Gridiron Football Research Articles

Sport and longevity: an observational study of international athletes.

The human lifespan is influenced by various factors, with physical activity being a significant contributor. Despite the clear benefit of exercise on health and longevity, the association between different types of sports and lifespan is yet to be considered. Accordingly, we aimed to study this association in a large international cohort of former athletes using a robust linear regression model. We collected data on athletes from public sources, accumulating a total of 95,210 observations, 95.5% of which were accounted for by males. The dataset represented athletes born between 1862 and 2002 from 183 countries across 44 sports disciplines. We calculated the change in lifespan by measuring the difference in age between athletes and the corresponding reference populations, while accounting for variations caused by sex, year of death, and country. The results revealed that various sports impacted lifespan differently, with male athletes being more likely to experience benefits from sports than female athletes. Among male athletes, pole vaulting and gymnastics were linked to the highest extension in lifespan (8.4years, 95% CI [6.8, 9.9] and 8.2years, 95% CI [7.4, 9], respectively), while volleyball and sumo wrestling were the most negatively associated with lifespan (- 5.4years, 95% CI [- 7, - 3.8]; - 9.8years, 95% CI [- 11, - 8.6], respectively). The association between lifespan and popular team sports in males was positive for cricket, rowing, baseball, water polo, Australian rules, hurling, lacrosse, field hockey, minimal for rugby, canoeing and kayaking, basketball, gridiron football, and football (soccer), and negative for handball and volleyball. Racquet sports (i.e., tennis and badminton) exhibited a consistent and positive association in both male and female athletes, as shown by an extended lifespan of up to 5.7years in males (95% CI [5, 6.5]) and 2.8years in females (95% CI [1.8, 3.9]). Although lacking conclusive evidence, we theorize that the observed results may be attributed to the aerobic and anaerobic characteristics of each sport, with mixed sports yielding the maximum benefits for the lifespan. While results from female athletes should be cautiously interpreted, our study highlights the complex interplay between sports and lifespan and contributes to the growing body of knowledge on the multifaceted relationship between physical activity and human longevity.

The Gridiron’s Ethical Striping: Threads of Tackle Football’s Moral Permissibility

In this paper, I examine the ethical landscape surrounding tackle football, exploring the moral permissibility of the sport and the myriad ethical considerations it entails. This examination comprises the use of an ethical decision-making framework to analyze four key aspects: relevant empirical facts, affected parties, salient moral values/disvalues, and potential options. In pondering these aspects, I identify the ethical conflicts arising from factual disagreements, conflicting interests, and divergent values/disvalues concerning players’ decision to partake in gridiron football. In addition to emphasizing the importance of understanding and addressing such aspects and conflicts to devise potential solutions, I contend that ethical issues related to the permissibility of football ultimately stem from value-related conflicts, highlighting the necessity of examining and reconciling conflicting moral principles.

An in-depth exploration of a positional subgroup in professional sport

An inevitable structural feature within sport teams involves ‘the groups within the group,’ otherwise known as subgroups. Although there is a large body of literature dedicated to group dynamics constructs at the total team level, little research has explored such topics at a positional subgroup level, particularly in professional sports. Thus, the purpose of this study was to provide an in-depth exploration of group dynamics perceptions from a specific positional subgroup in professional sports, with a particular emphasis on group cohesion and leadership. Specifically, we interviewed six experienced professional gridiron football offensive linemen to explore their perspectives of the factors influencing group cohesion within their positional subgroup. The analysis revealed environmental factors as well as internal roles and interpersonal processes that shaped group development and cohesion within the subgroup. Notably, the impact of veteran athlete leadership and how the behaviors of both the coaching staff and general managers could either positively or negatively influence group cohesion in professional football were apparent. Therefore, the present results are of interest to members of professional organizations generally, and gridiron football specifically, including general managers, head coaches, assistant coaches, support staff, and athletes regarding how the dynamics within a positional subgroup can impact individual and team outcomes. Lay summary: This article describes professional athletes’ opinions about group cohesion and leadership. All athletes were part of a positional subgroup in gridiron football. The analysis revealed environmental factors as well as internal roles and interpersonal processes that shaped group development and cohesion within the subgroup and the team as a whole.

Influence of forefoot bending stiffness on American football performance and metatarsophalangeal joint bending angle

ABSTRACT Changes in forefoot bending stiffness have been shown to affect metatarsophalangeal peak bending angles as well as athletic performance. Increasing bending stiffness tends to reduce peak bending angles, which could potentially reduce hyperextension injuries such as turf toe. Limited information is available, however, on the efficacy of increasing forefoot bending stiffness on large-sized athletes such as those that participate in American Football, with prior studies being conducted on smaller athlete populations. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to determine the influence of increased forefoot bending stiffness on metatarsophalangeal joint extension and athletic performance of grid-iron football players. Ten varsity grid-iron football players performed four National Football League combine movements in a motion capture laboratory in three footwear conditions of varying bending stiffness: Soft (12.7 N/mm), Control (23.8 N/mm), Stiff (42.2 N/mm). None of the footwear conditions significantly altered the maximum metatarsophalangeal bending. Therefore, to reduce metatarsophalangeal hyperextension injuries in American football players a greater amount of forefoot bending stiffness may be required. Performance differences were present only during the five-metre sprint acceleration, with athletes having an improved performance in the Control and Stiff conditions. This improved performance was due to an increased horizontal impulse and improvements in power generation at the ankle joint.

Harbingers of foul play: A field study of gain/loss frames and regulatory fit in the NFL

AbstractDo people cheat more when they have something to gain, or when they have something to lose? The answer to this question isn’t straightforward, as research is mixed when it comes to understanding how unethical people will be when they might acquire something good versus avoid something bad. To wit, research has found that people cheat more in a loss (vs. gain) frame, yet research on regulatory focus has found that people cheat more in a promotion focus (where the focus is on acquiring gains) than in a prevention focus (where the focus is on avoiding losses). Through a large-scale field study containing 332,239 observations including 27,350 transgressions, we address the contradictory results of gain/loss frames and regulatory focus on committing unethical behavior in a context that contains a high risk of detecting unethical behavior (NFL football games). Our results replicated the separate effects of more cheating in a loss frame, and more cheating in a promotion focus. Furthermore, our data revealed a heretofore undocumented crossover interaction, in accordance with regulatory fit, which could disentangle past results: Specifically, we found promotion focus is associated with more cheating in a loss (vs. gain) frame, whereas prevention focus is associated with more cheating in a gain (vs. loss) frame. In gridiron football, this translates to offensive players fouling more when their team is losing (vs. winning) and defensive players fouling more when their team is winning (vs. losing).

Football Increases Future Risk of Symptomatic Radiographic Knee Osteoarthritis.

Male youth in the United States commonly participate in gridiron (American) football. There are little data substantiating current popular opinion that it is associated with knee pain or osteoarthritis (OA) later in life. We aimed to evaluate the relationship of football with these outcomes in the Osteoarthritis Initiative (OAI). This is a study of male OAI participants with knee x-ray readings, symptom assessments, and completed surveys on lifetime physical activity. The OAI is a multicenter, observational cohort recruited from the community not based on football participation status. A history of exposure to American football was ascertained via self-report. Knee radiographs were scored for Kellgren-Lawrence grade (0-4). Radiographic OA (ROA) was defined as Kellgren-Lawrence ≥ 2 in at least one knee. Frequent knee pain meant at least one knee with frequent knee pain. Symptomatic ROA required at least one knee with both ROA and frequent knee pain. A total of 1166 men had a mean age of 63.7 (SD, 9.2) yr and body mass index of 28.6 (SD, 4.2) kg·m. Thirty-one percent (365/1166) played football at some point in their lives, 95% of whom participated from ages 12 to 18 yr. The ORs for symptomatic ROA from the lowest to highest football participation were 1.2, 1.5, and 2.2, respectively (P for trend = 0.004). Findings were similar for football from ages 12 to 18 yr and for outcomes of knee pain and ROA. This is the first large epidemiologic study to suggest that football participation, including in the teen years, may be detrimental toward knee health. Prospective studies evaluating football players are warranted.

Transnational Corporations of Football Kin: Migration, Labor Flow, and the American Samoa MIRAB Economy

In the U.S. territory of American Samoa, gridiron football has emerged as an important driver of a stock-flow relationship in which the stock of overseas-resident migrant athletic laborers sustains the flow of remittances to their extended family in their homeland. Within this article, I consider the significance of gridiron football within American Samoa’s MIRAB ( Migration, Remittances, Aid and Bureaucracy) economy, a model of Pacific Island microeconomies characterized by migration, remittances, foreign aid, and public bureaucracy. Based on a series of personal interviews with high school football players between the ages of 15 and 18 years on the Eastern football team squad, as well as more than a dozen coaches, parents, educator, and directors associated with the production of American Samoan High School football ( n = 60), I critically examine the social, cultural, and economic determinants involved in the collective decision-making process of footballers to emigrate to the U.S. mainland. I find that family units in the American Samoa operate as, to rephrase Bertram and Watters, transnational corporations of football kin, working collectively to develop and train skilled football laborers toward the accumulation of various forms of economic and social remittances for the benefit of the individual and extended family unit. More broadly, gridiron football in American Samoa produces a stock-flow relationship whereby a stock of Samoan gridiron footballers migrates to U.S. colleges and universities to support the flow of remittances and aid that sustains the island’s MIRAB economy.

Pipelines on the Gridiron: Player Backgrounds, Opportunity Structures and Racial Stratification in American College Football

Stacking—the tendency of playing positions to be racially segregated in sports—remains prominent in gridiron football. This raises questions of how stacking persists and how opportunities arise for athletes of different races to assume different roles. Demographic data on 41,484 NCAA football players reveal differences in opportunities and playing roles for student-athletes of different races. In concert with previous racial stacking studies, white players continue to be overrepresented in central, leadership positions. Racial minorities are overrepresented in peripheral “skill” positions. Stacking at each playing position is affected differently by the demographics of player high schools and college teams. Players assuming non-stereotypical roles are much more likely to come from a racially homogenous high school or college team. Even though racially homogenous schools provide stereotype-defying opportunities, they also exhibit intense racial stacking. The few white (or black) players on such teams are overwhelmingly slotted into stereotypical positions. Since stereotype-defying opportunities tend to emerge in racially homogenous schools, blacks playing typically white positions come from relatively poor schools. In contrast, whites playing typically black positions are relatively affluent, since such opportunities tend to emerge in whiter, wealthier schools. Implications for student opportunities and talent inculcation beyond the football field are discussed.

Concussion in Sport: The Unheeded Evidence.

Patients with repeated minor head injury are a challenge to our clinical skills of neurodiagnosis because the relevant evidence objectively demonstrating their impairment was collected in New Zealand (although published in the BMJ and Lancet) and, at the time, was mired in controversy. The effects of repeated closed diffuse head injury are increasingly recognized worldwide, but now suffer from the relentless advance of imaging technology as the dominant form of neurodiagnosis and the considerable financial interests that underpin the refusal to recognize that acute accelerational injury is the most subtle and insidiously damaging (especially when seen in the light of biopsychosocial medicine), and potentially one of the most financially momentous (given the large incomes impacted and needing compensation) phenomena in modern sports medicine. The vested interests in downplaying this phenomenon are considerable and concentrated in North America where diffuse head injury is a widespread feature of the dominant winter sports code: Gridiron or American Rules football. The relationship of this to shattered lives among the brightest and best of young men and the relatively dated objective evidence are a toxic mix in terms of ethical analysis and, therefore, there is a malignant confluence of social forces that tends toward minimizing the injury.

Intellectual Property Protection Comes to the National Football League

Some useful and productive social systems would be destroyed by the policing of intellectual property “rights” within them. This note examines how US professional (gridiron) football would be affected.

Virtual Patriot Games: American Football in The Times of London, 1888–1910

This study examines the American football press coverage in the Times of London from 1888 to November 1910. The time span covers the paper’s first mention of the game to the first game played in England. This period also coincides with increasing anxiety about the strength of the British Empire and unwanted American influences. During this time, athletic contests between the two nations turned into sites for the construction of national identities. Adapting the sport scholar Emma Poulton’s concept of ‘mediated patriot games’, the author argues that the American football coverage of the Times of London could be considered ‘virtual patriot games’, as the absence of domestic American football teams did not allow for direct competition. Two related narrative elements. The stories in the Times framed gridiron football as the pastime of the ‘other’, including translating rules and comparing the merits of rugby and American football. The reports also focused on the American game’s violence, confirming older traditions in British imaginations of America. Advancements in communication technologies, especially the telegraphic wire, were critical for the immediacy with which British readers consumed American sporting news. Contrary to current scholarship, British interpretations of American culture through gridiron football developed much earlier than the post-1970s information age.

Concussion: What’s the State of Play for Children & Adolescents in 2017? Brief Report

Every country around the world enjoys sport. Australia is widely known for cricket and rugby; America is known for baseball & gridiron football, Europe for soccer, amongst others. These sports are played at an elite level as well as beginners from an early age in the backyard. Yet it is also these sports that can deliver a ball at the speed of 100 km/hr (football), 105 km/hr (baseball), 112 km/hr (rugby), 150 km/hr (cricket) and 211 km/hr (soccer). This is the same force that can occur in a motor vehicle accident. The force finds the target, often accidentally, the head. Damage to the brain is not only from the impact of the ball hitting its target, but also the shearing forces of an acceleration-deceleration in jury — often resulting in a concussion. But you can’t see a concussion and this is what makes diagnosis and treatment difficult. Children and adolescents are particularly at risk as their brains are growing, requiring support and protection. (JNNN 2017;6(1):26–27)

Racism and homophobia in English football: The equality act, positive action and the limits of law

This article provides an analysis of two connected discriminatory practices in contemporary English male professional football. The first discriminatory practice concerns race and employment opportunities as coaches and managers despite the relative high levels of professional players from certain Black Minority and Ethnic (BME) backgrounds. An evaluation is made as to whether the introduction of a Rooney-type rule that requires BME candidates to be interviewed for these types of positions, which currently operates in American Gridiron Football, should be introduced in the United Kingdom. The second discriminatory practice concerns sexual orientation, appearing to result in it being impossible for gay professional players to openly acknowledge their sexuality. There are tensions between the right to privacy, on the one hand, and evidence of significant elements of homophobia in the culture of professional football, on the other. Both these discriminatory practices are complex and very much of the moment. This article provides an analysis of how these discriminatory practices manifest themselves. A key issue is an evaluation of how the Equality Act, particularly in the context of the positive action provisions under the Act, has provided a remedy to promote diversity in the particular social field of football. A range of anti-racism and anti-homophobia sports-related policies and rules has been developed to engage with these issues and this article examines the relationship between these normative mechanisms and the provisions under the Act. It is contended that the Equality Act’s positive action provisions fail to promote effective diversity in this social field in relation to race and sexual orientation. A case is made for more radical elements of affirmative action to be given legal support to bring about meaningful change in football in terms of diversity and inclusion.

The Original Pan-American Games? The 1937 Dallas Pan-American Olympics

In 1937, Dallas, Texas, hosted a sporting festival that drew teams from across the Americas to a ‘Pan American Olympics’. Organized under the umbrella of the Greater Texas and Pan-American Exposition, the games drew hundreds of athletes for track and field contests, soccer football matches, and a boxing tournament. Though historians generally consider the 1951 Buenos Aires Pan-American Games as the genesis of the Western Hemisphere’s biggest sporting carnival, the Dallas games certainly inspired even if they did not directly inaugurate the Pan-American Games movement. Directed by George Preston Marshall, the owner of a professional gridiron football franchise and an ardent leader of segregation in that sport, the Pan-American Olympics paradoxically produced an interracial set of contests that matched black, white, and Latino athletes against one another in the heart of the segregated US South. The Dallas Pan-American festival reveals the enigmatic visions of their architect, illumines the racial and national cleavages of the 1930s, and highlights the persistent dream of an Olympic-style event that would include all of the Americas.

Personal Foul: an evaluation of the moral status of football

The popularity and profitability of American gridiron football is beyond dispute. Recent polls put football as the overwhelming favorite of people who follow at least one sport and huge revenues are reported at both the professional and the university level. We know, however, that what is the case tells us little about what ought to be the case, and it is to the latter question that this paper is directed. I offer a three-pronged attack on the ethical acceptability of American football, both amateur and professional, based on (1) harm to the players, (2) objectification of the players, and (3) harm to others done by the players, leading to the conclusion that the sport, as currently constituted, is morally unacceptable.

MR Spectroscopic Evidence of Brain Injury in the Non-Diagnosed Collision Sport Athlete

With growing evidence of long-term neurological damage in individuals enduring repetitive head trauma, it is critical to detect lower-level damage accumulation for the early diagnosis of injury in at-risk populations. Proton magnetic resonance spectroscopic scans of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and primary motor cortex were collected from high school American (gridiron) football athletes, prior to and during their competition seasons. Although no concussions were diagnosed, significant metabolic deviations from baseline and non-collision sport controls were revealed. Overall the findings indicate underlying biochemical changes, consequential to repetitive hits, which have previously gone unnoticed due to a lack of traditional neurological symptoms.

Recognizing and managing concussion in school sport.

Every country around the world enjoys some sort of sport. The Olympics sees countries from all over the globe participate in elite sport, in both winter and summer competitions. Australia is widely known for cricket and rugby; America is known for baseball and gridiron football (among others). These sports are played at an elite level as well as beginners from early ages as young as 4 years in the backyard. Yet, it is also these sports that can deliver a ball at the speed of 100 km/h (football), 105 km/h (baseball), 112 km/h (rugby), 150 km/h (cricket), and 211 km/h (soccer). This is the same force that a car collision can produce. That force eventually finds a target, and in some cases, unfortunately, it is a head. Damage to the brain is not only from the impact of the ball hitting its target but rather also the shearing forces of acceleration-deceleration injury that can cause extensive injuries. There has been much discussion of late regarding concussion in sport and the accumulative effects of head blows resulting in varying degrees of memory loss and dementia later in life. The media have been saturated with heightened awareness of chronic traumatic encephalopathy. This, however, is still being researched. It is true that each concussion compounds the one before, but rather than focus on the injury, managers/coaches and sporting codes should be focusing on the identification and proper management of a suspected concussion and the return-to-play protocols. This is especially important in our schools where growing brains need nurturing. Neuroscience nurses are at the forefront of educating school children, teachers, and coaches through partnering with local schools. This article will focus on concussion recognition and management in school sport.

Sport w szkole i wstrząśnienie mózgu — co należy wiedzieć

Every country around the world enjoys some sort of sport. The Olympics sees countries from all over the globe participate in elite sport, in both winter and summer competitions. Australia is widely known for cricket and rugby, America for baseball and gridiron football (amongst others). These sports are played at an elite level as well as beginners from early ages as young as 4yrs in the backyard. Yet it is also these sports that can deliver a ball at the speed of 112km/h (rugby), 105km/h (baseball), 150km/h (cricket) and 211km/h (soccer). This is the same force that a car collision can produce. That force eventually finds a target and in some cases unfortunately, it is a head. Damage to the brain is not only from the impact of the ball hitting its target, rather, the shearing forces of acceleration-deceleration injury that can cause extensive injuries. There has been much discussion of late regarding concussion in sport and the accumulative effects of head blows resulting in varying degrees of memory loss and dementia later in life. The media has been saturated with heightened awareness of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). This however, is still being researched. It is true that each concussion compounds the one before, but rather than focus on the injury, managers/coaches and sporting codes should be focusing on the identification and proper management of a suspected concussion and the return-to-play protocols. This is especially important in our schools where growing brains need nurturing. This paper will focus on concussion recognition and management in school sport. (JNNN 2014;3(1):31–38)

American Football Becomes the Dominant Intercollegiate National Pastime

American colleges in the nineteenth century rejected British cricket for baseball and British soccer and British rugby for American football. While Americans copied British culture in many ways, they were often not direct copies. The historical concept of American Exceptionalism has been questioned by historians, but if there ever was an American Exceptionalism, the cases for the American games of organised baseball and football surely can be made. The actions of several individuals and influence of a variety of forces insured the creation of and dominance of American football as the intercollegiate sport of choice by the turn of the nineteenth century. In American institutions of higher education ‘gridiron football', in the vernacular of that era, represented the nascent ‘national pastime' that triumphed on US campuses.

Global Sport in the Pacific: A Brief Overview

In recent decades, sport has become an increasingly important path of mobility for Pacific Islander men, positioning them within interlinked local, state, regional, and global sporting economies. Players from the Pacific (particularly in rugby, rugby league, soccer, and gridiron football) have become icons through their sporting prowess, not only within Oceania but in Japan, the United States, and throughout Europe as well, as new markets have opened up through professional and semi-professional sport. Yet this movement continues to take place within the fragile context of the spread of globalized media, transnational capital investment, and development initiatives throughout the region. This introduction to global sport in the Pacific considers the complicated realities of and links between modern, highly commercialized team sports that have facilitated both the rise of global sport in the Pacific and the rise of the Pacific in global sport. Focused on key themes of agency and mobility; development and discipline; indigenization, embodiment, and ethno-nationalism; and polyvalent imaginaries, the contributions to this special issue explore how and why sporting practices have become closely linked to various economic, political, and social processes that shape possibilities for everyday life across the Pacific and beyond.