On the day the NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell doles out player suspensions against the current and former Saints players involved in Bountygate, horrific news ripples the social media waves of the apparent suicide of NFL Legend Junior Seau.
More and more ex-players are coming out and stating the absurd mental state and condition they are in. Brain and body taking punishing abuses throughout the years.
Lawsuits are crossing Goodell’s desk on a weekly basis from these former gladiators and the results are astonishing.
Depression and mental instability are becoming the norm as the players of our generation are showing how much more damaging the sport becomes on a daily basis. Players getting bigger, faster, stronger by the minute combined with performance enhancing drugs, painkillers and depression aids are all contributing factors to brain degeneritve diseases.
Are we coming to a point in time when we need to really consider life, health and safety of people ahead of the importance and enjoyment of the sport?
Billions of dollars are at stake but where are our priorities? Do we as a society owe it to those who entertain use to stand up and say “we won’t watch as long as they’re dying!”?
Strip down some pads, take away the helmets. Look at Lacrosse or Rugby. Players still hit and get beat up but mostly in the body and head trauma is very limited.
Players DO NOT know, or fully understand, what the fatal consequences of their on field actions can and will cause. They have a warrior like mentality and aggression that propels them to the highest level of sports entertainment that we as a society relish.
Given the fact that we as spectators have invested so much financially causes the high demand for a continuous increase in performance hence skyrocketing salaries and competition.
But when is enough, enough?
How much death and tragedy is allowed and acceptable and worth the price of admission?
I say NONE!
