I’m sure 5-10 years ago Jaren Hall would’ve finished that game last week, media would’ve called him a “tough kid”. So I guess there’s that
All depends on how you define progress, probably in managing it but not much in preventing. I doubt you would make serious reduction without eliminating the defense or making it flag football.
Didn’t it turn out that concussions weren’t the direct problem regarding CTE? I suppose the league can measure and do something about concussions, but not linemen headbutting each other 100 times a game.
Give skilled position players the option to play with a flag. Penalty if you tackle someone with a flag. Tradeoff is that it’s harder to get yards after the catch, but dramatically lower risk of injury for these critical players.
I would expect nearly all QBs to use this option, and many older and more injury-prone players.
How do you prevent a WR from making a catch if you can’t play the body at the point of the catch? Put a flag on any skill player and they immediately become unguardable. No corner in the league is good enough to clamp even a league average WR with only deflections and interceptions (especially with all the other rules that boost offensive production)
I’ll trade you one concussion for 5 torn Achilles…
I think the solution might be the NFL investing millions of dollars into football helmet research to come up with a helmet that actually protects the brain. These current helmets are designed to protect the skull, not the brain…there is a difference.
Technology advances every single year…at some point someone will have a breakthrough. Just have to make the effort to start that resarch on the league’s behalf…not on private helmet companies’ behalfs.
As a 49er fan, the death of Dwight Clark in his mid 50s to ALS really hits hard and was a big reality check about the long term effects of those small headhits…even the ones that don’t get diagnosed as concussions.
The NFL need to put their moey where their mouth is and start a research program into helmet improvements.
Two steps away from implementing player-worn flags. Someone farts on the sideline and a fine is handed down.