It seems lately everytime I look at the football newswire a former player or family of a former player is suing the NFL, normally for concussion or concussion related symptoms. Does anyone who understands law/lawsuits thinks all this litigation has a chance of toppling the league?

Additionally, with all this scientific data coming out showing how dangerous concussions are and how easy it is to get a concussion playing football, at what point does some legislative body step in and just outlaw the game altogether at the pop warner/high school/college/professional level?

Like many Americans, football is my favorite sport to watch (college and NFL), and I gamble on it and do fantasy, and it would really suck for me personally if football ended. That being said, at this point I don't think I would ever let my son strap on a helmet (in fairness he will probably be slow, small and generally uncoordinated like me so there isn't too much danger of this anyways).

Anyone have any insight as to how all this new scientific evidence of concussions and litigation will play out as it pertains to the future of the NFL and college football?

Pop Warner, maybe. No way on the rest.

Are you Troy Aikman?

concussions are actually going down at the NFL due to rule changes. Helmet technology is where to go to cure the problem.

nah aspoker hardly got a single kill off

..

I would think that as long as boxing/MMA survives, NFL will survive. Not like these guys shouldn't take any responsibility for playing a full contact sport.

I guess their angle is that the league didn't do enough, but if that is proven then they will simply pay off the lawsuits and do whatever they are told is enough in future. No more lawsuits.

Seeing as how helmet to helmet hits are a big part of the problem, maybe the outside of the helmet shouldn't be so damn hard. A little exterior padding would go a long way imo.

Take the facemask off and you will have 0 issues.

Doubt it bruh

The difference is that football is played in high school. If they find evidence that CTE can come from playing high school football then the jig is up and it's game over. Which is fine by me. You can't open schools up to this kind of liability if football is ruining people's brains like this.

It's frightening having a concussion. It would suck to lose football. But it would suck even more to continue wrecking kid's brains for fun.

IMO football should be banned until the age of 12.

Also, if you let your child play football id take it as far as to say it's bad/irresponsible parenting.

bc concussions at 12 are okay? Gtfo

huh? Concussions are never ok...but seeing 8 year olds ramming their heads into eachother is stupid.

Banning it until the age of 12 atleast gives them a 4 year break from that, until their at the age of middle school.

Ultimately I think the NFL will begin to die off in the next 15-20 years and baseball/basketball/golf will become the big 3 in sports.

Why hockey will probably survive the concussion crisis is because you can change the rules of hockey almost to the point of outlawing checking and the game doesn't look that much different IMO.

Where as if you do that in football, the game just can't be played anymore. Football 2.0

pee wee football is not a problem. The force the kids hit each other, for the most part, is not enough to cause serious injury. I see nothing wrong with having your 8 year old kid play football.

Ugh, this statement is pure ignorance : /

Brush you really think that it takes the same amount of force to the head to damage an 8 year olds brain as an 18 year olds?

I've watched a ton of pee wee football as it was a requirement for HS coaches and players to go down and watch the games. The weight limits help a ton and there are little to no use of the helmet as a weapon. The big issue with concussions is the use of the helmet as a weapon. You don't see it in high school either. The issue lies in college football and NFL.

I know the facemask won't leave but honestly, if you took off the facemask I guarantee that concussions go down considerably.

I've very interested in the research on this though. Just my experiences with the sport.

Has there been outcry over kids getting concussed in pee wee football from parents? Have you ever heard of a kid being seriously injured in the head due to playing football at 8-10 years of age?

So why have some HS football players brains already showed signs of CTE after concussions?

Did you watch the recent footage they showed on espn about concussions in pee wee/ whatever level comes after pee wee football?

Kids get concussions and are sent back into the games all the time at this level because no one knows wtf to look for.

Use of the helmet as a weapon? You don't see it in high school anywhere as you do at the college level or the NFL level. Lack of knowledge is definitely an issue but as education budgets continue to get cut which means you get less qualified trainers on the sidelines at the high school level.

Coaching, awareness, and trainers is what is needed, I don't doubt that. But I still stand by the helmet being the biggest issue with concussions.

Yeah, the impact on 2nd graders heads are as bad as college....****s pathetic and the coach that allowed that to go on in practice (as showed in the video) deserves jail time....little kids ramming eachother head on for no ****ing reason other than the coach is a ****ing moron

http://espn.go.com/espn/otl/story/_/...-college-games

OMG...jesus christ. Hey coach how about teaching your kids how to hit and when it happens tell them what they did wrong? WTF?

How did I never notice the kid crying after that hit?

I like that idea.