You drop your shoulder, as you do so the defender lowers his head to tackle. Helmets collide, defender is shaken up, what does the ref do? It isn't a penalty on the RB but a player is hurt. From the defenseless players rule, a ref will call a penalty if the player looks shaken up even if the hit was clean.
question on another rule change: i saw on NFLN last night, a rule change allowing TE's and Hbacks to wear numbers 40-49 now. Did i see that right? Didn't Dallas Clark wear number 44?
at first i was saying on this is a bitch move by the nfl... which in reality it is. its nothing more than goodell trying to save the nfl from the lawsuit pending against them. however back in the day when the helmets werent as good guys NEVER used their heads to do anything. that is a new thing as of the mid 70s. so i really dont have an issue with the new rule. although its reasoning frustrates me. AND if they really gave a shit they would stop the use of peds in the nfl. nowhere in time have people grown as big and as fast as they are now. THAT is why people get hurt. not because of equipment or anything else.
who cares how players were taught previously. the rule has changed and coaches now have to teach differently. if they don't teach differently, the flaw isn't the rule, it is the coaching. beyond that, obviously the head will lower as the shoulders drop, but that isn't what they are talking about. there is a huge difference with your head getting closer to the ground because you are lowering the upper body that it is attached to, and lowering your head to lead the way and absorb the contact.
a decision that aims to mitigate the damages of a possible billion dollar lawsuit is inherently the opposite of a bitch move...it is a extremely wise move.
the fact that is the ONLY reason this is happening is very bitch like. its reactionary, game changing and really has nothing to do with the fact that guys got fucked up for the last 30 years. its a weasel way to say oh please dont make the owners pay, we learned our lesson, we are fixing things. try telling that story to coal miners or guys who worked with asbestos for 20 years. oh well sorry you guys cant breathe, we will fix it now.
Soooo the overall purpose is to stop players from using their gear as a weapon, right? There is an easy way to accomplish it: remove all gear, let them play like they do in rugby -- trunks and t-shirts. Wanna lead with your head? NP, lets hope your head is solid wood, like Emmit Smith's.
Take this from someone who has played Rugby, this is a good rule. Without a helmet like in the NFL players do not lead with your head. You learn to take a hit better than trying to punish the tackler. For a league suffering from all kinds of head trauma this is not as bad as it seems. You can still get low without leading with the top of your head. This should save on head and spine injuries. He'll, maybe players like Shonn Greene will learn to make a guy miss in the open feild every now and then.... Or not.
My post was more of a feeble attempt to joke than anything serious. I don't mind this rule either, I'm much more pissed of at roughing the kicker bullshit. That said, I also played rugby in college and can tell you that you learn very quickly how to hit without getting injured. No protection makes players more skilled.
Nobody needs to lower their head to do anything. If the players were wearing leather helmets nobody would be lowering their head. The reason Jim Brown isn't against the new rule change is that players didn't use their heads as weapons in the 50's and 60's. The helmets weren't good enough to allow people to stick their heads in casually. That changed in the 70's when the Steelers started putting their helmets on the ball and everybody else followed suit. It was a bad change and one that has caused a lot of headaches, literally speaking, since then. You never heard of QB's retiring with concussion issues in the 60's before they got to put the dress on. Then the 70's happened and by the mid 80's most QB's were beginning to have problems because defenders were going helmet to helmet when they sacked or hit the QB.
that and linemen were 250 lbs... now lbs and rbs are 250 and run faster than wr and cbs did then. but there is drug testing....
The PED stuff is the next wave of change but it's a bit further out. It won't be litigation based either, because it's really hard to sue somebody because you injected yourself with PED's and now have horrible health issues in your late 40's that most 80 year olds never wind up with. The PED change will come when the NFLPA gives up on trying to own football and instead starts looking out for the welfare of its members which it should have been doing all along.
