godhell in charge it won't be American Football for long.:cool:

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Roger doesn't run the league.

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

The owners sure don't seem to dislike his ideas.

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

He's running the NFL.................in the ground.:rolleyes:

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

The main problem with concussion is not the direct blow to the head but that it sends the brain smashing against the cranium. Thats usually the big problem and what causes the concussion. Its also very hard to do anything about.

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Where this is all heading is helmets with sensors in them, which record the impacts and the force of the impacts, and then once you trigger a certain force, a bell rings somewhere and your helmet lights up and you are automatically out of the game. It WILL change the way the game is played, it will change the roster size and even impact coaching and strategy, but it will make it vastly safer by removing ANY arbitrary human element from the decision of who has gotten a concussion or who doesn't. When that happens you will see the game go towards more depth, more substitutions. Strategy will be about cobbling together a good scoring drive or two with your starters, before their bells all get rung, or resting players at first and then putting them in late in the game...

The other solution which sounds like lunacy but could actually work....is to make the helmets HUGE enormous puffy airbag type devices, so the players look like goofy bobble heads...looks silly to us, but I bet a modern helmet would look incredibly weird compared to an old-fashioned leather helmet, to someone of that era....

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Roger is the puppet for the 32 owners. The owners meet every year and decide the changes.

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Look at the newest generation of helmets. All the ones that receive 5 star ratings have wide facemasks that extend past the traditional field of view and wrap around most of the helmet. I expect that more teams are going to switch to the vengeance, xenith and riddell 360 model over traditional schutt and ridells.
As for big, puffy helmets-someone tried that before and the idea never picked up, google 'bulwark football helmet'.

Re: The concussion epidemic: Should helmets be banned from football?
 

Interesting info in your post, thanks.

I wonder if it didn't catch on because it doesn't really improve safety, or if it didn't catch on because it looks really weird. Which relates to part of my point in my post, which was, if they changed it, by the time the next generation of football fans and players came to get comfortable with it, it will no longer look weird. Things we take for granted today like foam padding on the goal posts, artificial turf, or the really bright dayglo orange styrofoam pegs in the end zone, that stuff used to be weird and unusual and a novelty in people's eyes, at one time.

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