When NFL Hall of Fame tailback Tony Dorsett was getting slammed to the turf in the 1970s or Super Bowl-winning quarterback Joe Theismann’s leg was being gruesomely broken by Lawrence Taylor in the 1980s, it was just NFL football.
Now things are different.
Scientific studies show head trauma can leave long-term damage. Hundreds of former players are suing the NFL in US federal court, saying they were not protected properly from injury. The US Congress is paying close attention.
Part of the reason the New Orleans Saints were punished so severely for their bounty system could be, as league commissioner Roger Goodell said when explaining his decision, that nothing is as critical for the league right now as the safety of players and real concern about concussions.
In the current climate, those issues seem to permeate every decision made at NFL headquarters.
“They’re not unrelated. You can certainly see the rules of the National Football League have changed over the years. What used to be considered normal player conduct that could result in serious injury has been expressly prohibited by the rules,” US Senator Dick Durbin said in a telephone interview on Thursday.
“Teams are dramatically more sensitive now to concussions and how soon a player is ready to play again. It shows awareness of the fact that what happens on a football field is more than a game,” Durbin said. “Some of these injuries can have an impact on a person’s life. It also is an indication that those of us, as fans, should hold these leagues to a higher standard.”
Durbin is organizing a congressional Judiciary Committee hearing to examine whether bounties in major sports should be considered a crime. He plans to invite witnesses from the NFL, along with officials from the NBA, NHL, Major League Baseball and college sports.
At an October 2009 US House of Representatives hearing on brain trauma in the NFL, Goodell was taken to task by lawmakers for not doing enough about concussions amid a growing body of medical literature linking head injuries in football with brain disease. That set in motion a series of changes to the league’s policies on head injuries — and they keep on coming.
On Wednesday, a few hours after the NFL announced its unprecedented penalties against the Saints, the chairman of the league’s competition committee, Atlanta Falcons president Rich McKay, talked about proposals that will be considered next week at the owners’ meetings in Palm Beach, Florida.
Among the proposals are:
‧ Allowing each team to designate one player per week who can go on the inactive list because of a concussion and be replaced on the roster.
‧ Expanding the rule that prohibits horse-collar tackles to also have it cover quarterbacks who are in the pocket.
‧ Expanding the protection of defenders from crackback blocks by also deeming them defenseless players who cannot be hit in the head or get hit by someone leading with a helmet.
“The protection of the players is the big thing,” New York Jets coach Rex Ryan said. “You don’t have a league without the players.”
Goodell’s stern punishment of those involved in the Saints’ bounty system sent a message to everyone in the NFL: Do not encourage deliberately injuring players. Goodell was also harsh because of attempts to cover up the bounties.
He suspended Saints head coach Sean Payton for all of next season, and indefinitely banned their former defensive coordinator, Gregg Williams, who was recently hired by the St Louis Rams. Saints general manager Mickey Loomis was barred for half of the upcoming season, an assistant coach got a six-game ban and the team was also docked two second-round draft picks and US$500,000.
One of the former players suing the NFL, former Saints receiver Joe Horn, has no doubt there is a connection between the -concussion-related court cases and Goodell’s actions.
“All of a sudden, he wants to pop his chest out and set up these [punishments]? If he was a great commissioner and he really cared about player safety, he would have fined teams five years ago for what happened, because it happened back then,” Horn said. “[Goodell] should fine himself US$7 million, because as the commissioner, he should have known years ago this same thing was happening with every other team in the NFL.”
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