rolling American football death spiral thread

http://www.vulture.com/2015/09/bruno-mars-super-bowl-halftime-show.html

Approaching stunt-shittiness

SAN FRANCISCO -- NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said that if he had a son, he would "love to have him play the game of football" despite various concerns about concussions and other safety-related issues.

Goodell, speaking Friday at his annual Super Bowl week news conference, said the NFL has "made great progress" in the area of concussions by way of rule changes and improving equipment.

"From my standpoint, I played the game of football for nine years, through high school. I wouldn't give up a single day of that," Goodell said. "If I had a son, I'd love to have him play the game of football. I'd love to have him play the game of football because of the values you get.

"There's risk in life. There's risk sitting on the couch. What we want to do is get people active. I want them to experience the game of football because the game of football will teach you the values ... the discipline, the teamwork, the perseverance. Those are values and those are skills that will lead you through life, and I believe football is the best to teach that."

johnny values

it's true though there are so many former NFL players who movingly talk about how football has given them a new appreciation for what is actually important in life, what should be valued, and they really desperately try to pass that message along to people thinking about playing the game.

If I had a son

Joe Montana at 59: 'I can't really run or do much'

“I tried a little bit of skiing, but unfortunately when you get weight on one ski under my left knee, it’s just not very strong. After my first back surgery, what kind of compounds things, is my sciatic nerve has been damaged. So the muscles along my sciatic nerve into my left foot have been numb since ’86.’’

Add Marshawn Lynch to the reasons you used to watch

http://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2016/2/7/10934536/marshawn-lynch-retirement-seahawks-nfl

there are smokier guns than a 59yo who has trouble skiing

Oh yeah if I'm trying to run and jump and ski at age 59 then I've got other things wrong with me
But I am never an elite QB

during that one last touchdown, i was reminded why football was awful -- as CJ anderson struggled the few yards to the end zone, he took like three or four really intense blows to the head. a little horrifying, frankly.

in the super bowl obvs

you can kind of see (and hear) it around 0:50 here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8nYdByKNRM

Magary has another excellent piece up, on pads and helmets:

http://deadspin.com/the-one-thing-the-nfl-will-never-do-to-make-football-sa-1758114037

IMHO somebody else will try and create a no-armor league, and who knows, people might watch. I would.

Big fan of the XFL?

@washingtonpost
Ivy League football unanimously votes to cut tackling in practice http://wapo.st/1LTm0Cw

@dick_nixon
Jesus!

boom

In N.F.L., Deeply Flawed Concussion Research and Ties to Big Tobacco

x2

https://twitter.com/NYTSports/status/713068574441652224

http://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2016/3/28/11250362/nfl-concussions-cte-connection-roger-goodell-comments

The owners really do all deserve their own circle in hell.

At the end of the day I think [these athletes] are adults and they're getting paid large sums of money.... A lot of these guys that are claiming they're having these concussion issues, they have alcohol or drug problems that are just going to compound it.

jim irsay's daughter in glamour

an aside to this part, but:

But the hardest thing—in some ways, even more than being a woman—is people just assume that this was handed to you [by your parents].

the owners and their families are all first against the wall imho
I have one lung holding its breath for some of the "good ones" like the Maras or the Rooneys to come out and state that this is bullshit while the other lung just keeps going GLWT DUMBASS

The Browns pick up RG3. Parity is bullshit, there's a competitive set of teams and then a pile of organizations that demonstrably are long past pretending to give any fucks.

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/04/18/474702082/concussion-update-u-s-appeals-court-affirms-deal-between-nfl-retired-players

A couple million bucks each for the uncompensated QALYs likely to be lost by all these thousands of men seems like robbery but I'm not a judge I guess.

I believe the eventual payouts from that could become what insurance underwriters talk about when they talk about "the tail"

Leitch swoops in with the challops!! He's got the numbers to back him up!!

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/09/by-staying-silent-roger-goodell-and-the-nfl-won.html

The film flopped. Nobody cared. Television ratings for 2015 games were up from 2014, and so on. The American public has listened to all the arguments about the immorality and dangers of football, and they have responded by … watching more football. I’m sorry, Mr. Bradshaw, but however scary CTE makes football seem, I’m not sure soccer’s gonna catch up.

1. Everybody still hates Goodell. Nobody will defend his record. He is an atrocity. I repeat, everyone hates him.
2. Concussion didn't do well at the box office?!?!? OMG NFL football is doing great!
3. The product keeps getting worse (nobody remembers anything about the last seven highest rated shows on TV except that one where the Seahawks were dumb and that one with the blackout)
4. All the preseason headlines I've seen have been about:
- disgusting injuries
- the Vegas stadium pricetag
- some guys kneeling during the anthem

Yes, it's an exciting sport that people want their young boys to play and it definitely hasn't peaked, because people still put the Super Bowl on while they do other stuff - Goodell's a genius!

I look forward to Leitch reversing his position on the WB DC film franchise two years from now when Zack Snyder cleverly chooses to not address his critics.

lol as if the film was the first time people had heard of concussions and CTE

does everybody think Tagliabue is often getting let off the hook for things he made Goodell inherit simply cos he didn't commish in the social media explosion era?

obv I think he was better than Goodell (esp in public relations), but his administration is also the one that let Leonard Little play again so idk how much better....

I think Goodell is definitely getting hit with criticism for things that are exactly as they were under Tagliabue - Leitch does trot out his "journalist issue" thing wrt head trauma - people really didn't pay that much attention. Ditto stadium financing, shitty officiating, do-nothing domestic abuse policy, arbitrary discipline and dumb ideas about drugs.

it could be football is in a death spiral but i don't know how you'd tell. it seems as hegemonic + popular as ever and it's not like americans have demonstrated any kind of sensitivity that would suggest that they're ready to abandon it en masse for its crimes. as long as the sport is not literally just two men beating the shit out of each other (nb a sport that is still pretty popular today) ppl will continue to watch. i don't see it going away anytime soon tbh.

it would like a lot for football to outright 'go away', but not as much to start reducing its share of the sports market. which obv hasn't happened yet, but way more people are talking about these things than they were 5 years ago.

but the idea of NFL just like flickering out in the near future are kinda laughable, given how popular it still is.

IMNSHO it peaked in 2015 and is going to gradually lose its share of popular attention and concern from now on until it's a weird curiosity for my grandkids

i just don't see how we get from here to there. do u just imagine massive fan disengagement? why now and not earlier? does the product become worse? do they all develop empathy? atm it sounds more like wishful thinking.

The product only gets worse from here. The farm league has its own intractable problems on that front. The coaching talent pool is as much a part of the problem as the player pool. Appropriately, at least to me, the Pats' dominance is going to be the hallmark of "when football was great." Let them own that.

Are you saying its going to deteriorate as a sport cos less men are going to want to play it in the years to come?

As long as it pays as well as it does I think the talent will continue to be there. As of yet the players quitting or refusing to play are marginal. It's still a ticket to college and a shot at fame & fortune.

i just don't see how we get from here to there.

I doubt that the injury/concussion/domestic abuse problem will drive away the current fans in appreciable numbers. A few, but not enough to hurt revenues. What might do it would be the dilution of talent on the field combined with a scandal that calls into question the legitimacy of game outcomes, such as a gambling scandal where refs or players were shaving points. A double whammy like that wouldn't force football to disappear, but it could cause a considerable defection among fans and demote it from the top spot among US sports fans.

Less children will be allowed to play. Less adults will know how to play. Less players will learn enough to coach well. The sport has already narrowed itself to where the smart play is almost always to pass and the nickel is the standard D, but marquee QBs are almost nonexistent. It's a mess.

Like boxing, there will be a certain point in the near future when players (and coaches) are obviously getting huge paychecks that have nothing to do with the quality or entertainment value of their performance. And like boxing, that's going to be how you know you're a weirdo for caring if you don't have money on the line.

Do you think Archie Manning's grandchildren will play in the NFL? That's my essay question for you.

Tombot otm. With every Duerson and Seau the player pool will shrink a little more.

they should change the game so everybody has laser tag guns and to tackle someone you gotta shoot em on a laser tag sensor on their vest and then they are down

if a horrific child molestation scandal can't knock the penn state football program into total ruin and drive its fans away let alone keep them from continuing to revere their legendary former coach, i don't think people are going care about CTE in the NFL that much.

Im sure the sport must be rife with steroid abuse. Is this something people dont care/ignore/so common no-one gives a shit?

Nobody gives a fuck about PEDs in football. Baseball crucified itself whenever someone gets popped and nfl fans just shrug and assume it's the cost of doing business to stay on the field.

Painkiller abuse is a more serious concern than steroids/HGH, IMO.

If baseball can fall from its heights during the 20th century, then so can football. What might cause that decline won't be easy or pretty, of course.

baseball is a $10b/yr business, so while it is no longer front and center, it's doing okay. also it's been pretty successful selling the nostalgia/experience of attending a game, which i can't see the nfl ever managing

this isn't really an existential threat to the nfl, but imo before long there's going to be a successful lawsuit against the ncaa and big-money college sports for leeching off amateurs, and it will be interesting to see how things shake out

To the Penn State point - sure, in State College and environs, being a diehard is acceptable. Leave town wearing your fan gear and see how that plays.

Redskins fanship is undergoing a similar issue from where I sit

also more and more players are making the news by retiring early due to CTE concerns

The NFL’s “concussion crisis” has taken its next logical step: the “retirement crisis.” On Friday, New York Jets offensive tackle and former Pro Bowler D’Brickashaw Ferguson announced his decision to retire from the NFL at 32 years old. Unlike some players who are forced to hang up their cleats after clinging to every last bit of turf in the hopes of scoring another contract but eventually retire because of debilitating body injuries, Ferguson — like around a dozen other NFL players over the past two years — has retired early without any outstanding injury or body-related issues.
[...]
San Francisco 49er Chris Borland retired at 24 years old in March 2015, saying that he didn’t want to have “any neurological diseases or die younger.” Buffalo Bills linebacker A.J. Tarpley retired at 23 years old on Wednesday, citing concussions and a desire to “preserve my future health” as his reason. Safety Husain Abdullah, 30, retired last month because he wanted a “sound mind” in the next stage of his life. Below the NFL level, 26 college football players have retired over the past three seasons because of concussions, according to Al Jazeera America.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/dbrickashaw-ferguson-nfl-early-retirement-no-surprise_us_5707c4d5e4b0c4e26a2273fa

Guys, Will Leitch is right, Luke Wilson is completely unbelievable as Roger Goodell. The NFL has won.

so cam newton got fuckin rekt last night

http://imgur.com/Mn1z9Ld?r