This past Sunday, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell announced that the NFL is going to change the way teams deal with players who get concussions. Teams now are required to get an independent neurologist to supplement the team medical staff and evaluate players who get concussions. While the cynic in me asks, “Why now?”, the bottom line is that the NFL is starting to seriously address the issue of brain injury, which I think is great.
The issue of concussions is nothing new to the NFL. Troy Aikman and Steve Young come immediately to mind as star players whose careers were shortened because of the number of concussions they received. When players like these have to hang it up early, there is a cost to the NFL. After all, we want to see the stars play, not announce.
Football is a collision sport and injuries of all types happen often. That’s the nature of the game. This isn’t going to change, and if it does, we won’t be watching, which is the NFL’s greatest fear. It will be interesting to see how the NFL deals with the concussion issue now that it’s becoming one of the latest media driven causes.
Commissioner Goodell’s announcement may well be a PR move designed to deal with the uptake in media and Congressional attention recently given to the issues of concussions, but it’s also the next step in changing the culture of football to be one where brain injuries are taken as seriously as other injuries by coaches and players.
The positive attention given to star players like Brian Westbrook or Clinton Portis sitting out more games than they would have in the past because of a concussion is a gentle reminder that concussions are serious injuries. These reminders are important because it helps coaches and players at all levels not only to be accepting of the time required to heal, but also to put more emphasis on preventing injury.
The key to preventing concussions is to use the right protective equipment. The key pieces of equipment are football helmets and the mouthguards. There is a lot of technology available to help prevent concussions, but it comes with a hefty price tag that people aren’t always willing to pay. However, football protective gear is nothing you want to be cheap about. The price of quality equipment is much less than the price of a concussion or other serious injury.
My hat is off to the NFL for treating concussions as a serious injury and not sidestepping or ignoring the issue. There will likely be critics who say this should have happened a lot sooner, but this is a culture change that will take time to work its way through the football community. The NFL is the leader of that community and regardless of what prompted it, they are indeed stepping up.
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