Wearing helmets in body contact sports
Roar Pro
By Michael C, 21 Oct 2009 The Crowd is a Roar Pro
- Tagged:
- AFL, Basketball, Charles Barkley, National Football League, NBA
Charles Barkley, the famous former NBA star and US Olympic basketballer, was recently quoted speaking about AFL players.
“I don’t want to insult the Australians (but) I am like, ‘These guys are some damn idiots’,” Barkley told the Dallas affiliate of ESPN Radio.
“Nobody plays football without pads every week for three, four or five months and don’t make any money.
“At least in the NFL, you are going to kill yourself and . . . you get to be a millionaire after it’s over.”
This may be so, however, as Greg Baum’s recent article Destructive love and the risks in football illustrates, simply wearing padding and a helmet may just be the trigger that allows faster/harder impacts with a perception of greater protection.
Baum’s article is based on a study commissioned by the National Football League that reports that Alzheimer’s disease or similar memory-related diseases appear to have been diagnosed in the league’s former players vastly more often than in the national population — including a rate of 19 times the normal rate for men ages 30 through 49.
Perhaps we’re all idiots playing any form of contact sport or football code.
However, at what point do the code administrators have to take responsibility for the positions of greatest risk that the participants are placed in.
On this point, the AFL really can’t be criticised for seemingly taking greatest heed in recent times of advice from their doctors in crafting rules and interpretations.
After all, without specific “Don’t” rules, then we see football players, as has happened historically, decide that denied the use of hands, the head is a legal tool.
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Nam Turk said | October 21st 2009 @ 3:15am | Report comment
I’ve watched the NFL my whole life and can tell you that helmets do a lot of harm. They become a weapon as much as armor. Tackles often lead with the head and brutal contact is always the result. I think scrum caps are a good compromise: they protect the head but don’t give the wearer a sense of being a human battering ram.
Where I think Australian codes get by is in tackling over hitting. The NRL may permit the shoulder charge, but one is still required to keep the ball-carrier down to record the tackle. The NFL, on the other hand, lets these huge men play pinball with their opponents’ bodies and that’s considered effective strategy. Protection or not, a huge hit does more damage than a proper wrap-up.
Also, Charles Barkley is an idiot.
Kurt said | October 21st 2009 @ 3:54am | Report comment
Not sure about helmets, but you have to love those quotes from Charles Barkley.
macavity said | October 21st 2009 @ 6:01am | Report comment
he was talking about NRL – he was watching a Souths game with Russel Crowe.
BennO said | October 21st 2009 @ 6:31am | Report comment
I’m over in the US at the moment. I realise I’m going to sound like a cantakerous old man, but I get tired of Americans saying, “I’m like, ‘woah dude’”, or “I’m like, ‘that’s awesome’” or even…“I don’t want to insult the Australians (but) I am like, ‘These guys are some damn idiots’,”
Just bloody well say you like it or that you’re impressed or whatever and move on.
Sorry. But I’m getting tired of it over here. For my own sanity I watched the film Kenny the other day and I loved the line he used where he said “Has someone called the Queen and told her what they’re doing to her language?” Classic.
Firestarter Bob said | October 21st 2009 @ 6:36am | Report comment
Epic fail from the deluded AFL media. Barkley was talking about the NRL and the Rabbitohs.
Pippinu said | October 21st 2009 @ 7:22am | Report comment
That might be true – but who cares?
Are you trying to get bragging rights out of the fact that he called NRL “Australian football”?
Firestarter Bob said | October 21st 2009 @ 7:29am | Report comment
Who cares? Michael C obviously, for one! This Roar page wouldn’t be here at all if Michael hadn’t have accepted Barkley was talking about AFL.
AFL IS BARKING MAD
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/afl-is-barking-mad/story-e6freye0-1225788982651
Michael C said | October 21st 2009 @ 7:38am | Report comment
Unfortunately I penned this yesterday arvo before the News Ltd media corrected their error.
The comment of course applies equally to both NRL, AFL and even Rugby Unioin – - from the perspective of an American more familiar with American Football.
To suggest it was the AFL media pushing it is a nice one – given News Ltd is the bedpartner of the NRL!!!
btw -
it can be annoying that a Russell Crowe type person might take an international visitor to the ‘footy’ and NOT ensure that the visitor realises he’s not watching “Australian (Rules) Football” if they are at the Rugby (L or U).
Firestarter Bob said | October 21st 2009 @ 8:53am | Report comment
So when someone is clearly talking one football code, it can be taken he is talking about all football codes? Talk about trying to backtrack Michael. AFL is nothing like the rugby codes when it comes to collision after collision, tackle after tackle, game after game, week after week, season after season. There are collisions in AFL, but not repeatedly on the same player.
Why should anyone at a soccer or rugby game in Australia have to make mention to a visitor of the existence of AFL? Is it somehow impolite? You’re overstating the place that AFL holds in the world. No one cares.
Michael C said | October 21st 2009 @ 9:12am | Report comment
FB -
funny you say that, yes, in a game of RL you may have several hundred tackles. And, rather like Grid Iron, they tend to be 96% front on. ANd, invariably one of the participants is not travelling at an overly great speed. In RL, quite often, the guy getting tackled effectively runs straight into the stationary tacklers. Collision after collision….to a degree. But, speed is rarely that great. This is mainly due to the 6 tackle rule, and that the ball carrier is NOT obliged to seek to dispose of the ball.
AFL is a different style of tackling, from all directions and generally at greater speed, and with the ball carrier generally obliged (if having ‘prior opportunity’) to dispose of the ball.
Very different tackle equations. The repitition of hits/tackles in AFL will invariably be most felt by key midfield players. Don’t for a minute think it’s not physically demanding and requiring of high levels of toughness.
It just doesn’t look like what your used to. I won’t say one is tougher than the other – that’s not the point.
- – - if you host an international visitor, and they suggest going to the footy…..I’d hope you wouldn’t take them to the NRL and claim that as ‘Australian Football’?? That’d be like giving someone XXXX and claiming it to be VB!!!!
Redb said | October 21st 2009 @ 3:27pm | Report comment
MC,
It has been said before about Aust footy in the US about no pads, probably why the reporter made the mistake in the Barkley instance.
Aussie Rules has been telecast on cable in the US for 20 years, ESPN,etc.
So Crowe talk him to a NRL game and this was his reaction?
Redb
Pippinu said | October 21st 2009 @ 7:37am | Report comment
Sir Charles looked quite fetching in the doctored Geelong guernsey too.
Robbos said | October 21st 2009 @ 6:47am | Report comment
You cannot compare AFL to NFL as a full contact sport. He was talking about Rugby League & the comparison is much closer there between NFL & NRL.
The fact that an American, thinks Australian football is Rugby League just shows how big Australian Rules football is outside of this country.
Pippinu said | October 21st 2009 @ 7:09am | Report comment
…don’t you mean how big Rugby League is outside of this country? He was referring to Rugby League but used the expression Australian Football.
One could at least argue that Australian Football had entered his consciousness.
Not that it matters anyway – in America, nothing exists apart from their preferred sports.
macavity said | October 21st 2009 @ 5:06pm | Report comment
the national rugby league is australian football.
the same as the a-league is australian football.
they are australian football competitions.
you AFLers dont own the name “australian football”
if you are going to be so precious I suggest you go back to “victorian rules”
Pippinu said | October 21st 2009 @ 5:51pm | Report comment
Mac
not being precious.
AFL = Australian Football League
and the laws of the game are called the Laws of Australian Football.
I can’t do nothing more than to point that out – what people do thereafter is up to them.
Ken said | October 22nd 2009 @ 3:05pm | Report comment
I think the point he was making is that Australian Rules Football (to give it, I think, it’s correct title) – has a very generic name. It’s not a big leap that someone unfamililar with any of the codes played in this country would go to a football game in Australia and call it Australian Football.
Funnily enough probably the only code that he wouldn’t have called Australian Football was soccer, which would lead all the soccer supporters to say, in their inimitably whiny voices, that they have the only true Australian Football…. (there! managed to avert a RL vs AFL flame by bagging the common enemy
)
Pippinu said | October 21st 2009 @ 7:13am | Report comment
This whole Charles Barkeley business has become a bit idiotic.
His original comments were off the cuff, were intended as a backhand compliment, and was just a bit of mucking around, and nothing more – not even worth reporting to be honest.
Those who hate our native game, initially took it as affirmation of their very own prejudices.
But once they discovered he was really talking about their game – they were very quick to backtrack!!!
(you can follow this in a few forums)
At the end of the day – one is absurd as the other.
Firestarter Bob said | October 21st 2009 @ 7:37am | Report comment
It was only picked up because some AFL reporter thought it was about AFL. If he had understood that it was about rugby or soccer, then it would never have been picked up. It’s a classic example of the AFL media searching far and wide for someone outside of Australia giving AFL a mention.
Pippinu said | October 21st 2009 @ 8:54am | Report comment
I saw it on the back page of the The Age sports lift out – where all the jokes, funny stories, lampoons are – absolutley no one would have taken it seriously – regardless of who he was referring to.
And his point is well made – relative to NFL players – all our blokes are getting hammered for peanuts!!
Grimmace said | October 21st 2009 @ 7:13am | Report comment
On the money again Bob.
The AFL players are already permitted to wear thicker head gear than is allowed in Rugby under IRB guidelines. How far do they want to go?
Pippinu said | October 21st 2009 @ 7:36am | Report comment
Is there a pissing contest about who wears thinner head gear?
I’ll give the prize to the A-League players then.
Simmo said | October 21st 2009 @ 7:55am | Report comment
or footballers who aren’t Petr Cech
Michael C said | October 21st 2009 @ 7:42am | Report comment
The main discussion point here should be the requirement of sports administrators and rule makers to have a greater duty of care for the participants.
What is the duty of care for Rugby Union administrators to the players regarding safety in scrums (collapsing ones). That’s been an ongoing issue for some time. Have they done enough?
Unfortunately the over zealous editors of theRoar have made completely ambiguous this comment “After all, without specific “Don’t” rules, then we see football should be SOCCER players, as has happened historically, decide that denied the use of hands, the head is a legal tool.” If I’d wanted to use ‘football’, I would have appropriately qualified it by stating “Association Football”.
Gawd – can the editors please stop crapping on the non-soccer threads. It’s with this sort of mentality that we get situations like this where no-one knew what the guy (Barkley) was talking about. Surely they (theRoar editors) realise by now that AFL is a league and “Football – Australian” is the game.
Dave1 said | October 23rd 2009 @ 5:02pm | Report comment
thats a bit Orwellian
luke of altona said | October 26th 2009 @ 6:25am | Report comment
AFL isnt really a contact sport though, so I dont know where you got that from.
If Crowe took Sir Charles to an AFL game he would ask “how did ballet get so popular over here?” and “where do they leave their handbags while the game is on?”
Get over it.
Dave1 said | November 12th 2009 @ 5:25pm | Report comment
AFL is a contact sport
Firestarter Bob said | November 12th 2009 @ 6:12pm | Report comment
Only if you also count ballroom dancing as a contact sport.
Dave1 said | November 13th 2009 @ 6:55pm | Report comment
I dont count ballroom dancing as a contact sport but I do count AFL as a contact sport.
BennO said | October 21st 2009 @ 8:45am | Report comment
For what it’s worth, I have been able to watch a few AFL games over here in the US in the past couple of weeks. They broadcast a game or two a week on a couple of channels. The people I’ve spoken to quite enjoy watching it. Sadly, the folk I have spoken to don’t actually know rugby league exists. THey know what rugby is, but have no idea about league.
As a fan of both rugby codes it worries me if the seppos are getting into AFL, they’ll win the battle of the codes!