Thread: What Would the End of Football Look Like?

The average age of MMA in my town is 19 and many have been doing muay thai when they were 16 to cross train and I've seen the kids taking some enormous shots with elbows, knees, shins, and headbutting. No bouts like in the PI, but that stuff is definitely cumulative. Aspiring MMA fighters will sometime fight in dark (non-televised) matches 20-30 bouts just to get noticed in non-sanctioned events.

Amatuer boxing trains nearly year round depending on the region. To get good you've gotta spar and that means some mean contact and concussive force. How many times in any sport you've heard the term that the practice is harder than the real game? Either way you slice it it's a whole lotta getting your bell rung.

I believe that as MRI's get more advanced and the pixelation becomes even more detailed you'll really see what goes on trauma wise in contact sports.

Originally Posted by Riczaj01

I was talking more from the point of the article. The article's point is that as you start to see higher h.s. and early college concussions, your going to see more and more parents refuse to let their kids play, and see more and more lawsuits at that level. If a lawsuit wins, you'll see more win, and then you could also see States such as California outlaw the sport at a h.s. level. It's a slow to rapid waterfall effect that kills the sport from the bottom up. Once Lil league through H.S. football goes away...the whole sport goes away.

It said right now there are 90000 concussions at the h.s. and collegiate level; and there just now starting to track it and how to correctly track it.

I gotcha. No doubt it would cause some real concerns. I'm not certain they can put it under completely but it could do a lot of damage. To me it will look a lot like MLB. Not as many kids play organized baseball from Little League on today like I did as a kid. Soccer has stolen a lot of those guys. So we see more players coming from Cuba and Latin American countries or the Japan or any place where they play from the cradle on. We may see more guys coming from states or countries where the game is still played. I can't forecast it but it's gonna take some real disasters to take a multi billion dollar business down.

Wow. Here is another problem, although I am not a doctor or some kind of brain surgeon, I know that no matter how well you design the helmet, the brain bouncing around in your skull is what causes the concussions. I just don't know if technology can build something so impact absorbing that it would keep the head from moving and stopping at a high enough rate to keep the brain from bouncing.

Originally Posted by Riczaj01

Thanks, don't follow any of those sports really, good info. What little I've seen of MMA training has been on spikes contest to get into UFC; and they take very few shots to the head(in training) the fights I have no doubt cause concussions. The 20-30 spread over a full 12 mo's (about 2 a mo or so)is still a lot less then the 16+ over 17+weeks, which is not including the offseason schedule. Most amatuer boxers also have headgear and larger gloves to help lessen the blows, but again I have no doubt about the concussions. I'm not saying that these sports aren't dangerous, they are by the very definition; but a lot more kids-adults play football, and the NFL is a much larger sport then either of those combined. This is also not a zero sum game, just b/c something is more dangerous, doesn't make football not dangerous, and b/c of the popularity of the sport(at all ages) it is also far more likely to incur lawsuits. If it were to fall to concussion issues, you could even see these sports start to get a closer look...actually that could happen regardless.


Soul, that is actually what it states could happen, but if it does it states sport will be lessened in the eyes of Americans since you wouldn't have as many americans playing it. I'd also point out that very few countries play american style football so unlike the mlb it wouldn't have those natural feeder systems world wide that MLB does..

All true now Ric but the NCAA is the feeder system for the NFL. If that broke down maybe American players would go to colleges elsewhere without the restrictions placed on NCAA schools. I'm not saying it can't happen and if the owners started getting hung with multimillion dollars lawsuits they file BK's and protect what assets they can. For family owned teams it would be devastating and I wouldn't be surprise if they didn't go to Congress pleading for protection like they do over anti-trust issues.

Never say never but it will take sometime and some real disasters in court before they surrender their billion dollar businesses. And by the way. Get your son to play QB. At least you can't hit those guys in the head and they don't head butt their lineman anymore like Mac used to do either. LOL

Originally Posted by Riczaj01

And where does the NCAA get their players from?

Well the article points out that 40% of fortune 500 companies from 1983 no longer exist, and at the turn of the century MLB, Boxing and Horse racing were THE sporting events, now just one is(MLB) is. So just b/c something is huge now, doen't mean it will be forever. Also understand the article is looking 10-15 years down the road, not in the next few.

Let's put it off a little longer until I'm senile and then I won't give a shit. LOL