The NFL’s Biggest Headache: How the League is Handling Concussions and Early Retirements

March 10^th is the most hectic day of the year for NFL players, executives and officials. It is the official opening of the league year. Players with expiring contracts can now seek new deals with any team they want and players under contract can be moved by General Managers for each other. This is the day the internet officially breaks. Two weeks into the official league year, $1.8 billion has been spent on men who have dedicated more than half of their life to a game. It’s the most exciting time of the year for fans and players alike, seeing which superstar will soon don their team’s colors.

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For others, today is a sad day. It is the day they may first realize their career and dreams could be over. They stare at their phone all day, praying someone gives them one last chance. They hold out for a couple of weeks, spending more time with their family than they had in the past 10 years. He’s decided to hang up the helmet and fame for a quiet life with their wife and kids. He’s had a good career. Maybe not a Hall of Fame career, but a nice career, making enough money to live the rest of his life on. Unfortunately, many do not walk away from the game completely intact. They’ve spent probably the last 14 to 30 years of their life (from high school, to college, to the pros) running into the equivalent of a cinder block wall, head on. Some players don’t even make it that long. Players suffer torn ligaments, broken bones, and traumatic head injuries that end not just the hopes of playing a game, but the chance to do something as simple as walk normally. They want to be able to remember their kids’ names and be able have the peripheral vision to simply see them run up beside them. All the money and fame in the world can’t account for that. That is why multiple players shocked the world this month, by retiring before reaching that scary reality.

Dec 21, 2014; Pittsburgh, PA, USA; Pittsburgh Steelers outside linebacker Jason Worilds (93) reacts after recording a sack against the Kansas City Chiefs during the fourth quarter at Heinz Field. The Steelers won 20-12. Mandatory Credit: Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports

Jason Worilds entered the new league year being ranked the 25^th most talented free agent by Walter Football. He had just come off of a one year, $10 million contract with the Pittsburgh Steelers, and was due to make somewhere around $8 million a year, over a four or five-year span. On March 11^th, Worilds shocked the world by retiring at the age of 27. Worilds cited his religion, Jehovah’s Witness, as the reason to walk away from the game at such a young age. Aside from his religion, Worilds has also suffered multiple injuries in his five-year NFL career. The official injury reports from over his career list the following body parts injured in his five-year NFL career: shoulder, knee, quadriceps, wrist, and abdomen. There is little doubt that the fear of accumulating more injuries played a role in seeking the help of his religion and ultimately hanging it all up.

Linebacker Chris Borland was drafted with the 77^th pick in the 2014 NFL draft. He was a First team All-American, Big Ten Freshman of the Year, Big Ten Linebacker of the Year, and Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year. He was a superstar linebacker in the making. In his first season, Borland played 14 games, had 108 combined tackles, two interceptions, and one sack. His teammate Patrick Willis retired at the age of 30, creating a bigger opportunity for Borland to contribute and make an impact on the team. Everything was going his way.

Shockingly, Borland retired from professional football after one season at the age of 24. It was something unheard of, a player so young and talented willingly walking away from the game so suddenly. On ESPN’s “Outside the Lines”, Borland compared continuing to play football to “jumping into water and not seeing how deep it is.” Borland says he could either come out “unscathed”, a little cut up, or hit his head. He told everyone that “risk wasn’t worth it.” He followed up those comments by saying that “I think I’d have to take on some risks that, as a person, I don’t want to take on.”

Worilds and Borland are just two of the players that walked away from the game at such a young age. Titans Quarterback Jake Locker retired at the age of 26. 49ers Linebacker Patrick Willis walked away from a Hall of Fame career at 30. Though these are only a small percentage of players walking away so young, it troubles the NFL to see its budding superstars walk away.

I asked Sayre Bedinger, Editor for NFLmocks.com, what he thought of Borland’s surprisingly early retirement: “I personally think it’s completely fine if you’ve got recommendation from a physician that your football career is at the point of jeopardizing your future health. For the most part, however, you should know long before you get to the NFL the long-term health risks, and for Borland to retire at such a young age is, to me, a bit of a head scratcher. The 49ers made a significant investment in him and were counting on him as a key part of their future, but such is life in the NFL. It’s ultimately the decision of an NFL player, but they should know the risks before they are drafted into the league and thus, I don’t fully agree with Borland’s decision. However, it is exactly that — his decision.”

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I also talked to Charles McDonald, an assistant editor for NFLmocks.com, who felt like the culture of the NFL is “flawed” and praised Borland’s decision: “I have no problem with Borland’s decision. If you spend an elongated amount of time on/around a football team you understand that the culture of football is extremely flawed. The pressure to be seen as a warrior is immense. What this leads to is players feeling coerced into playing through any type of injury, even serious ones. I’m proud of Chris Borland for being able to step away from the game before it consumed him. I only got to the Division Three level and everyday my body still feels the effect of playing football since I was seven years old. I’m glad Borland was able to leave on his own terms unlike so many other NFL players.”

The fear of concussions is the biggest red flag for not just NFL players, but for anyone associated with the game; from a college coach to the Pee-Wee League parents. The league has had the looming cloud of concussions over its head for several years, ever since lawsuits from former players have been filed against the league, claiming that it hid the scientific results/effects of brain injuries, mainly concussions. There is currently a settlement in a class action lawsuit being reached upon between the league and former players, but nothing has been officially finalized. The reported deal is expected to be worth $765 million, pennies to what the league revenue is reported as. According to www.nflconcussionsettlement.com, a site set up by the players for others to get information on the settlement, the benefits from the settlement will include the following: “Baseline medical exams for retired NFL players; Monetary awards for diagnoses of ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease), Alzheimer’s Disease, Parkinson’s Disease, Dementia and certain cases of chronic traumatic encephalopathy or CTE (a neuropathological finding) diagnosed after death; and Education programs and initiatives related to football safety.”

As part of the league’s new initiative to promote better awareness and scientific knowledge, Commissioner Roger Goodell appointed Dr. Elizabeth Nabel the first Chief Health and Medical Advisor in the history of the NFL. In the league’s 2014 Health and Safety Annual Report, the word “concussion” is written 95 times. New on and off-field penalties are being implemented against players who hit others dangerously, which the league claims has led to a 25 percent decrease in concussions. Probably most important, the league is implementing a new program called “Heads Up” to teach youth and their coaches about how to properly tackle and avoid/detect concussions.

What scares the league and players the most is the outcome of these injuries. In May of 2012, soon-to-become Hall of Fame Linebacker Junior Seau committed suicide in his San Diego home at the age of 43. Post-mortem tests showed his brain possessed signs of CTE, or Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy.

The following information was reported in a Boston University report on Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy:

“Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) is a progressive degenerative disease of the brain found in athletes (and others) with a history of repetitive brain trauma, including symptomatic concussions as well as asymptomatic subconcussive hits to the head. CTE has been known to affect boxers since the 1920s. However, recent reports have been published of neuropathologically confirmed CTE in retired professional football players and other athletes who have a history of repetitive brain trauma. This trauma triggers progressive degeneration of the brain tissue, including the build-up of an abnormal protein called tau. These changes in the brain can begin months, years, or even decades after the last brain trauma or end of active athletic involvement. The brain degeneration is associated with memory loss, confusion, impaired judgment, impulse control problems, aggression, depression, and, eventually, progressive dementia.”

On December 2^nd, 2012, Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Javon Belcher committed suicide in front of his Head Coach and General Manager at the team’s workout facility. This came immediately after Javon had killed his girlfriend in their home. Belcher’s brain also showed signs of CTE. These incidents, along with several others, is what the league is trying to prevent. This is why players like Chris Borland walked away from millions of dollars.

The NFL is one of the biggest and most influential corporations in the world right now. Prior to the 2014 season, the league split $6 billion of its $9.5 billion revenue between the 32 teams in the league. It surpasses Major League Baseball’s revenue by half a billion dollars, and the National Basketball Association’s by nearly five billion dollars. Will the NFL see a dramatic effect to that revenue number from a couple of under 30-year-old guys retiring? Probably not. Could the effect of guys like Chris Borland, Jason Worilds, Patrick Willis, and Jake Locker lead to more players perusing the same option? It very well may lead to that. In order to not just protect itself, but its players, the NFL must continue to enhance its new player safety protocols and on-field rules. The league has the influence to change the world, and this is an issue they must now face upfront and tackle. No one, not even the National Football League is too big to fall. Try to imagine a world without the NFL… Hard, isn’t it?

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