Pro Football Players Die at a Higher Rate than Pro Baseball Players

The Scientist ^ | May 2019 | News

[GuavaCheesePuff]

An analysis of the causes of death of 3,419 former athletes in the National Football League and 2,708 former Major League Baseball players finds that football players suffer a mortality rate nearly 1.3 times higher than baseball players. The study, published last week (May 24) in JAMA Network Open, calculated NFLers to be 2.5 times more likely to succumb to cardiovascular disease and nearly three times more likely to die from neurodegenerative disease than MLB players.

The underlying reason for the disparity is not known, and it’s unclear if it has to do with elements of the sports themselves, such as the high level of contact in football compared with baseball, and the tendency for football players to weigh more.

[Karl Spooner]

The mortality rate of ex-pro boxers would have been an interesting study, too.

[Yaelle]

Really? You mean if you play baseball your chances of dying are lower than 100%??

[norwaypinesavage]

They all die at the same rate - 100%. There’s obviously some missing information here.

[Cementjungle]

Heavyweights vs lightweights perhaps

[PhiloBedo]

Let me take a wild guess as the reason. NFL players are basically thugs who go back (or never left) the “hod” lifestyle. Thus, end up being gunned down in a drug deal gone bad, or simply being dissed by another brother. Then there’s the drug overdoses, for massive consumption that leads to an early demise.

Where’s my grant money?

[PhiloBedo]

err...”hood”.

[TomGuy]

Baseball players are not getting pummeled on nearly every play of the game.

[DoodleBob]

Let's go to the tote board for football players, baseball players...and musicians:

So what have we learned?

-The avg age of death for football players at 59.6 is higher than that of baseball players at 66.7 years.
-Male musicians die earlier in general than female musicians.
-Rock stars die about 20 years earlier than the general population
-with an average age of death around 47, rock stars die earlier than football or baseball players.
-However, blues, jazz, and gospel musicians live longer than the general population.

[DoodleBob]

Let's go to the tote board for football players, baseball players...and musicians:

So what have we learned?

-The avg age of death for football players at 59.6 is higher than that of baseball players at 66.7 years.
-Male musicians die earlier in general than female musicians.
-Rock stars die about 20 years earlier than the general population
-with an average age of death around 47, rock stars die earlier than football or baseball players.
-However, blues, jazz, and COUNTRY musicians live longer than the general population.

[Steven Scharf]

An analysis of the causes of death of 3,419 former athletes in the National Football League and 2,708 former Major League Baseball players finds that football players suffer a mortality rate nearly 1.3 times higher than baseball players.

The article is describing the study incorrectly. Only 517 of the NFL players 431 of the MLB have died. The universe of selected players is 3,419 from the National Football League and 2,708 former Major League Baseball.

I really hate articles that cite articles that report of issues like this.

The original staudy report: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2734063?utm_source=For_The_Media&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=ftm_links&utm_term=052419

White race of the total groups was 60% for the NFL and 77% for MLB.

Cardiovascular were noted as underlying or contributing causes in 498 deaths in the NFL and 225 deaths in the MLB. Neurodegenerative conditions in 39 NFL players and 16 MLB players.

[BookmanTheJanitor]

Something tells me that a man weighing 300 pounds will tend to die sooner than a man weighing 180.

Yep. I went to a 20th reunion of one of my college teams and some of the defensive backs looked like linemen. Most of the linemen looked like fatter linemen. Years of eating large to gain weight/muscle for football had continued after football was over and the cardio had stopped.

[hinckley buzzard]

I know. Ridiculous, isn’t it.

[BookmanTheJanitor]

From a different source....The researchers determined based on their study that in hypothetical populations of 1,000 NFL and MLB athletes followed up to 75 years of age, the NFL players would have 21 more all-cause deaths, 77 more cardiovascular-contributed deaths and 11 more neurodegenerative-contributed deaths.

Really surprised the neurodegenerative deaths weren’t at a higher rate in the NFL.

[the OlLine Rebel]

Gee, I thought their death rate would be the same.

[Terabitten]

The mortality rate is the same for everyone: 100%.

Nobody gets out of life alive.

[rlmorel]

You can’t die from a hangnail the affects your throwing hand.

[boop]

That is very interesting, Doodle.

Someone should do a study of comedians.

Seems they die young or roughly at Methuselah's age.

RIP, John Candy, John Belushi, John Pinette.

Or maybe check out SNL alums.

They die young, too.

[foreverfree]

Bump

[DoodleBob]

The SNL fandom page on deceased cast members lists 8 deceased alumni. Their average age at death is 51.375. However, skewing the results is George Coe, a minor cast member who was 86 when he died. If you remove him, the average age falls to 46.43, which puts comedians' avg age of death in line with rock stars.

[lepton]

Maybe I am wrong here, but don’t they both have a 100% death rate?

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Not quite yet...but eventually.