After watching Football this weekend ... [View all]

and watching player after player, going out with concussions and other injuries resulting from "Blow up" hits ... it came to me. A single, relatively simple, and easy to enforce, rule change could be instituted that would make Pro (and college) inmeasurably safer.

I played Defensive Back (Safety in High school and Corner in college) 30+ years ago. Back then, we, too, relished the "big hit", but we were taught "form tackling", where you hit with your shoulder pads and your head up ... but most importantly, you were taught to hit and wrap. In fact, leading with your helmet was a 15 yard penalty and (as a Defensive Back and with my coach) getting caught on film hitting someone without attempting to wrap the ball carrier up, meant wind strints until you puked ... even if the ball carrier went down, and even if you forced the fumble.

This weekend passed, I watched (primarily) defensive back getting running starts and just launching themselves where they thought the ball carrier would be ... they, generally, made no wrap up the ball carrier; just make the big hit and hope that the ball carrier went down, jarred the ball loose, or the hit knocked the ball carrier into someone else who could grab them ... and I counted 17 instances where the D-back, filled the gap; but because they were going for the big hit, completely missed the tackle or the ball carrier bounced or spun off, or huddled the D-back and kept running. (Yeah, I counted)


But the fact is, you can't blow someone up AND wrap them up (that's why you can play rugby, without pads). So I would propose that hitting without attempting to wrap (like spearing) should be a personal foul and after two calls, the offender gets to sit out the rest of the game ... just like in high school (back in my day).

I think instituting this rule will reduce the incidence of concussions and leg/knee injuries from Big Hit tackles.