D.C. Football Frenzy Features BU’s Med School, Concussions, Anti-Trust Laws, and Rush Limbaugh

If there’s one thing that unites this campus, it may just be a love of football. That’s why whether you prefer fantasizing about Tom Brady or wearing 18-1 t-shirts in the GSU, you might be interested to learn that Congress held a hearing today on the subject of football head injuries, and that BU was a big part of it.

Researchers at BU’s medical school who study Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE, or what happens when you hit your head repeatedly over long periods of time) were in Washington, and testified in front of the panel that there is a clear link between playing football and developing CTE, which can cause memory loss and emotional problems.

Congress pressed NFL commissioner Roger Goodell to address these concerns, but as usual, the commissioner was largely defensive, arguing that the NFL was supporting injured players to the best of its abilities, continuing to research links between football and dementia, and stating that he wasn’t a “medical expert” whenever he was asked to give any opinion whatsoever about the medical repercussions of playing football.

The hearing also included testimony by David R. Weir, a researcher from the University of Michigan who led an NFL-commissioned study that concluded that there is no definitive link between football and dementia. But it’s important to note that dementia is only one form of illness that is said to affect players, and that CTE in particular is a different phenomenon altogether. And regardless of whether playing football can be liked to any specific illness, the fact still remains that the life expectancy of an NFL player ranges from 53 to 59, depending on the position played. The U.S. life expectancy? 77.7 years, according to the CDC.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a congressional hearing on sports (Steroidgate, anyone?) without the obligatory warning to shape up “or we’ll look at your anti-trust status,” this time delivered by California Representative Maxine Waters (whose husband played in the NFL). But the hearing got really interesting when Representative Steve King of Iowa started pressing Goodell on why Rush Limbaugh wasn’t allowed to buy the St. Louis Rams.

King mentioned Fergie and Jennifer Lopez, both minority owners of the Miami Dolphins (and presumably Democrats) as similarly divisive owners, and continued to press Goodell for answers, noting (according to The Hill) that the two singers have “between the two of them alleged that the CIA are terrorists and liars. They’ve promoted sexual abuse of women, they’ve used the n-word, verbal pornography, recreational drug use, etc…”

Of course, it was the group bidding on the Rams that kicked Limbaugh out after St. Lousians (it’s actually “St. Lousians,” wow) noisily complained about the possibility of the conservative talk show host having a stake in the team, not the commissioner, but that didn’t seem to matter to King.

If you don’t think it makes a lot of sense to hijack a hearing on sports injuries to talk about team ownership, you’re not alone. Without getting too political, maybe it says something about the state of Republican leadership that a congressman decided he had to step in to defend his party’s chairman prominent politician okay, only real voice of the party Limbaugh at a medical hearing. Of course, Winters sounds like just as much of a crazy anti-business socialist liberal as King does a conservative goon, but at least she related her point to sports medicine.

So, back to the real topic of the hearing, is there any real risk of congress suspending the NFL’s anti-trust-exempt status over the way it treats injured players? No. But should we, as football fans, place more emphasis on the health of our favorite players? Given the evidence, I’d say so. After all, we all know that at the end of the day, sports is about uniting people through common interest, not injuring them.

Ah, who am I kidding? Sports is about finding as many excuses to yell “BC Sucks!” as possible.