Football is a very unique sport. Most sports are defined by the ball that is
used to play them, but football is different. Football, while it can be defined
by its oblong shaped ball, it is more appropriately defined by its
ever-changing helmet because the changes in the helmet often correlate with the
changes that occur in the game. In order to understand today’s culture of
football and the current conflicts in it’s community, one must first understand
the history of the game and what it used to mean to be a football player. There
are four major changes that have occurred during the history of football that
included helmets and the changes in the game that have come along with them.
These changes include the first helmet and the forward pass, the 1960’s helmet
and the Merger, the 1980’s model and the “Golden Age” of quarterbacks, and
today’s helmet, where the rule changes and economics of the game has caused it
to change its identity. Throughout all of these helmet changes, we see the
identity of the game begin to change slowly towards what it has become today, a
game that has lost touch with its diehard community.
Today football has become a game where
the players are commodities rather than just players and these commodities are
used to make the owners money not only on the field but also off the
field. One of the main ways that the NFL has attempted to secure their
investments is by over penalizing players for intensity that up until now had
always been tolerated and had often been encouraged in the game of football. By
reducing the intensity of the game, the NFL hopes to gain more fans by
appealing to the less violent viewer and to make sure that their most important
commodities, quarterbacks, don’t get hurt. Looking into these new rules and
regulations the helmet can always be identified as the starting point because
change in football always begins with a change in the helmet. As the helmet has
up until now signified change and progress in the sport of football, recently
it has become more of a darker symbol that is representing a sport that has
been using money and marketing as its main motivator rather than staying true
to a game that fans have grown to love.
In the infancy of football there were no helmets. In the early 1900’s, once the
popularity of the game picked up and injuries became more serious, players
began to wear leather snow hats on their heads with two flaps on the sides.
This was the first helmet. Along with the addition of the helmet, came the
introduction of the forward pass, which changed the game drastically. In this
beginning stage of football, the game was already fine tuning it’s self in
order to solidify its own identity, which was that if you play football, you
have to be more than an athlete. Football is a sport that requires extreme
toughness and aggressiveness yet it also requires immense discipline. Football
players began to be recognized as “tough guys” simply because of the pure
nature of the sport that was implemented from its birth. The main points of the
game involve pummeling the person across from you or the person who is in your
way. Knowing this, naturally the identity of the sport would become synonyms
with some sense of extreme masculinity.
Since the beginning of football
this identity has pretty much remained the same in the sense that you had to be
a specifically unique or tough individual in order to object your self to the
dangers of the sport. Recently the identity of the sport has begun to change in
the sense that players don’t have to be real football players like back in the
old days when no body had a pretty face and players were paid to play not paid
to be a marketing commodity. Today we see “athletes” rather than “football
players” playing the game more and more because of the recent rule changes that
have made the sport less physical and less aggressive. These rule changes are
changing the identity of the game that had been established years ago. These
changes have seen a new type of player introduced to the game that isn’t as
rugged as they once were. This new type of player or “athlete” is now more
physically gifted and more marketable than the old, beaten, battered,
super-masculine, player of years ago. Today we see players like Tom Brady who are
the spokespeople for boots and who pamper their hair. This is a drastic change
from players of years ago like Ronnie Lott, who would cut off their fingers if
they had to as long as it meant getting back on the field. This doesn’t speak
to the lack of commitment of players today; it just speaks to the changing face
of masculinity in our society that says you can look good and play good and you
don’t have to play injured to still be a man.
In the 1960’s, football was in another time of change. Helmets were the key
leaders in this change because they became bigger and safer because of the
change from leather to plastic. Along with this drastic change in equipment
came one of the biggest changes in the game to date, the AFL-NFL merger. After
the first three Superbowls, which all featured the new helmets, the NFL and the
AFL decided to combine forces and create the even larger NFL that we know
today. This new league opened up many doors for new ideas and innovations into
the game and one of them was deciding to make the Superbowl an annual event
between the two champions of each conference. Like every other major change in
football history, the helmet change was synonymous with the game change. In
this instance the game had already begun its identity change. Superbowl III
between the Baltimore Colts and the New York Jets was one of the most important
events in NFL history. The Jets were huge underdogs, but flamboyant quarterback
Joe Namath felt that they were going to win anyway. Namath was so sure about a
Jets victory that he guaranteed it. At that point, this was the biggest public
announcement ever made by a football player. Eventually the Jets would over
come all of the odds and beat the mighty Colts proving the bold quarterback
correct. This move by Namath would begin to pave the new road that NFL owners
would want their franchise to go in because right after his prediction Namath
became a cultural icon and could virtually sell anything.
In the 1980’s football reached another state of maturation in the sense that
the NFL really began to reach it’s “Golden Age”. Thanks to Namath, quarterbacks
became the most highly paid and most dominant position on the field. The
position was truly being played in its most beautiful form. The 1980’s and 90’s
was the time period where we really began to see quarterbacks putting up
tremendous numbers, yet staying true to the game by taking their share of hits
while doing it. Some of these quarterbacks that were really thriving during
this time period were Dan Marino of the Miami Dolphins, Joe Montana of the San
Francisco 49er’s, Troy Aikman of the Dallas Cowboys, and Steve Young also of
the 49er’s but just after Montana left. This time in football saw great
quarterbacks winning many championships, seven just between Montana and Aikman
alone. This era began in the early 80’s with the birth of yet another new
helmet that was similar to the one introduced in the 60’s but it now featured
many bars across the front of the helmet that protected the face and also absorbed
more of the energy of a hit than in years past. There is no coincidence that
the new helmet had more bars on the facemask so that they could protect the
faces of the players, at this point owners had realized that they needed to
protect their investments because that is what players really were to them,
investments. This golden era of football came along with another helmet change
and was a time of prosperity in football that may never be rivaled. The reason
is because it was a time of such offensive and defensive balance. In today’s
game the new rule changes have strictly favored the offensive side of the ball,
which hinders the integrity of the game.
After the 1980’s helmet, the status quo
in the NFL pretty much stayed the same not many changes were made to the game
and likewise the helmet remained the same all throughout the 2000’s. Recently
helmets have changed again. These new helmets made by Riddell called
“Revolution” are the safest helmets ever made, focusing all on reducing
concussions. Although the helmets that have been made recently are the safest
helmets ever made, this time, it appears that no changes in the game have come
from it in the sense of game-play. In fact, the changes have been for the worse
in regards to the integrity and identity of the game.
The game that has emerged today
is a game that is about nothing more than dollar signs and two hand touch.
There are many new rule changes that are supposedly being enacted for safety
purposes. When it is evident that the rules being implemented are all in the
interests of making more money and protecting their biggest investments, the
quarterbacks. Moderate fans of the game like touchdowns and they also like
great quarterbacks. One way that these two things could be increased is by
instituting rules that hinder defenses and aid receivers and quarterbacks. With
the introduction of the defenseless receiver rule that was put into place last
year, receivers no longer had to fear getting blindsided, which takes away one
advantage that the defense had over the offense. Rules such as this one are
ruining football and tarnishing its integrity because now offenses have a
decisive advantage over the defenses. When the receiver cannot be hit when he
is defenseless, he can make almost any catch and can concentrate on any ball
thrown his way, which helps them immensely. Another new rule implemented
prevents a defender from hitting a quarterback below the waist.
You
be the judge on if this was the correct call or not. Was this really a malicious hit
that deserved a penalty?… furthermore is this even a penalty that should exist?
When a
quarterback can only be hit in one spot of his body, it really prevents the
defense from making the QB have a tough time at all throwing the
football. When these two rules are in place, what do you get? More yards
and more touchdowns. All of the evidence is in week one of the 2011 season
where many offensive records, passing ones in particular, were shattered.
“There were more passing yards in Week One (7,842) than any week in NFL
history. To put that in perspective, teams averaged 245 yards passing…14
quarterbacks passed for over 300 yards. That’s also the most for any week
in NFL history…Tom Brady
and Chad Henne
combined for the most net passing yards (906) in a game in NFL history...”
(Week One sets records for passing yards, return scores). These rules are
beginning to take away the fear that every player used to have to deal with
when he lined up across from other players. Without fear in the game what
separates athletes from football players? People used to need a certain
mentality to play the game because you knew the dangers that came with it. In
today’s game all one needs is a strong arm or fast legs to play the game
because the new rules have allowed this to take place. “Athletes” are beginning
to dominate the game and it all has come because of the rule changes.
Another interesting aspect about these
“safety rules” is that the rate of injuries has gone up since their inception.
If that were the case then one would have to believe that the rules are just in
place to raise the numbers on the scoreboard in order to draw in new fans.
According to the NFL players union, the average number of injuries rose during
the 2010 season. The NFLPA also says that 13 percent of all injuries required
players to be placed on injured reserve during the 2010 season, compared to an
average of 10 percent for 2002-09 (NFL injuries up in 2010, NFLPA says). If
these rule changes aren’t protecting all of our players better, why are they
even in place besides the fact that they are breaking scoring records and
making more money. Star running back Adrian Peterson when asked why the
injuries have increased he responded with a very interesting remark "I
think the players are getting bigger, stronger, faster, Then again, I think it
[has to do with] some of the rule changes. Guys are getting fined, $25,000,
$50,000 for hits to the heads, so guys are going to try to go for the legs.
Stuff like that – they make it to protect the quarterback, but it hurts the
integrity of the game, too." (NFL injuries up in 2010, NFLPA says).
Players in the game today even agree that some of the rule changes are
ridiculous and have done nothing but ruin the integrity of the game and cause
more injuries. What the NFL is doing is protecting the quarterbacks because
those are the moneymakers and they are changing the rules to score more points
because that is also a way to make more money. The end result of these actions
are causing more injuries to players who already have shorter careers than
quarterbacks and it also changes the game play that many fans across America
have come to love.
Looking at the grand scheme of things,
what do all of these helmet changes and game changes mean? As the game changes
so do the helmets that the players wear. Recently we have seen the introduction
of a new, safer helmet and in return we have gotten a game now that is much
safer for only quarterbacks and receivers and has actually gotten more
dangerous for the rest of the players. The new rule changes that are being put
into place have begun to change the integrity and identity of the game all in
the name of making more money. From helmetless to overbearing plastic buckets
that dare not be touched, we have seen the game go from a gridiron of soldiers
to chessboard where the all of the players are pawns and the quarterback is
king. Greed is the new face of football and just like in the rest of America
the game is a commodity and we are all just consumers.
To truly
understand the current agenda of the NFL and its media marketing progression
through the Quarterback position, click on the link below. Also when watching
the video take note of the helmet changes and how it all ties in together... By
the way the Joe Namath comment I came up with before I saw this video.
I'm just gonna say "Ditto" on the proud comments!!!
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