Posted on 10/18/2010 10:35:15 AM PDT by Mind Freed
NEW YORK -- The NFL could soon start suspending players for dangerous helmet-to-helment hits, vice president of football operations Ray Anderson told The Associated Press on Monday.
A day after several scary collisions in Sunday's games, Anderson acknowledged the league might need to do more than fining players to prevent such hits. "There's strong testimonial for looking readily at evaluating discipline, especially in the areas of egregious and elevated dangerous hits," he said in a phone interview. "Going forward there are certain hits that occurred that will be more susceptible to suspension. There are some that could bring suspensions for what are flagrant and egregious situations."
Anderson said the NFL could make changes in its approach immediately, with Commissioner Roger Goodell having the final say. League officials will consult with the union, but he didn't expect any opposition.
(Excerpt) Read more at sports.espn.go.com ...
Why not just go to two hand touch and call it a day.
Just take their helmets away and leave all the other “padding” on. The ferocity of hits as well as head-first hits will be much better.
I think the hits to the head are unacceptable. Two occurred in the Browns/Steelers game. While both might be legal under league rules, they are very dangerous.
While I’ve had enough of the ‘pink’ stuff...the fact is this year has so far featured quite a few unnecessary helmet to helmet shots on receivers, quarterbacks.
It won’t stop via fines, if that was the case it wouldn’t be a problem.
They aren’t telling them not to hit so hard, they want them to not hit so HIGH. As more and more data is coming out about head injuries and NFL players the league is finally starting to look at the long term costs of what it does. When players like Chris Henry who never missed any games due to head injury wind up with permanent brain damage they know there’s a problem. The science is telling us that pretty much every blow to the head does brain damage and all brain damage is permanent, so they want players to aim lower, fewer hits to the head, less brain damage to the players, fewer retired players with the emotional problems brain damage causes, fewer scary headlines that cause parents to not let their kids play football.
Desean’s deal looked like a collision. Heck they were both in bad shape. A hit isn’t suppose to be suicide, but how do you fine a collision? This is not an arguement for head hits, however.
Bingo. I don't know how many times I've made this comment while watching a game. There is no way a player would go flying in leading with his head and risking paralyzation if he wasn't wearing a helmet and full body armor. I'd go all the way though and take away all the padding. The hitting in international rugby and the Australian Football League is every bit as intense as it is in the NFL. It would make the game faster and more exciting too.
There are rules in every sport, even MMA. Certain things are allowed, certain things not.
Case in point: the guy yesterday that suffered a concussion (Jackson). It looked to me like a deliberate hit and the guy delivering it had to know it wasn’t sportsmanlike.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAR_zEvT7dM&feature=related
If it’s pambyism...then let’s let baseball pitchers deliberately hit a batter with the ball with no penalty, or a basketball player jump on the back of another player. The way I see it it’s just rules to make the game “fair” and maintain a certain level of sportsmanship.
We should revise the rules for boxing too ... the gloves should be taken off and only slaps to the face are allowed. This has the added benefit of letting women participate in the sport as well. </sarc
The other side of this is, these guys are professionals. We see the game at full speed, athletes see the game as a whole, much like a pilot sees the instrument panel,so asking them to start changing their aim point is not a huge deal, in fact it will make the game better.
That frightening DeShawn Jackson hit should cost that player one game suspension. I don’t think Jackson will ever be the same.
I saw the hit DeSean Jackson took in the Falcons/Eagles game, very scary, but it couldn't have been avoided. The DB broke towards the ball and he and Jackson collided at full speed. There was nothing dirty, or even questionable about the hit. It's an extremely fast, contact sport. No way they're going to take that out of the game.
Hell, just turn it into the National Flag Football League.
No tackling allowed.
I saw a Pats safety take a shot at another player’s head for nothing more than an attempt at intimidation. The impact could have given the defenseless player a brain injury or a broken neck.
But hey, sack up and deal with it, busted up player. This is the NFL.
actually, punching a guy with padding allows you to hit someone harder.
The first of those two (the one on Cribs) was not at all intentional. Harrison had committed into diving at the direction Cribs was heading before Cribs got tripped up, falling forward. If Cribs didn't start heading to the ground, Harrison hits his legs, not his head.
The game is so fast, especially when guys like Cribs have the ball, I don't know how you prevent those kind of hits. Maybe make every player wear 20 pound ankle weights to slow them down. ;~))
A tackle involves grabbing a player and bringing him to the ground. What does smashing a helmet into another player’s head have to do with that?
We’re 6 weeks into the season and every week so far has seen at least 2 players get concussions. That’s just not acceptable.
Let me just be clear that I am not condoning violent hits that are meant to purposely injure someone. I just think that the hit on Jackson was a case of two players going full speed and for the ball. The player who made the hit looked to me like he was starting to bend down and trying to get more shoulder pad on him then helmet, but Jackson was coming in pretty fast. It’s a horrible thing to see someone get hurt like that and I hope that he can still play the same when he gets better. Unfortunately, there are always going to be hits like this in the NFL, I guess it’s just up to the ref’s to determine what the penalty should be. I have not looked at the statistics though, so I haven’t seen that the number of these hits and the injuries to players have increased.
Saturday a Rutgers college football player tackled someone from Army. He broke his neck and is now paralyzed from the neck down.
Something needs to be done and no I am not namby pamby but the game is supposed to be fun not a vehicle to the intensive care ward in a hospital.
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