Tackling the NFL’s Tackling Problem
Today’s NFL is dangerous. It’s reckless. It’s destroying its future.
The National Football league is a league predicated on the necessity for big plays and big hits. It always has been. People gather around their televisions for hours to see people get flipped upside down and obliterated in stunning high definition. However, as much as we love to watch it, these plays are destroying the game and leading the NFL to a path of low quality talent and sub par play.
What is this hit? Did Vontaze Burfict, number 55 for the Cincinatti Bengals, make any attempt to dislodge the ball or bring down Antonio Brown, number 84 for the Steelers, in a way that would agree with some standard football fundamentals? No, he didn’t. This was a malicious hit, aimed at the head of the best player for the Pittsburgh Steelers. Yes, Burfict did get penalized and he will receive a suspension to start the next season, but will that cure Antonio Brown’s concussion or whatever long term affects a hit like this will have on his mental health? Absolutely not.
These hits are now even more the rage with a concussion suit against the NFL ending last year in what many deemed a minuscule fine that did not capture the true effect that the NFL is profiting regardless of the bodies and lives it destroys. 3 players killed themselves between 2011 and 2013 because of head trauma sustained while playing in the NFL. One of those players even took the life of his long time girlfriend and mother of his child. The lawsuit ended in a settlement that will cost the NFL more than $900 million over the next 65 years.
The problem with football, and the alarming rate of NFL injuries, is intrinsic to the nature of the sport itself. NFL football is a gladiator sport where the gladiators are padded and made to feel invincible and incapable of destruction or self harm. This fact causes the players to play at 100% at all times, flying around the field at top speed without a care in the world about their bodies or protecting them. It’s basically the scenario when your older brother wrapped you in blankets and pillows and said “Christopher, let me hit you with this bat and tell me if you feel it.” You would probably say “Hell yeah. And get it on video so we can put it on YouTube.” It’s the endorphin stimulating feeling of being invincible. It’s the only sport that fully pads its athletes in semi protective bubbles, then straps a weapon to their head and calls it a helmet.
If you took away all the pads and helmets and told the football players to play with the same rules, it would be the game would be infinitely safer. I’m not saying that’s the answer to our issue here, but it makes us think of the other major contact sport that doesn’t require its players to wear pads. Rugby.
Rugby is also a violent sport and is no stranger to injuries. However, the injuries do occur in a place that is not common in american football so translating their playing style would not translate their same injuries to the National Football League. According to a 2013 article from The Guardian, Jim McKenna discusses that the helmet in american football is a major factor in the influx of head injuries and all other injuries in american football, and the reason there is a lack of those same injuries in rugby. Rugby has a growing epidemic in spinal injuries caused by scrums and the amount of piled bodies placed on the lower back of players. These injuries won’t translate because the NFL doesn’t have similar organized scrums. The biggest noticeable difference between rugby and american football is the tackling philosophy. Rugby players aim for the thighs of the ball carrier, keep their head up at all times, and wrap up like their lives depended on it. The football view, although taught the same, shows players lowering their heads or diving shoulder first at an opponents legs. You will rarely see a rugby player leave their feet without first extending their arms to wrap up, whereas this is commonplace in the NFL.
Rob Gronkowski, and many larger players in the NFL have been the victim of many low hits. As shown in this is picture, Cleveland Browns safety TJ Ward has no intention on wrapping up. He fully intends on taking out the knees of Gronkowski without seeing if he is successful or not. This is a dangerous play, albeit fully legal in the rules, and ends in a multitude of knee injuries. If TJ Ward had kept his head up and made the conscious effort to wrap his arms around the upper thighs of Gronkowski, then Gronk may have been able to finish this season without another ACL surgery.
Some coaches have already started teaching their players rugby tackling philosophy, like Pete Carroll.
As much as I despise the Seahawks, he is doing the right thing here by teaching a tackling technique that takes the head out of tackling. This is the only way to save the NFL. The key here is that he says you can work on this method without pads or protective equipment. That shows that this method is safe. The most important thing for the future is teaching proper tackling and maintaining safety first football. You cannot play football if every young kid in america knows it’s basically a death sentence.
That leads us to the final point here. Just like all change in America it starts from the roots. There have been efforts in the heads up tackling initiative, but until players like Dashon Goldson, Donte Whitner, Vontaze Burfict, and DJ Swearinger stop launching their heads at other players on national tv we won’t end this problem. You think anyone wants to play wide receiver in a league where you may not remember what your name is after the game, or play tight end where losing an ACL is the norm. I think they’d rather play basketball or baseball where they won’t be worried about who is going to pay for their concussion related Alzheimer’s treatment 30 years from now.
