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Hey there Dakka,

I was reading an article today over my lunch break on the NFL and its concussion problem, which got me to thinking.... As many of you know the American Federal Government is taking a keen interest in this issue of concussive injuries sustained by athletes (they are focusing on football, but also have some stuff dabbled in from Baseball and Hockey as well).


Following this train of thought, I got to thinking about one of my absolute favorite sports: Rugby Union, and so among a couple of questions, one of the big ones here is mostly directed at you fellas from the UK, Australia, NZ, etc. where Rugby is a very big sport.


Do your local/national governments collectively or individually "meddle" in the affairs of professional sports the way the US's does? Do you feel that it is the JOB of government of any level or type to be involved in professional sports in this manner?

This is what happens when the government does research into making better head protection (ACH=Advance Combat Helmet).

Not really.
There are governing bodies that change to rules but unless the government make a direct ruling on a sport they tend to leave them alone...

 Jihadin wrote:
This is what happens when the government does research into making better head protection (ACH=Advance Combat Helmet).

yeah... and now we have a little computer sensor thing in the top of our ACHs... dunno who else is getting them, but my BCT got them for this upcoming deployment.


However, my issue isn't with them using us soldiery as "guinea pigs" for head trauma research, but rather them attempting to legislate how sports are played.

Find a ingenious way to work your "glitter tape" around it

I don't think i've ever heard of our Govenment "meddling" in the way pro sports are played. I imagine their would be a bit of a stink kicked up if they did meddle though.

The NFL is an employer operating in the U.S. and is running a buisness in which wokers(players) are suffering career ending job-related injuries with long term health complications.

Ultimately this DOES fall under OSHA (a federal agency run by the Dept. of Labor) even though they have done little to address working conditons in the NFL up to this point.

The deaths of NFL players (Stringer of the vikings in 2001 for example was investigated by them) has put the NFL on OSHA's radar, and now considering the breadth and magnitude of the concussion problem and the fact OSHA set precident by examining the Stringer case, it is likely the agency is motivated or being told to look into this issue, especially given the magnitude of former players who have sued the NFL and the recent high-profile deaths of players such as Easterling, Dave Duerson, and Junior Seau.

The question is why wouldn't they and why shouldnt they?

Football was almost banned in 1906, (I believe that is the year), but implementing more strict and safety rules saved it.

The game was a different game this, a lot more violent, lot less equipment and quality of it but heard a doctor say that the size and speed of today's players have surpassed the safety provided by the equipment.

There may be less deaths now, but the few that do happen to trigger the alert signs, in particular to parents who's kids are playing football right now. If there are studies that connect that serious brain damage causes mental health issues from contact football 1 of 2 things will happen. Parents will not let their kids play football or try to ban it. Something like this will generally start from the ground up.

Goodell has been very unpopular with his latest safety rules, but what he is doing is more or less removing a target on the league from the government and disgruntled parents.

It doesn't help that pads can be used as weapons.

Australian sport is tightly tied to government. Most stadiums get built with major contributions from state or federal government, and the Department of Sport works closely with every major sporting body to encourage kids to get out and play sport. That said, in terms of rules the sports are entirely self-regulated at the professional level.

This works pretty well as there's a general understanding that sports which get linked to serious injuries, particularly to the head, die out in popularity pretty quickly. In Australian the two largest professional sporting bodies*, for aussie rules football and rugby league, have undertaken reforms of their rules to show a cleaner version of the sport that avoids serious head injury.

This happened for a lot of reasons, but one of the big ones were that oth sports noted that at the junior level soccer was the most played sport, because Mums were having an increasing say in what their kids played, and they worried about head injuries.


That said, blood sports have heavy regulation. You can't organise a boxing match, even a match of three one minute rounds without getting a licence. And in that regard boxing should stand as a warning to American Football - along with baseball it was the big money, premier sport of the first half of the 20th century. It now exists entirely on the fringe of modern sport, there's still a lot of money in it for winners but its disappeared from the mainstream consciousness almost entirely - do you think 5% of the population could tell you who the heavy weight champion is?

A large part of this is because the sport got linked to long term brain injury. Whether its government, or the NFL or someone else, it is only reasonable for American Football to heed that warning and make it doesn't drift out of being one of the US' premier sports.

Amaya wrote:It doesn't help that pads can be used as weapons.

This.

This is the problem with Hockey, and it is apparent in Football as well. There is no need for hard-shell pads other than to cause injury to the other player.

Piston Honda wrote:The game was a different game this, a lot more violent, lot less equipment and quality of it but heard a doctor say that the size and speed of today's players have surpassed the safety provided by the equipment.

Yep. In fact a lot of folks think Rugby has fewer serious injuries because the players don't have the illusion of safety that the pads and helmets give American Football players. They think the pads will protect them, and they DO protect them from some stuff, but when you're talking about guys THAT big moving THAT fast, they can still quite easily snap limbs and occasionally necks.

There may be less deaths now, but the few that do happen to trigger the alert signs, in particular to parents who's kids are playing football right now. If there are studies that connect that serious brain damage causes mental health issues from contact football 1 of 2 things will happen. Parents will not let their kids play football or try to ban it. Something like this will generally start from the ground up.

Yup. Lots of parents don't want their kids anywhere near a football field. Concussions have permanent effects, and each one (IIRC) tends to make you more vulnerable to future brain injuries.

 Mannahnin wrote:

Yup. Lots of parents don't want their kids anywhere near a football field. Concussions have permanent effects, and each one (IIRC) tends to make you more vulnerable to future brain injuries.

Had 3 concussions when I did play, not fun experiences. Interesting enough, all 3 came against the same high school, a high school I am sure where they went to Pelican Bay and got all the ax murderers to play for them. No way those guys were 14 on up. Have many other injuries, one of the most embarrassing one was headbutting a guy with his helmet on. Busted open my eye brow, got the team a penalty and kicked out of the game.