Aaron Hernandez' Brain Had Severe CTE

[Dan_Bali]

Need to stop any contact/tackling above the neck.  Same as rugby.  If you make an illegal hit a mandatory suspendable offence you'll see how quickly teams and players will adapt to the new rules.

You'll have the traditionalists and the rubberneckers who get aroused at watching traffic accidents and dangerous hits who will complain.  But they can all get f'ed.

Safety and post retirement health of the players should be of paramount importance to the NFL and the paying public.  

[RandyMossIsBoss]

Any word on how those VICIS helmets have been performing? They are the expensive ones with a flexible outer shell that act like a crumple zone. Feel like that has a lot of promise, tested highly in labs and deviates from the same old 1970s conceptual design every other still helmet uses.

[MemphisEagles]

13 minutes ago, RandyMossIsBoss said:

Any word on how those VICIS helmets have been performing? They are the expensive ones with a flexible outer shell that act like a crumple zone. Feel like that has a lot of promise, tested highly in labs and deviates from the same old 1970s conceptual design every other still helmet uses.

A concussion-proof helmet is a pipe dream unfortunately. Even significantly reducing head injuries is unlikely. You can't stop the brain from moving inside the skull with a helmet.

[MemphisEagles]

I think eventually we are going to come to a point where football is realized to be inherently dangerous, and no amount of rule changes or technology can truly solve that.

 

So what I predict happening is kids through high school playing flag football, college athletes either getting money or health care, and the NFL being forced to give lifelong treatment to all players. This will really hurt the bottom line of the NFL and the NCAA, and will severely reduce the talent pool.

 

But the only way to save the game is to only let consenting adults play and for them to be rewarded enough for doing so. Some of these issues might be worth it for the stars, though what happened to guys like Mike Webster and Junior Sea, nothing is worth that.

But say adults, you know the risks and the rewards, here you go. Kids, you don't quite grasp that yet and there's significantly more risk and less reward, so you play flag.

[RandyMossIsBoss]

Just now, MemphisEagles said:

A concussion-proof helmet is a pipe dream unfortunately. Even significantly reducing head injuries is unlikely. You can't stop the brain from moving inside the skull with a helmet.

Anything to reduce them is worth looking into, because football is not going away. Obviously the concussion proof helmet doesn't exist, but you can't tell me we fit players with the best possible helmets given our current tech. LIS they haven't really changed much from their 70s design, which was made to prevent skull fractures, not concussions. Extra interior padding, in different shapes, patterns, sizes and density, is the difference between 2017 helmet and 1970 helmet. I think that right there is a problem. The league has done good in recent years pouring money into helmet research, and I'd hope they start being much more selective with helmets they approve of. We need a happy medium between the modern helmet that is so hard that it gets weaponized on the field, and the exposed skull. 

[MemphisEagles]

4 minutes ago, RandyMossIsBoss said:

Anything to reduce them is worth looking into, because football is not going away. Obviously the concussion proof helmet doesn't exist, but you can't tell me we fit players with the best possible helmets given our current tech. LIS they haven't really changed much from their 70s design, which was made to prevent skull fractures, not concussions. Extra interior padding, in different shapes, patterns, sizes and density, is the difference between 2017 helmet and 1970 helmet. I think that right there is a problem. The league has done good in recent years pouring money into helmet research, and I'd hope they start being much more selective with helmets they approve of. We need a happy medium between the modern helmet that is so hard that it gets weaponized on the field, and the exposed skull. 

I understand, but they tried this with the revolution helmet which ended up not doing anything. Granted these helmets will be more top of the line compared to that, but the problem is when you're going fast and all of a sudden you stop from hitting or being hit. The brain keeps going until it crashes into the skull. You would have to pad your brain from the inside somehow, like a woodpecker.