There are, on average, about 700 tackles per team per season. Today, there are 32 NFL teams. In 1920, there were 14 teams. The NFL has played 102 seasons. So that’s about 1.6 million tackles in pro football games across all teams and all seasons.
Just a SWAG, but double that to account for practices, scrimmages, preseason games, exhibition games, etc. So you have 3.2 million tackles over the past 102 years.
Another SWAG - 20% of tackles are chest hits (probably a lot higher). That’s over 650,000 chest tackles.
The tackle has to hit in a 5 millisecond window to cause commotio cordis. So the odds are 5/1,000 = 0.5% that the timing would be “right.”
5% fo 650,000 = 3,284 total tackles occurring at the right instant to cause commotio cordis.
College football has 254 D1 teams and 169 D2 teams. That is 13 times the number of NFL teams.
So, including both NFL and College football, that would suggest over 46,000 potential cases of commotio cordis in pro and college football from 1920 to today. Suppose only 5% of those hits in the 5 ms window actually caused commotio cordis. That’s still 2,300 cases.
Yet we have only ONE such serious medical injury by that cause?
Correct, based on your mathematical analysis, an unbiased clinician would look for some other cause contributed to his cardiac arrest.
What could it possibly be?
The tackle has to hit in a 5 millisecond window to cause commotio cordis. So the odds are 5/1,000 = 0.5% that the timing would be “right.”
= = =
I am following your methods and calcs. Good approach.
But in the statement above, you have assumed that the 5 millisecond window occurs with a 1 second timeframe. How often does this 5 ms window occur? Once per second, or once per heartbeat? If the pulse rate is greater than 60, then the 5 ms windows would be closer together. Like twice as often for a 120 heart rate. And what is the instantaneous heart rate in the middle of a play and tackle?
Should this be a part of your calcs?
One that you know of.
There have been 200 or so cases like this, in all sports. Ever.
It is rare. But not unknown.