(09-30-2022, 06:58 AM)OutsiderFan Wrote: Earlier this week in the aftermath of the Niners losing Trent Williams and Azeez Al-Shaair for several weeks, on the heels of losing Trey Lance for the season and Elijah Mitchell for a coupe months, I told a friend my interest in NFL football was waning because it is becoming hard to root for a team that is never representative of what it was suppose to be, and stupid to me for these players to be paid so much money and routinely put in positions to miss so much time due to injury. Yes, athletes get injured in other sports, but the frequency and severity of football injuries is just at another level.
Then I saw a video clip of the Tua Tagovailoa head injury from last night. Obviously, Trent Williams isn't a QB, but Trey Lance is. Tua Tagoavailoa is. The common denominator is they are both young QBs being battered to pieces. It's not good for the game, to say nothing of the players themselves.
Listening to ESPN radio this week, I heard scoring is way down in the NFL through three weeks. Why might this be? Well, one reason is coaches are so terrified of players getting injured in preseason that the starters don't play much if at all, which makes Steve Young say the first month of the season is like pre-season in terms of offenses getting the work they need to be coordinated. Defenses being ahead of offenses would then lead to lower scoring, despite every rule in the book to the benefit of offenses. The Warriors had their first pre-season game today. Steph Curry played. The fact NFL coaches are too afraid to play starters in pre-season games says the sport has a problem. It not only is impacting player health, but low scoring and bad offensive showings like Niners 10 Broncos 11, does nothing but degrade the quality of the product. I should be rabidly anticipating Niners-Rams on MNF. I'm not. Maybe I'll watch, but I'm not feeling passion for it at all.
The QB position is the most important position in sports, and while there are rules to protect QBs, if the objective is to keep them playing, how does it make sense to allow them to be hit at all? If QBs had flags that had to be pulled to get a sack (hit behind LOS), we would potentially see a reality where QBs couldn't be hit at all. Makes the idea that Kyle Shanahan purposely ran Lance like a RB to take more hits, that much more stupid.
Anyway, maybe flags on QBs isn't the answer. Maybe the players are simply too big and fast for the sport to be played with actual human beings and keep my interest any longer. Maybe Troy Vincent was right when he said the future of football is flag.
I'm just really struggling with the fact something I have loved so much and has been a large part of my best relationships, is now turning me off with unregulated professionalization and free agency ruining of college football (Cal fans are now taking up collections to pay RB Jadyn Ott, to hopefully ward off him being poached by another school in the transfer portal who will offer him more "NIL" money), and the non-stop significant injuries I see happening to Niners players and players around the NFL.
Football was always an escape that brought me joy. Not so much anymore. I just wanted to vent and see if anyone has similar feelings about football these days, and see what others have to say about it. There is more going on here than just concern about CTE.
So, you are feeling guilty watching football. Stop watching. Easy answer.
It’s a violent game. Always has been, always will be. Those who play it understand the risks. As for QB’s there has never been a “safer” time. If you doubt that, go watch Jim Plunkett while with NE.
(09-30-2022, 07:59 AM)needle Wrote: Change the rules to prohibit touching an opponent’s head for any reason. Flag football would probably follow from that, though there could possibly be other options.
I don’t think this new sport would be especially popular.
That’s impossible. RBs lower their head, lineman are always going to have situations where they hit each other with the helmet.