What makes the shifts potentially groundbreaking is that major-league sports are famously technophobic. The NFL outlaws computers and PDAs on the sidelines, in the locker room and in press-box coaching booths within 90 minutes of kickoff.
This isn't about "technophobia" it's about controlling information that may be used for gambling purposes. For better or for worse, the NFL wants information about player injuries/etc to be distributed through a controlled process ("xxx has a leg injury and his return is questionable") rather then risking that some part of the population will have the info and another part won't.
Anderson would consider putting a computer chip in the ball and a laser on the goal line to replace the time-consuming debates and video reviews of scoring.
Fans have been talking about this for year, but it's not quite that simple, since scoring (and yardage in general) aren't just dependent on the location of the ball, it's also dependent on if/what body part of the ball carrier is touching the ground. It's worth investigating, but it won't be a panacea.
As long as opponents can't intercept the communications, he sees no reason why all players and coaches shouldn't be connected with wireless headsets, eliminating the need for a huddle or the quarterbacks' wristbands with plays listed in tiny print
Again this is something that's going to be inevitable. However, looking at booth-to-sidelines and sidelines-to-player communications today, if the headset system of one team breaks down, the other team isn't allowed to use their system until the first team's system is working again. I would assume that a similar rule would be in place for a team headset system, so that if one player's headset breaks, the other team wouldn't be able use their system until it got fixed. I wouldn't expect a team helmet communication system to be implemented until the NFL can be sure that the reliability will approach 100% which will be difficult considering the abuse the equipment may undergo, as well as potential interference issues.
An up-tempo pace will definitely increase the conditioning requirements of players, I'm curious as to how it will affect today's 300+ lb linemen, especially with the limited game roster.
While the NFL is finally coming around on concussions, I think information from G-meters might be something they would rather not know. We all know the game is violent and NFL fans love a great hit. I don't think people want to know just how violent it is though.
In a business the money usually comes first, and the NFL is a business in which there is surplus labor available and which has a tradition of replacing broken bodies.
It is the rare game which has no injury which causes at least one player to miss the next game.
Players are mostly a commodity the business of football. There are exceptions like the Aaron Rodgers or Tom Bradys of the world, but in general there is always another young guy waiting for his shot to play in the NFL.
The average NFL career is under 3 years long. And those guys typically don't even make that much money given the amount of post playing medical expenses they incur. I've had long conversations about the NFL with ex players (quite a few went to my old gym) and none of them would let their kids play football at any level because of the injuries that inevitably occur to everyone who plays. I think that's pretty telling.
I think this is an interesting debate, and something the olympics has to deal with as well.
Should we use technology in real world physical sports to abstract control of the game away from the players themselves?
Is watching football more enjoyable when the players turn into pawns?
When does the NFL start poaching starcraft players to help direct the field of play?
A lot of people are quoted in that article as saying "Technology is changing and the game must keep up." as if it simply goes without saying that it must.
But... must it? Why? Expand the "obvious" for me. Because I can't actually see why the game must keep up. And I can provide a good reason why it mustn't keep up, which is that we don't really want games won or lost on the quality of software that one side or the other has at game time. It's not the question we're interested in, it's not what we want to watch.
I italicized "the game" above because I am strictly talking about the game. Tech for safety gear or medical treatments? Bring it on. Mandate it. Go nuts. But who cares if the coach is calling plays from a tablet? What matters is a level playing field, not what level the playing field is on.
I agree with you that there's no real imperative for a sports league to need to "keep up" with technology.
But one possible way to look at this is as a regulation on what technology coaches can or cannot use currently as they please. E.g., defenses playing against teams who run no-huddle offenses usually have no time to call plays or change the defensive scheme, and thus allowing the defensive captain to update and change plays at the line could be a huge plus for teams that _wanted_ to do this but currently cannot.
Forcing coaches to use iPads on the sideline for the hell of it is silly; prohibiting teams who want to analyze film in realtime on the sideline or instantly communicate plays on the fly who wish to do so is a bit different.
> defenses playing against teams who run no-huddle offenses usually have no time to call plays or change the defensive scheme, and thus allowing the defensive captain to update and change plays at the line could be a huge plus for teams that _wanted_ to do this but currently cannot.
Allowing such communication changes the tradeoffs of such a strategy. How are you concluding that one set of tradeoffs is "correct"?
I think we have to keep in mind that sports are games of people vs people. Adding computers is giving people tools, but that kind of thing has always been tightly regulated in sports. Would we allow the quarterback to use a giant Chuckit thrower just because someone made one that launches footballs instead of tennis balls? Why should we allow coaches to use computers?
EDIT: And no huddle because of headsets? Then were exactly is my incentive to scream my freakin' head off?
I can't wait to have coaches using tablets and other gadgets! It's going to be great to watch the first iPad launched into orbit when it doesn't react properly.
That and I'd imagine using a touch screen in sub-zero weather might not be the easiest thing either.
anything they can do to limit the frequency of coach challenges and replay reviews is a good thing in my book. i'm blown away that we still use three or four oft-poor camera angles to try and determine whether or not a ball crossed a straight line.
other than that, i still think football should be played on a grass (preferably muddy) field with the outcome determined by grit, determination, chance, and physical ability - not robots picking from a statistically optimal playbook. That being said, it will be pretty funny to see the geeks take over the NFL.
i still think football should be played on a grass (preferably muddy) field
As someone who had football-related knee-reconstruction surgery, I respectfully disagree. Yeah, there's something nostalgic about 22 players slogging their way through a mud-covered field, but it just results in way too many ankle, knee and hip injuries. We have field turf, let's stick with it.
This isn't about "technophobia" it's about controlling information that may be used for gambling purposes. For better or for worse, the NFL wants information about player injuries/etc to be distributed through a controlled process ("xxx has a leg injury and his return is questionable") rather then risking that some part of the population will have the info and another part won't.
Anderson would consider putting a computer chip in the ball and a laser on the goal line to replace the time-consuming debates and video reviews of scoring.
Fans have been talking about this for year, but it's not quite that simple, since scoring (and yardage in general) aren't just dependent on the location of the ball, it's also dependent on if/what body part of the ball carrier is touching the ground. It's worth investigating, but it won't be a panacea.
As long as opponents can't intercept the communications, he sees no reason why all players and coaches shouldn't be connected with wireless headsets, eliminating the need for a huddle or the quarterbacks' wristbands with plays listed in tiny print
Again this is something that's going to be inevitable. However, looking at booth-to-sidelines and sidelines-to-player communications today, if the headset system of one team breaks down, the other team isn't allowed to use their system until the first team's system is working again. I would assume that a similar rule would be in place for a team headset system, so that if one player's headset breaks, the other team wouldn't be able use their system until it got fixed. I wouldn't expect a team helmet communication system to be implemented until the NFL can be sure that the reliability will approach 100% which will be difficult considering the abuse the equipment may undergo, as well as potential interference issues.
An up-tempo pace will definitely increase the conditioning requirements of players, I'm curious as to how it will affect today's 300+ lb linemen, especially with the limited game roster.