CTE? Will CTE end the sport? What will America watch?
The only reason that it would cease to exist entirely by 2030 is if the sport itself were banned. I don’t think that that’s likely; even as many people have come to realize just how damaging playing football can be to its players, it’s still a tremendously popular sport, both for participation and as a spectator sport.
That said, I do think that there’s a very good chance that the NFL itself will get knocked down a few pegs from where it stands now. High schoolers who are deciding to not play football now (or whose parents are preventing them from playing football) due to concerns about CTE are the potential NFL players ten years from now. If enough teenaged boys choose to play another sport, the talent pool could noticeably shrink by 2030, and lead to a decrease in the quality of play.
Beyond that, if enough football fans begin to believe that the sport isn’t worth the risk it poses to its players, their enthusiasm for football could wane, and that would hit the NFL in its wallet. I know that, for myself, as a lifelong Packer fan, I’m not nearly as enthusiastic about the sport as I was just a few years ago. The pace of social change in the U.S. has accelerated dramatically in the past few decades (look at how rapidly views about same-sex marriage suddenly changed), and I don’t think that it’s too hard to imagine views towards football changing surprisingly rapidly.
And, finally, the NFL has been completely, brazenly greedy over the past couple of decades, to the point that they may well be reaching (or exceeding) the saturation point for fans’ desire for football. That overexposure, and the blatant greed associated with it, could also come back to bite them in the collective butt.
I’m really surprised it has lasted this long.
Back in the 1980’s my affluent* friends in high school were complaining about how expensive NFL ticket prices were and how the only reason they ever got to attend a game was because someone provided tickets to a parent as a “business gift.”
So even back then it seemed like corporations bought NFL tickets to spread them around and call them business expenses, but the average guy couldn’t afford anything but the nosebleed seats behind the scoreboard. If it weren’t for televised games, it seemed like following a team was out-of-reach for the average family and only megacorporations could afford to attend a whole season.
And after that it seemed like spectator sports in general seemed to rely more and more on TV broadcasting deals and getting a cut of the advertising income, particularly for beer commercials. And the association between the major spectator sports and alcoholic excess among spectators kinda got emphasized in the 1980’s when the “Don’t Drink & Drive” and other anti-alcohol fads were going strong.
–G!
*We’re talking about kids whose parents were TV station managers and Biotech firm CEO’s, that kind of affluent.
Other contact sports just implement rules that make their game softer and softer. Probably doesn’t do much, but it might give the impression that some duty of care is being pursued.
See also:
One thing I’d look out for would be some sort of massive lawsuit against the NCAA. Without the college game, there’s no NFL. Even college greed has made the sport less enjoyable. The haves get richer and the have nots get poorer. The national Championship is always the same teams.
Also, there’s a ton more youth activities available now. The days of kids growing up playing football, baseball and basketball informally and then moving into organized youth leagues are no longer the norm. And, I imagine the liability costs for youth football will continue to go up.
There’s just so much kids today can do for recreation and, no I don’t mean non stop video games or Netflix.
10 years? No problem. 30 years from now, enough time for an entire generation to stop caring about it, then maybe, but this has to be more than a blip. If there’s no NFL this year it’s better for them, the fans will come back in a big way if they play a real season next year, but a shortened season isn’t going to grow the fan base and may shrink it.
Anecdote from school here. I’m a 14 year veteran teacher in Michigan and here is what I’ve seen. Enrollment has actually increased in my district, mind you. We have 1050 kids in my building:
2006 - Middle School of 800 kids(half boys) had three football teams. 8th grade, 7th grade, and a 6-8 “didn’t make the cut” team. Pretty much the same in all local districts in the league.
2020 - One team per school, almost had to cancel football area-wide 3 years ago due to a few schools barely being able to make a team and almost cancelling the sport.
High schools still have JV and Varsity football, but not a freshmen team or anything.
For comparison, all other sports are fine and many are increasing. Track and Field has blown up in numbers and baseball continues to have a lot of kids. Only football has declined like this. We added soccer to the Fall schedule of sports because there are enough kids to form a team now.
The NFL has gotten greedy because Americans are obsessed with it…until the CTE things came out
Have people stopped watching MMA?
No, but that will decline too.
Contact and brutal sports like NFL, MMA, boxing will decline with the younger generations.
The NFL is declining because of CTE, politics and apathy.
This study suggests the ratings decline is over protests, not CTE. Note that the ratings decline was before the BLM protests so that decline might be reversed.
People, people, can you not use acronyms without defining them? Especially when that’s ALL you had to say in the OP.
I had no idea what CTE was, and there are other things abbreviated CTE. Finally figured it out, and ummm… people have known about it for years. And been concerned about the number of concussions in the sport for decades. Why would you think that years later, that’s the one thing that’s going to end football forever?
There are a lot of factors coming together that could end football as we know it, not just one. But, that’s okay, as long as curling takes off (as a safer/more distanced alternative, with similar stadium crowds, and betting, and local fanaticism).
CTE in a thread about the NFL isn’t an unusual acronym. I agree the OP should have been fleshed out a bit.
What has happened, over the past decade or so, is that people – both those inside the sport, and fans – have been learning more about the long-term effects of head trauma (both actual, diagnosed concussions, and sub-concussive hits) on players.
For years, both teams and players sought to downplay the seriousness of concussions: teams wanted to get their players back on the field as quickly as possible, and players feared that not coming back quickly would cost them their jobs. And, until the past few years, the NFL itself downplayed the risks, and questioned any research that said otherwise.
Meanwhile, what was becoming clear was that a not-insignificant number of players and former players were suffering from severe mental and emotional issues in their 30s, 40s, and 50s – players like Mike Webster, Junior Seau, and Dave Duerson.
What researchers had discovered was that many of the former players who had such issues were suffering from chronic traumatic encephelopathy (CTE).
In addition, there are at least a few examples of players, like Aaron Hernandez and Chris Henry, who had behavioral issues (and engaged in violent behavior), and died before age 30; upon autopsy, they were discovered to have CTE.
And, beyond that, there also seems to be an unusual incidence of ALS among former players (such as Steve Gleason and Dwight Clark), and researchers believe that there may be a connection between ALS and CTE.
Even in the past few years, as the NFL created its “concussion protocol” for assessing how soon a player who’s suffered a concussion can return to play, and changed the rules to try to limit some of the more questionable types of hits, we still see players and teams that aren’t following the protocol, and it’s not clear that outlawing certain types of tackles, or changes in helmet designs, can make a substantial difference.
In addition, researchers also believe that, even if a player never has an actual, diagnosed concussion, playing football leads to hundreds of “sub-concussive” brain injuries, and the damage can mount. It’s also believed that, even if a player never plays in the NFL (or even if they never play past high school), it’s possible to have already suffered such brain injuries.
Over the past few years, a small number of players, such as 49ers linebacker Chris Borland, have walked away from the game, due either to head injuries, or concerns over head injuries. And, anecdotally, there are many stories of parents who are now unwilling to let their sons play the game.
I do think that, as evidence mounts around CTE and football, there will be fewer people who are willing to play it, as well as fewer people willing to watch it, but I don’t believe that either of those groups are going to drop to zero (or even close to zero) in the immediate future.
League of Denial is a great documentary on how the NFL responded to claims of long-term effects of concussions… a “must watch” (and read if you like non-fiction) for those interested
I think we may be getting to a point where there is a stigma to allowing children to play football. Will there be a large enough pool of first rate players to staff the NFL if training doesn’t begin until adulthood?
I think we’re already at the stigma level in upper middle class neighborhoods with high levels of college educated residents. Question is does it spread to working class and poor neighborhoods and does it splinter among racial lines?
Our town has masks as the default near the college and downtown, and “sneering at masks” as the default in the more suburban/rural neighborhoods.
So it’ll be Masks/No Football on one side of the tracks, No Masks/Football on the other.
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And thanks for the analysis, kenobi. I appreciate getting educated.
I honestly thought this was an old topic that had been bumped up. NFL Ratings have been on the upswing the past few years.
What has changed? Pro football has been around for a century or so. I started listening to radio broadcasts of games in the late 40s. Chuck Bednarik played 60 minutes a game (as offensive center and middle linebacker) and there was no discussion of concussions. And they used leather helmets in those days. So why are things so much worse today?