Why NFL overtime rules make sense

[eridani]

It's very simple. The human body can handle 16 or more innings of baseball, but it sure the hell can't handle 8 quarters of football--which could very well happen if you insist that every score by one team deserves an opportunity for an answering score by the other team. Even without overtime, football takes a major toll on athletes' bodies.

NFL players union and Harvard team up on landmark study of football injuries and illness

http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/health/2013/01/29/nfl-players-union-and-harvard-team-landmark-study-football-injuries-and-illness/aCGnf96h7ptWX2Lnp5MIiP/story.html

The National Football League players union, alarmed that its members die nearly 20 years earlier on average than other American men, has selected Harvard University to oversee a $100 million accelerated research initiative aimed at treating and ultimately preventing the broad-ranging health problems plaguing the athletes.

Legions of Harvard specialists from across its many schools and affiliated hospitals will team up with the NFL Players Association in an unprecedented study of 1,000 retired players. The researchers will look at everything from their repetitive brain traumas, torn knee ligaments, and arthritic joints to the gnawing effects of long-term exposure to acute pain and chronic use of painkillers.

Granted, part of that is probably due to the cardiovascular problems associated with the typical football player physique, as weight-related cardiovascular problems correlate with high lean body weight, not fat. But quite a bit is due to the physical punishment of the sport.

[gopiscrap]

1. I think there should be a full over time period just make it shorter like 10 minutes instead of 15

[Logical]

2. I doubt any overtime would last that long......

Some teams going to score a touchdown and the other team will not or only get a field goal.during the middle of most football games the score is not tied.

[Malraiders]

3. It's a gladiator sport and the NFL is more about money than players. nt

[MohRokTah]

4. I have to agree with the modified sudden death rules.

Allowing sudden death on the first possession ONLY if a touchdown is scored makes absolute sense. Touchdowns are incredibly difficult to score in professional football so if a team can score one on the first possession in overtime, they deserve to win. Field Goals, on the other hand, are a dime a dozen and it basically came down to the coin toss as to who would win if a Field Goal alone could decide the game.

The owners, including Green Bay, decided these were the best overtime rules for professional football unanimously.

[JayhawkSD]

5. Well, if you're that worried about the players' health

Just make the games thirty minutes long instead of sixty. Two quarters with a fifteen minute halftime. The players would be much happier, and nobody cares about the fans; you know like whether or not we feel cheated by unfair overtime rules.

How we feel about overtime rules does not matter. It's all about the players' health, so... Thirty minute games/

[eridani]

6. I've heard it suggested that there should be a combined weight limit for all 11 players on the field

That might reduce the premium placed on bulk, and f=ma comes into play.

[just ray]

9. Well

If you do that, then the captitalistic pigs can't make as much money advertising. The Republicans would not like that.

[BlueStreak]

7. They should do it like Soccer and just flip a coin to decide the winner

Is that how Soccer does it? That or some ridiculous game of H-O-R-S-E shooting goals at the end of 60 minutes.

I think the only fair way to determine the outcome is with an endzone dance competition. The guys are always working on their moves anyway, so make it part of the game.

[TexasTowelie]

8. Do they also have to sing show tunes?

It might inject a new element of culture into the games.

[BlueStreak]

10. That would be awesome. Maybe extra points for the best impression of Kate Smith