After a spate of player concussions and injuries this past weekend, it looks like the National Football League is poised to crack down on players who made hard head hits during games.
Several press accounts, including one in The New York Times Tuesday, reported that the NFL would mete out tough penalties and possibly even suspend players who inflicted dangerous blows to the heads of other players. NFL executive vice president of operations Ray Anderson warned of the coming actions Monday.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/19/sports/football/19hits.html?_r=1&ref=sports
The NFL should take action after the long list of shenanigans last Sunday. After being hit in the helmet Detroit Lions linebacker Zack Follett was hosptialized overnight. Pittsburgh Steelers player James Harrison “knocked two Cleveland Brown players out of the game with head injuries,” according to The Times.
And the topper seems to have been New England’s Brandon Meriweather, who was penalized for his hit on Baltimore’s Todd Heap.
The Times quoted Anderson as saying that the league didn’t want another Darryl Stingley incident on its watch, referring to the New England Patriots player who was paralyzed in a 1978 hit and died in 2007.
There is even talk of suspensions for helmet-to-helmet hits, a suggestion made on-air Sunday by former NFL player Rodney Harrison, who had a reputation as a hard-hitting — even dirty– player during his career. According to The Times, Harrison said that that suspensions, not fines, “got his attention” when he was playing.
The NFL competition committee might even consider barring all hits that invovle using a helmet, The Times reported.
