ACC 2016 Tourney in Verizon Center

[73CAV]

I don't think the lawsuits will end the NFL. I think it will be a ban on football for younger kids, which will cut off the pipeline of talent. This will start with high school football, IMO. And I think it will be more than 20 years.

It was reported on The Today Show this morning that Brett Favre is concerned that his recent lapses of memory may be connected to CTE. He also said, if he had a son, he would not allow him to play organized football. If a future Hall of Fame quarterback says he wouldn't allow his son to play, what mother wouldn't do the same? The flow of the pipeline begins to diminish here. Then, as more is published about CTE, public health officials get involved. And, as schools start to examine their liability exposure, coupled with the aforementioned public health folks, junior high schools and high schools are going to start discontinuing their football programs. The same will apply to colleges and universities. At some point, there won't be many players for colleges to recruit, and the quality of talent available for the NFL to draft will not resemble that of today. I agree that the lawsuits, by themselves, won't end the NFL, but those suits are just one of a number of elements working against the league. I think 20 years may be a very conservative estimate.

 

[Townie72]

It was reported on The Today Show this morning that Brett Favre is concerned that his recent lapses of memory may be connected to CTE. He also said, if he had a son, he would not allow him to play organized football. If a future Hall of Fame quarterback says he wouldn't allow his son to play, what mother wouldn't do the same? The flow of the pipeline begins to diminish here. Then, as more is published about CTE, public health officials get involved. And, as schools start to examine their liability exposure, coupled with the aforementioned public health folks, junior high schools and high schools are going to start discontinuing their football programs. The same will apply to colleges and universities. At some point, there won't be many players for colleges to recruit, and the quality of talent available for the NFL to draft will not resemble that of today. I agree that the lawsuits, by themselves, won't end the NFL, but those suits are just one of a number of elements working against the league. I think 20 years may be a very conservative estimate.

You may be right. And I know that public health officials and the press that cover them are going to do everything they can to create a stampede whether or not it ends up being true. Like so many other phantom health scares we have endured in the past.

My kids played football at a number of levels. The only time they got hurt was in an unsupervised, free-for-all game they called "Mall Ball". In my day, it was called "Tackle the kid with the ball".

What I have seen is the psychological impact of fear-filled mother's on sons who wouldn't allow them to do anything with any degree of risk to it, especially football.

Youth football is almost without risk in my experience. 85lb and 95lb aren't going to do one another a lot of damage especially with full pads on. In high school, its a little more risky.

Pro football, because of the size, speed and physicality is a whole other thing.

 

[cuseguy]

Football will come with a warning label like cigarettes and alcohol. Play at your own risk or play soccer.

 

[longtimefan]

They're gonna knock down the Farley Building?

There is a plan to move Penn Station across the street (Moynihan center), and I think the Garden was part of that development.

Football will come with a warning label like cigarettes and alcohol. Play at your own risk or play soccer.

I don't think that soccer would be the only beneficiary of concern re: head trauma. You might see more of the top American athletes gravitate towards baseball and basketball, and maybe even some niche sports like lacrosse.

 

[BlackKnight76]

I would love it to be in NYC every year at MSG or Barclays (Barclays is an awesome building), but DC, Boston, Atlanta are all cool with me as compromises.

 

[SmilinBob]

Given the current revelations we're seeing concerning CTE (Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy), college football's days are numbered. In twenty years, the NFL will likely be history. In fact, it will probably be fewer. While the $765 million dollar settlement to which the NFL just agreed was accompanied with denials of culpability, I don't think those protestations matter much. The precedent has been set. Reportedly, UCLA has developed a test for CTE that precludes a post-mortem exam, and Tony Dorsett, Joe DeLamielleure, & Leonard Marshall have all been diagnosed with the condition. The first time a former collegiate player, who never played in the NFL, is diagnosed with CTE and sues his former college, lawyers and insurance execs are going to jump up and take notice. And, even if that takes a while, as publicity surrounding this affliction gains traction, few, if any, mothers are going to let their sons play any kind of organized football. As I write this, I imagine that there are a lot of universities around the country taking a long, hard look at their financial exposure in continuing to field teams, in light of these disclosures. And this says nothing of the pressure that is going to come from public health officials. The fight against tobacco has provided the blue print for the coming struggle.

And for these reasons, Notre Dame will become a full time member of the ACC sooner than anyone would have thought because ACC football is going to cease to exist. I imagine the end result is that collegiate futball will now be played on Saturdays in much larger venues.

Isn't football already history at Virginia?

DC would be my second choice after MSG and it's an excellent choice with so many options and things to do.