Just wondering what others think about this recent development:

Not Safe for Children? Football’s Leaders Make Drastic Changes to Youth Game

A snippet:

Quote:The organization has created a new format that brings the game closer to flag football and tries to avoid much of the violence in the current version. Among the rule changes: Each team will have six to nine players on the field, instead of 11; the field will be far smaller; kickoffs and punts will be eliminated; and players will start each play in a crouching position instead of in a three-point stance.

“The issue is participation has dropped, and there’s concern among parents about when is the right age to start playing tackle, if at all,” said Mark Murphy, the president of the Green Bay Packers and a board member at USA Football.

Personally, I think it makes a ton of sense IF the new format is actually demonstrated to be safer in the long term. The head injury data are just stacking up too high to ignore. And I know there are those who think there are values that football can only instill in its full physical glory, but I have a hard time believing those values can't come from somewhere else if a parent is willing to think a little harder. I know there will be those who dismiss this as another step in the wussification of America, and I am interested in hearing those views.

Jon Gruden probably has the most entertaining quote in the article, by the way:

Quote:There are a lot of geniuses out there that are diminishing football right now. There are a lot of geniuses that are trying to damage the game, and ruin the game. Do you feel it? There are a lot of geniuses that want to eliminate all sports, including recess.

I'm pretty sure that after that, he removed a shiny homemade hat and passed around a petition to bring back the Flying Wedge.

Good grief...

I don't like it one bit.

Imagine: Your sitting in the stadium... it's 4th down... the video board says "MAKE SOME NOISE!" Guys like Ja'Von Rolland-Jones, Blaise Taylor, or Ironhead Gallon are chasing after Taylor Lamb or Brandon Silvers on 4th down... they are reaching for the QB's flag, about to "sack" him... fans in suspense waiting to hear the sound of velcro tearing off from a belt... and then it happens, and the flag falls to the ground... and the players and crowd go nuts!

College defensive athletes will be drafted based on their speed and ability to consistently grab a flag off of a hip.

And then the NFL will gravitate toward playing flag football. Players like Clay Matthews, Von Miller, and Richard Sherman grabbing flags off of Ezekiel Elliot, Dak Prescott, and Julio Jones. NFL play-by-play announcers showing slow-motion instant replays of an amazing flag grab (aka tackle). Every game must finish in a tie, so there are no losers. The winners AND losers of the Super Bowl receive a Lombardi Trophy.

And then 50 years later, flag football is considered too aggressive and dangerous. It evolves into touch football.

I've been thinking for a while that the evolution of football might end up like this:

still have human athletes, but they are are wired up into some kind of sophisticated suit and may not even be in the same location as each other. In any case, they will have robotic avatars that carry out the action on the field, they will be finely tuned into what the human "controllers" are doing and then the dangerous hits, tackles, etc. will just be the robots hitting each other, the humans will be contact free. Kind of like that movie Reel Steel with Hugh Jackman about the robot boxers. Of course then the robots may get tired of smashing into each other and achieve consciousness and want to fight back against us...kind of like Westworld.

(01-31-2017 01:54 PM)Pounce FTW Wrote:  Personally, I think it makes a ton of sense IF the new format is actually demonstrated to be safer in the long term. The head injury data are just stacking up too high to ignore. And I know there are those who think there are values that football can only instill in its full physical glory, but I have a hard time believing those values can't come from somewhere else if a parent is willing to think a little harder. I know there will be those who dismiss this as another step in the wussification of America, and I am interested in hearing those views.

If there's any evidence that playing football only through the college level increases risk of CTE or premature Alzheimer's, I haven't seen it yet. Most likely because it's not there, even before the new concussion protocols have been introduced.

This is an example of what Michael Crichton called "the Politico-legal media complex". Media needing headlines and lawyers needing people to sue and politicians in need of a crisis blow something out of proportion.

BTW, there's evidence in other sports that prolonged careers can cause CTE as well. Heck, pro-soccer players have rates of ALS that is pretty significantly higher than the population at large. But let's make football the story because it's viiiiiiiiiiiolent.

(01-31-2017 05:17 PM)EigenEagle Wrote:  

(01-31-2017 01:54 PM)Pounce FTW Wrote:  Personally, I think it makes a ton of sense IF the new format is actually demonstrated to be safer in the long term. The head injury data are just stacking up too high to ignore. And I know there are those who think there are values that football can only instill in its full physical glory, but I have a hard time believing those values can't come from somewhere else if a parent is willing to think a little harder. I know there will be those who dismiss this as another step in the wussification of America, and I am interested in hearing those views.

If there's any evidence that playing football only through the college level increases risk of CTE or premature Alzheimer's, I haven't seen it yet. Most likely because it's not there, even before the new concussion protocols have been introduced.

You're telegraphing that you doubt the results before they're even in. A few years of research doesn't mean that these studies are beyond their infancy. Articles like this explain that not every case of CTE in football players is for someone who played beyond college. The issue is that most of the brains studied (two-thirds in the case of that article) are from players who went on to the NFL, which is understandable at this point in the development of the research.

(01-31-2017 05:17 PM)EigenEagle Wrote:  This is an example of what Michael Crichton called "the Politico-legal media complex". Media needing headlines and lawyers needing people to sue and politicians in need of a crisis blow something out of proportion.

BTW, there's evidence in other sports that prolonged careers can cause CTE as well. Heck, pro-soccer players have rates of ALS that is pretty significantly higher than the population at large. But let's make football the story because it's viiiiiiiiiiiolent.

Indicting someone else for a similar crime doesn't make someone innocent.

(01-31-2017 04:36 PM)CardinalBlackTrojan Wrote:  Good grief...

I don't like it one bit.

Imagine: Your sitting in the stadium... it's 4th down... the video board says "MAKE SOME NOISE!" Guys like Ja'Von Rolland-Jones, Blaise Taylor, or Ironhead Gallon are chasing after Taylor Lamb or Brandon Silvers on 4th down... they are reaching for the QB's flag, about to "sack" him... fans in suspense waiting to hear the sound of velcro tearing off from a belt... and then it happens, and the flag falls to the ground... and the players and crowd go nuts!

College defensive athletes will be drafted based on their speed and ability to consistently grab a flag off of a hip.

And then the NFL will gravitate toward playing flag football. Players like Clay Matthews, Von Miller, and Richard Sherman grabbing flags off of Ezekiel Elliot, Dak Prescott, and Julio Jones. NFL play-by-play announcers showing slow-motion instant replays of an amazing flag grab (aka tackle). Every game must finish in a tie, so there are no losers. The winners AND losers of the Super Bowl receive a Lombardi Trophy.

And then 50 years later, flag football is considered too aggressive and dangerous. It evolves into touch football.

You know this is just for youth football, right? Like, probably, 11 years old and younger? Or are you really thinking that the slope is as slippery as you describe?

(01-31-2017 04:49 PM)boroeagle2 Wrote:  I've been thinking for a while that the evolution of football might end up like this:

still have human athletes, but they are are wired up into some kind of sophisticated suit and may not even be in the same location as each other. In any case, they will have robotic avatars that carry out the action on the field, they will be finely tuned into what the human "controllers" are doing and then the dangerous hits, tackles, etc. will just be the robots hitting each other, the humans will be contact free. Kind of like that movie Reel Steel with Hugh Jackman about the robot boxers. Of course then the robots may get tired of smashing into each other and achieve consciousness and want to fight back against us...kind of like Westworld.

And at that point, the purest form of football on Earth becomes...the Lingerie Football League.

(01-31-2017 06:41 PM)Pounce FTW Wrote:  

(01-31-2017 04:36 PM)CardinalBlackTrojan Wrote:  Good grief...

I don't like it one bit.

Imagine: Your sitting in the stadium... it's 4th down... the video board says "MAKE SOME NOISE!" Guys like Ja'Von Rolland-Jones, Blaise Taylor, or Ironhead Gallon are chasing after Taylor Lamb or Brandon Silvers on 4th down... they are reaching for the QB's flag, about to "sack" him... fans in suspense waiting to hear the sound of velcro tearing off from a belt... and then it happens, and the flag falls to the ground... and the players and crowd go nuts!

College defensive athletes will be drafted based on their speed and ability to consistently grab a flag off of a hip.

And then the NFL will gravitate toward playing flag football. Players like Clay Matthews, Von Miller, and Richard Sherman grabbing flags off of Ezekiel Elliot, Dak Prescott, and Julio Jones. NFL play-by-play announcers showing slow-motion instant replays of an amazing flag grab (aka tackle). Every game must finish in a tie, so there are no losers. The winners AND losers of the Super Bowl receive a Lombardi Trophy.

And then 50 years later, flag football is considered too aggressive and dangerous. It evolves into touch football.

You know this is just for youth football, right? Like, probably, 11 years old and younger? Or are you really thinking that the slope is as slippery as you describe?

I understand it's for youth football currently, but once youth football begins doing this, it's undoubtedly going to gravitate upward through the football ranks. Especially when parents that favor flag football over tackle football begin to go ballistic because their kids have graduated out of youth football and are about to learn how to tackle and take hits. It's going to wind up being a pressured move by parents to change the look of fundamental football and it's rules.

(01-31-2017 07:30 PM)CardinalBlackTrojan Wrote:  I understand it's for youth football currently, but once youth football begins doing this, it's undoubtedly going to gravitate upward through the football ranks. Especially when parents that favor flag football over tackle football begin to go ballistic because their kids have graduated out of youth football and are about to learn how to tackle and take hits. It's going to wind up being a pressured move by parents to change the look of fundamental football and it's rules.

Will be interesting to see how much it does snowball. I personally think it's almost inevitable that youth football is going to become very different over the course of the next couple of decades. I wonder how determined the nation will be to hold onto the NFL as we know it, and how much change it might take to cause folks to abandon it.