Late in his team’s game against the Green Bay Packers on September 15, Indianapolis Colts tight end Kylen Granson caught a short pass over the middle of the field, charged forward, and lowered his body to brace for contact. The side of his helmet smacked the face mask of linebacker Quay Walker, and the back of it whacked the ground as Walker wrestled him down. Rising to his feet after the 9-yard gain, Granson tossed the football to an official and returned to the line of scrimmage for the next snap.
Aside from it being his first reception of the 2024 National Football League season, this otherwise ordinary play was only noteworthy because of what Granson was wearing at the time of the hit: a 12-ounce, foam-padded, protective helmet covering called a Guardian Cap.
Already mandatory for most positions at all NFL preseason practices, as well as regular-season and postseason practices with contact, these soft shells received another vote of confidence this year when the league greenlit them for optional game use, citing a roughly 50 percent drop in training camp concussions since their official 2022 debut. Through six weeks of action this fall, only 10 NFL players had actually taken the field with one on, according to a league spokesperson. But the decision was easy for Granson, who tried out his gameday Guardian Cap—itself covered by a 1-ounce pinnie with the Colts logo to simulate the design of the helmet underneath—in preseason games before committing to wear it for real.
I get why people throw that stat around but I don’t think it’s a fair way to view the sport. You can go in and only focus on those minutes but if you’re choosing to watch closely there’s lots in the middle bits too. It’s probably better to think of that stat as time of action. During that time there’s a chance to analyze how the teams are setting up, what movement and audibles are they making, consider strategy and future actions, etc.
I think probably most of our activities have an ebb and flow and highlighting only one aspect of it would certainly empower someone to try to ridicule or treat it as a waste of time.
Just trying to offer a different perspective because I do think the risk of concussion is worth highlighting but your ignorance is on display which can take away from the argument I think your trying to make.
Still a bunch of guys in tights chasing other guys in tights.
And there’s something wrong with men wearing tights?
Pretty much anything can be boiled down to worthlessness if one chooses to view it in that light.
Did I say there was?
If you enjoy it, that’s your business. And if you enjoy it because of the tights, that’s also your business.
My issue with the sport is the number of kids getting CTEs, or dying from dehydration because their coach thinks that “toughens them up”; because they’re being told that’s their one chance to get out of poverty- even though the chances of that being true are almost effectively zero, when over the course of a career, STEM or even Trades offer more stability and more of an escape than American football ever has.
Further, that these things aren’t mandatory (or even need to be mandatory… for fucks sake) is deplorable.