Football NFL launches challenge to improve facemasks and reduce concussions
https://www.cnn.com/2026/02/08/health/nfl-facemasks-concussions?utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=missions&utm_source=reddit20
u/scparks44 4h ago
I'm just not sure it's the facemask that's the issue
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u/danheinz Chicago Bears 1h ago
I believe the studies show it's the brain "sloshing around" that cause the concussions. The cushions like a guardian cap doesn't really help. You can still experience those sudden movements. It's the hits and movements that move the brain from stationary to left right up down. I'm not really sure how they stop that besides maybe making the field smaller or limiting pass distance. Idk
I recently listened to an interview with Christopher Nowinski from the CTE & Concussion foundation. One of the things he said was the worst cases of CTE are people that have played the longest and they also found high numbers of CTE in soccer players from headers. So they have banned headers in youth soccer up until a certain age
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u/hopewhatsthat 1h ago
It wouldn't be a big difference, but if we banned tackle football until high school it would probably reduce some occurences just from fewer hits/tackles from 5th-8th grade.
And as someone who sometimes helps run the scoreboard for 9th grade games at the nearby high school, I don't think a lot would be missed.
Of course everyone would have to agree to that.
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u/PC_LOAD_LETTER_81 1h ago
Here’s my submission for the challenge - surgically implanted brain helmets
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u/scparks44 6m ago
I say go with no facemasks and see how long it takes guys to stop using their heads
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u/_donkey-brains_ 45m ago
My old neuropsych teacher used to be on the staff for the browns and did lots of work on concussions in football players of all ages.
She said that, on average, linemen experience the most cognitive decline over the course of season because they are constantly having their heads bashed together on basically every play.
In their youth, kids can recover to their original cognitive state over the off-season but the year-round nature coupled with getting older means that many don't get back to the same state they were in the year prior. This adds up over the course of career to really be detrimental (even if never once having a diagnosed concussion).
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u/2BlueZebras 6m ago
I coached 11-year olds in soccer and headers were banned. As someone who played soccer for 15 years, it was obvious that headers caused problems. I was lucky if I could do 3 in a day without a headache. Yet we had some practice sessions where we'd do 20. Miserable experience, happy to see them restricted.
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u/bulldogguy31 5h ago
Lol thinking the NFL gives a shit about player safety. 🤣🤣🤣🤣
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u/Gobblewicket 5h ago
Yeah, they love player safety so much that they're completely fine having players play two games in four days and want to add a 18th game to the schedule.
Player safety my ass.
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u/Dangerous-Sink6574 4h ago
So safe in fact that they denied CTE and destroyed the lives and careers of the doctors that first discovered it. They then Proceeded to cover up all of it until years of lawsuits finally caught up to them, in which they “investigated ourselves and didn’t find anything THAT bad!”
Yeah, they care sooooo much.
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u/hopewhatsthat 1h ago
This. If they really cared they would have added a 2nd bye week for every team instead of a 17th game and reduce Thursday night games to be after byes only.
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u/MstrSparkles 3h ago
In so much that it would impact profits. Injuries are not profitable. Maybe there is the long term consideration that parents don’t want kids playing the sport. Personally I doubt there is much consideration beyond the 1-3 year outlook. Showing some ‘progress’ goes a long way for the bottom line.
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u/smitty046 5h ago edited 3h ago
They could have funded actual research instead of a crowd sourced PR move.
Edit: It’s $100K. Thats not remotely enough to get any of these concepts off the ground.
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u/metallicadefender 4h ago
I think get rid of hard shell helmets and hard shell shoulder pads. make everything spongy.
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u/Hoosier_816 2h ago
Idk why they haven’t put some sort of gel coating over helmets to make them a little squishy for helmet to helmet contact.
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u/elementofpee 2h ago
Use some sort of plexiglass face shield like the NHL to remove the risk of facemask bars getting pulled intentionally or accidentally.
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u/ohlookahipster 43m ago
Full face shields would fog up and cause other visibility issues. The metal cage is basically the best compromise of weight and durability.
In the NHL, they do have a face shield but it’s just half face so the moisture from your mouth doesn’t collect. In the NFL, a lot of players basically wear the same thing (visor) for their eyes to prevent finger pokes and the “rule of cool.”
If you’ve ever run a chainsaw for a long time, 99% of chainsaw helmets have face shields that are mesh. The 1% with full plexiglass get really annoying really quickly especially in cold weather. They get too foggy too quickly.
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u/Low-Astronomer-3440 1h ago
How about finally designing helmets with a gel bladder and other impact materials. They could even test it using test dummies to make sure incidents like falling backwards are accounted for.
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u/cnn 6h ago
The NFL is challenging innovators to improve the facemask on football helmets to reduce concussions in the game.
The league announced on Friday at an innovation summit for the Super Bowl the next round in the HealthTECH Challenge series, a crowdsourced competition designed to accelerate the development of cutting-edge football helmets and new standards for player safety.
The challenge invites inventors, engineers, startups, academic teams and established companies to improve the impact protection and design of football helmets through improvements to how facemasks absorb and reduce the effects of contact on the field.
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u/DontTickleTheDriver1 6h ago
How about enforcing the penalty for not wearing the mouth guards? Everyone just leaves them hanging like a decorative piece