What Can the NFL Do?- Part III

What the NFL Can Do

The NFL has done a lot of research now on concussions and how much they actually affect the players who play the sport of football.  The problem the NFL has, though, is that they make roughly $9 billion dollars in profits and they do not necessarily want to hurt that by changing the game too much.  If they change the game too much they will definitely lose out on fans, which in turn hurts their profits significantly.  The fans are the people who make sure the NFL as a business keeps running; they pay for the tickets, merchandise, concessions, and even the TV contracts.  Overall, the fans are a major component to making this business work, and the NFL does not and should not want to change the game to a level that would make them lose fans.

There are many ways the NFL can handle this situation so they do not lose out on their profits and their fans, yet still protect the players.  The different things that can be done include; creating and implementing a new helmet, upgrading testing technology and procedures, enforcing the penalty on the field, and creating a governing system to handle punishment.  All of these things would both improve protection, and keep the fans somewhat happy.

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There is no helmet that can completely eliminate concussions, but as time progresses, there is always more and more technology being created to increase protection.  This new technology has already been designed by a company called Riddell.  Riddell is a football equipment company that makes the protective equipment for the NFL.  Riddell has created a new helmet, called the Riddell 360, which is supposed to redefine protection of a player’s head.  As stated before, an average player receives 950 hits to the head during one season, so the main source to improve head safety would be to improve the helmet.  Brittany Sauser said, Riddell has now created this new helmet to help reduce the impact a hit has on the front of a players head.  The helmet does this by the use of a newly designed facemask, made of carbon steel and another flexible material, according to Sauser.  This new facemask is able to flex and reduce the amount of impact on the rest of the head.  Sauser claims research shows that 70% of hits to the head are in the front of the head, so now this helmet protects that area much more.  This new helmet is supposed to go into effect next football season.  According to Sauser, Riddell has gathered statistics on head injuries using its own HIT technology, a system that employs sensor-equipped helmets to measure the location, magnitude, and direction of hits experienced during a game or practice.  Over all, this new helmet will not eliminate head injuries, but it definitely will help transfer the force of impact off of the front of the head and help to reduce concussions.

The next area that needs to improve is the technology on the field to help read the impact of collisions and to test the level of damage to the head on the field.  According to Dr. Chirban, “A main focus of the NFL's research this season has involved impact testing; specifically how they can effectively measure the impact a hit has on a player's brain at the time of the injury.”  The NFL has now looked into putting sensors into uniforms, specifically helmets, to record the impact of a hit, because no player wants to come out of a game if they do not need to, Dr. Chirban also said.  The NFL can also use this information for more research on head injuries.  The NFL plans to put this system into place as early as next season.  There will also be a new system of procedures to evaluate a head injury on the field to see if a player can come back in.  Gary Mihoces claims that the new procedures are called "Sports Concussion Assessment Tool 2" or "SCAT2."  This new system will consist of a checklist and a list of tests to help analyze whether or not a player has a concussion or not, according to Mihoces.  This new system with sensors in uniforms and a set of procedures to evaluate a player will help determine if a player can come back into the game or not, which makes the fans happy.

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Another area the NFL needs to improve to help make players safe on the field would be their rules and officiating.  One of the major things the NFL could do to keep the players safe would be to simply strongly enforce the penalty on the field.  On many occasions last season, players had helmet to helmet collisions with other players, which cause head injury, and there were no flags thrown.  An example of this would be when James Harrison knocked two Cleveland Brown players out of the game with concussions on helmet-to-helmet hits, and neither of the hits was ever penalized on the field, but both the hits ended up getting Harrison fines up to $75,000.  The referees simply throwing the flags on illegal hits to the head sends a strong message to the players, because no player wants his team to have to give up 15 yards for his hit on another player.  The NFL has developed rules to protect players from getting hit in the head, yet in some cases the refs did not even penalize the players on the field.  Greg Easterbrook suggests the NFL should eject players from the game for malicious hits to the head, because that would even send a stronger message to the players. (Easterbrook)  Taking away a player’s actual playing time, even if it were for one quarter, would send a very stern message and the players would take the hint about how serious the NFL is.  When the NFL fines players for hits they make on the field, it just fires the players up, which in turn makes the fans not happy.  So if the NFL simply enforces the penalty on the field and/or suspends the player for a game, it would send a very strong message and the players will change the way they hit other players.  Not one player wants to do something that will jeopardize their team, so with both of these punishments dealing directly with that thought will reduce the amount of dangerous hits on the field.  Fining a player only hurts that one player, whereas these two punishments hurt the whole team so it will be more effective.  Overall, the referees need to enforce these penalties and rules on the field so that the players receive the message that the NFL is serious, because they do not necessarily need to do it by fining the players for their hits.

When the NFL does face a situation where a player needs to be fined or suspended for either multiple offenses or a malicious hit to another player, then they should listen to an idea thought up by one of their own players.  Troy Polamalu, a safety for the Pittsburgh Steelers, has been on record suggesting that the NFL use a governing system to dish out the punishment for these types of hits.  "There needs to be some type of separation of power, like our government," Polamalu said.  "I don't think it should be based totally on what two or three people may say that are totally away from the game. It should be some of the players that are currently playing." (Walker)  Polamalu has created a good solution to this punishment problem.  The NFL should create a panel of former and current players, coaches, and/or managers to debate on the hits and figure out an appropriate punishment for a player.  As of right now, according to James Walker, the commissioner has too much power when it comes to deciding punishment for the hits, and this has led to unhappy players and fans.   A governing body or panel to review the hits and decide punishment would be a lot more effective than to just have one or two men decide the penalty.  Polamalu believes it should be set up like a democracy, since that is what our country runs on, and this is our country’s most popular sport.  Evidence that suggests Polamalu’s proposal will work better than the current system can be seen in the Judiciary branch of the US Government.  Obivously it would be on a lot smaller scale, but the NFL could base this system off of the court rooms, and specifically the jury part.  I am not suggesting that the NFL should hold hearings for each dangerous hit; what I am saying is that if the NFL made a panel to review the hits, it could act like a jury would in the court system and make a decision on the correct form of punishment that should be handed out.  In conclusion, this idea that Polamalu had, would help to tone down the harsh punishments, but still hand out effective punishment for the players who decide to hit other players that way.