
NBC took Bob Costas off the Super Bowl for speaking out about concussions - smacktoward
http://www.espn.com/espn/otl/story/_/id/25914913/inside-story-how-legendary-nfl-broadcaster-bob-costas-ended-excised-football-nbc-espn
======
bredren
>"I recall the phrase, 'It's a six-hour, daylong celebration of football, and
you're not the right person to celebrate football,'" Costas says.

The odd thing was if you watched the Superbowl the culture of the event had
obviously changed. You rarely saw cheerleaders, unless in the background of a
play. None of the commercials offered up exploitation of women at least
nothing on the scale of GoDaddy and Paris Hilton had in the past.

Budweiser's main hook throughout was that they did not use high fructose corn
syrup in their ingredients! That's a long way from the bro-y bikini image beer
companies have made the Superbowl to be about for so long.

So when I read that this was a celebration of the culture of Football, what is
that now? Is it this more progressive, more healthy sport EXCEPT when it comes
to brain trauma?

I think eSports, particularly DOTA2's TI is far, far more relevant to young
men than Football at this point and has true global appeal. Football and the
Superbowl seem like so many boomer institutions where this old guard is doing
everything to slow down the bleeding for as long as possible.

~~~
simmanian
>I think eSports, particularly DOTA2's TI is far, far more relevant to young
men than Football

I cannot disagree more. NFL is the biggest sports league in the entire world
by revenue by far, even though it's only played within the United States! More
and more people are playing video games, but eSports is still a very niche
market. You certainly don't see people talking about a DOTA championship match
as much as people talking about the Superbowl game on social media. eSports
still has a long way to go in terms of general acceptance and social
influence.

edit: changed "sports" to "sports league" after seeing some feedback

~~~
aetimmes
> NFL is the biggest sports in the entire world by revenue by far

Source on this? I can't imagine this being true compared to soccer.

~~~
astura
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_professional_sports_le...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_professional_sports_leagues_by_revenue)

NFL had €11,394 million (over eleven billion Euro) in revenue in 2017 whereas
the Premier League had €5,340 million (over five billion Euro) in revenue for
2016–17.

MLB and the NBA also beat out the Premier League in revenue.

EDIT: OK, OK, I thought the GP was talking about sports LEAGUES not NFL vs
sports as a whole. I read "sports league."

~~~
microtherion
The NFL is the biggest LEAGUE by revenue, but soccer is by far the bigger
SPORT. Just add up the revenues from all the national leagues. To my
knowledge, there is only one other professional league in the world (in
Canada) that plays (more or less) the same sport as the NFL.

~~~
Retric
NFL is also used as a shortcut for a sport as it’s got different rules than
high school or college football, and the both share a name with Soccer.

~~~
diminoten
Rulesets aren't what bound a "sport".

~~~
Retric
Define something else that does.

Now, you may call something very similar the same sport, but a 100m vs 400m
sprints are really different races even with just one slightly different
number.

~~~
diminoten
You're confusing event with category.

NFL and NCAA Football are different events, but the same sport. 100m and 400m
races are different events, same sport.

~~~
Retric
You play chess and checkers on the same board but they are different games.
The rules are extremely different between the NFL and NCAA.

People discuss the “NBA’s” 24 shot clock vs the NCAA’s more leisurely 35
seconds which among other things has a dramatic difference in how the two
different games are played. Which was my original point, when the only people
using a set of rules are in one org the names become interchangeable.

If you never compete it’s not clear how seemingly subtle rule changes have
dramic impact. This changes not only game strategy but also things like how
far people travel over the course of the game. 400m at a full sprint takes
real endurance where 100m is mostly about acceleration.

Top athletes may have many skills that crossover to different sports, but
these are very different games.

~~~
diminoten
This is a dumb conversation. Basketball is basketball if there's a smaller
(womens) ball or larger (mens) ball.

Football is football if you touch one foot inbounds or two.

You're clearly trolling, please leave me alone.

~~~
Retric
Calling something Dumb does not win an argument.

Is flag football still football becase it’s got a similar name?

Greco-Roman wrestling and freestyle wrestling are separated at the olimpics.
Even though they share the “wrestling” tile and just have different rules.

Clearly, people have different full names for the different types of football
becase they are different sports. Which need somewhat different training and
different reflexes.

~~~
diminoten
This isn't an argument, you are wrong on the facts. The definition of the
word, in English, isn't what you say it is. It is dumb to pretend otherwise,
because you are not able to communicate with others who speak English if you
do.

I left Reddit to avoid this kind of drivel, go back there if you want to
continue to perpetrate it.

~~~
Retric
If you really believe that is true, find some actual evidence beyond gut
assertions to support it.

The difference between HN and Reddit is not just being polite, it’s about
productive arguments backed up by evidence rather than simply relying on
believing something to be true.

~~~
diminoten
This isn't an argument, you are _factually_ incorrect. You are misrepresenting
the definition of "sport", and to disprove that, all _anyone_ has to do is
look up the definition of the word "sport", or have had a conversation with
anyone else about sports at any point in their lifetimes.

No one, and I mean _literally_ no one, thinks of NCAA football and the NFL as
two separate sports; they're both football, with different rules, a fact _you_
already know but are refusing to acknowledge because _you 're trolling_.

Your insistence on some kind of "evidence" for what the word "sport" means is
just you trying to get me to do work that you yourself could do, because
that's what trolls do -- they waste the time of others for their own
amusement.

~~~
Retric
If you actually look up sport you end up with something like:

“an activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or
team competes against another or others for entertainment.” The first thing
google returns. Which does not support your argument. Saying some arbitrary
dictionary is enough is not evendence when they don’t actually say what you
want.

I could go off and find quotes relating to the NCAA vs professional sports
saying thing a like ~”Rules define the game, different rules different games.”
But doing so is a waste of time when they don’t counter an argument.

As you need to be specific before I can counter or there is no way to move
forward. Specific examples like the overtime rules are never going to counter
your vague and baseless assertions so it’s pointless for me to keep responding
to someone either trolling or just rather confused.

~~~
diminoten
Willfully picking the inapplicable definition, then _lying_ about the fact
that it doesn't support what I've been saying is troll behavior, friend.

If you look at the wikipedia page for "Sport", you see all kinds of instances
of the word "sport" being used in a way completely incompatible with your
view. Please go away now.

------
Shivetya
The CTE issue will probably be settled out of court with some fantastic number
paid to the player's union to be doled out and managed through that
organization effectively silencing the issue. they may even be so nice as to
have short little spots about how the NFL is the "leading supporter" some time
down the road.

So its good see Bob Costas take off. Far better to get out than sell out. The
NFL other damage to people and communities is all the tax money that goes into
funding their stadiums, the juicy tax and concession deals beyond financing,
and even have the tax payers pay for security at the recent Superbowl in
Atlanta.

Don't just vilify the owners, the player's union and the players themselves,
aren't here for anything but glory and money, lots of money. They have been
riding high on the back of the tax payers for far too long; they are not the
only sport that does this.

~~~
josefresco
The CTE issue was already "settled" in court:
[http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/15229132/appeals-court-
up...](http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/15229132/appeals-court-
upholds-1-billion-nfl-concussion-settlement)

>The settlement would cover more than 20,000 NFL retirees for the next 65
years. The league estimates that 6,000 former players, or nearly three in 10,
could develop Alzheimer's disease or moderate dementia. Fewer than 200 of
those retirees opted out of the settlement, while 99 percent approved.

------
wnevets
As someone who used to religiously watched, this is just another reason why
I'm glad I stopped watching the NFL several years ago.

Between the awful viewing experience with annoying commercials, cliche talking
heads, concussion cover ups, highly questionable refs, rampant cheating, the
kneeing debacle, etc. I'm surprised more folks my age haven't bailed on the
NFL.

~~~
astura
I don't follow football, can you elaborate on "rampant cheating?" Are you
talking about deflategate? Or is there more cheating controversies I'm not
aware of?

EDIT: Yeesh! I didn't know how much of an issue PEDs are in the NFL.

~~~
wcarron
Probably the rampant PEDs. The NFL is worse than professional cycling these
days.

Even before Lance, the UCI/WADA implemented among the toughest, if not the
toughest, doping control schemes in sports.

The Bio Passport, automatic urine tests of winners and podium placers for each
race. Random in-event controls, random out-of-competition tests, etc. Riders
are required to report their whereabouts so that they can be randomly tested
over a dozen times per year, wherever they may be. Multi-year suspensions for
anyone testing positive and losing the appeal, to start. 4 year ban, I
believe, on 2nd positive.

Compare that the NFL's pathetic drug policy, where players aren't even tested
for recreational drugs during the season. And only a few-game suspension for
getting caught.

~~~
wnevets
And on top of that if you get caught cheating with PEDs you still get to play
in the playoffs and super bowl. At least in the MLB if you get caught with
PEDs you can't play in the postseason that year.

edit:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Baseball_drug_pol...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Baseball_drug_policy#Discipline)

------
xkfm
I've recently started getting into watching football. There's a great amount
of tactical depth, and I really appreciate that it's one of the few sports
where the coach has a very noticeable impact on the outcome of the game.

It's essentially like watching a physical version of chess.

In light of the whole concussion thing, it's somewhat interesting that there
are two new football leagues launching in the US soon. The AAF (aaf.com)
recently launched this past weekend and is positioning itself as sort of a
minor league to the NFL. There's also the XFL, which is a relaunch of sorts
(it existed briefly in the early 2000s), and seems to be setting itself up to
be a faster version of the NFL. Both of these new leagues do have rule changes
that are there to speed up the game, and marginally improve player safety.

Eventually, I would suspect that NFL teams will be able to send some of their
practice team players, and players they want to get another look at before
cutting, to the AAF for more development.

The AAF seems to have had a moderately successful weekend launch. At least to
the extent that there were no catastrophic failures.

A lot of the players who like playing football seem to really like playing
football (i.e. they had opportunities to go pro (getting paid actual money) or
semi-pro (college in the US) in other sports, and still chose football over
them), so I don't think it'll go away entirely unless middle and high schools
stop offering the game completely.

~~~
Apocryphon
The AAF got rid of kickoffs as a safety measure, though it's allowing hard-
hitting tackles against QBs. The league is investing a lot into game data for
betting, as its business model:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19129902](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19129902)

~~~
xkfm
That would make sense. The app was working fairly well, and you could guess
what the offense was going to do on each play. It's going to be interesting to
see where the league goes.

------
hart_russell
As someone who played football in pop warner, high school, and Div.3 NCAA for
12 years, I worry about the long term damage to my brain. If I have boys, I
will absolutely not allow them to play football in its current state.

If the NFL cared about its future, it would immediately get rid of helmets à
la rugby. People will not hit with their head if they don't have a hard
plastic case around it.

~~~
chrisrogers
Rugby players face worse concussion risk than NFL players. [https://www.brain-
injury-law-center.com/blog/head-injuries-r...](https://www.brain-injury-law-
center.com/blog/head-injuries-rugby-vs-football/)

Football helmets evolved precisely because players were facing gruesome head
injury risk without them. I can't fathom how removing helmets from NFL play
would be a smart move.

~~~
hart_russell
From what I understand, single concussions are not necessarily the main cause
of CTE. Repeated blows to the head, the average kind you get in practices and
games, are the main cause.

------
biesnecker
I strongly believe that the NFL will cease to exist as a major sports league
in the foreseeable future (< 25 years). It increasingly seems that CTE is an
unavoidable side effect of the game, and as that reality really registers with
parents the steady supply of young players is going to dry up. I've heard
people say that it will end up a niche sport like boxing (which has its own
obvious brain trauma problems), but you need a lot more potential football
players to maintain a viable league than you do potential boxers to maintain
the level of professional boxing we have today.

edit: typo

~~~
cooperadymas
I've been hearing this for 10-15 years now. Meanwhile, not only is the NFL
still exceedingly popular, but there are new football leagues popping up
everywhere, giving even more people the chance to play at a professional /
semi-pro level.

~~~
ZacharyPitts
At the same time, high school participation is way down over the past 10
years: [https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2019/jan/30/high-school-
fo...](https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2019/jan/30/high-school-football-
numbers-drop-brain-trauma) (plus many more articles with just a quick search).

Locally, a couple of high schools dropped varsity football because they
couldn't get enough recruits for brain injury.

~~~
Dirlewanger
Interesting to read, but I wonder how many of those schools actually sent kids
to D1 schools. I'd be willing to bet that most of the schools shuttering their
football programs weren't college football recruitment hotspots to begin with
and only had the odd kid every few years play at a D1 level.

------
oflannabhra
Some of the most refreshing coverage I've heard of football, the NFL, and even
CTE has surprisingly come from Freakonomics (the podcast). They had an episode
covering CTE [0] entitled "How Much Brain Damage Do I Have?" that was sparked
by Brian Urschel withdrawing from the NFL after a CTE study came out.
Recently, they did an entire series on athletes, and their full interview with
Dominique Foxworth [1] was also enlightening from a business / incentive
perspective. He's a former player, and former COO of the Player's Union.

One thing that gets lost in all of the discussion of the NFL are the vast
majority of former players who were amateur (although it is debatable if NCAA
players are amateurs), who are likely to experience a similar result as NFL
players, but without the enormous cash-generating machine or potential future
settlement money.

[0] - [http://freakonomics.com/podcast/brain-
damage/](http://freakonomics.com/podcast/brain-damage/)

[1] - [http://freakonomics.com/podcast/domonique-
foxworth/](http://freakonomics.com/podcast/domonique-foxworth/)

~~~
bardam
Also of interest, Malcolm Galdwell's podcast* "Revisionist History" had an
excellent episode on CTE in football. He made an analogy to smoking. Evidence
had long suggested that smoking was dangerous, but it was only that --
evidence, not hard proof. Evidence continued to pile up, but so did the
counter evidence (primarily from tobacco firms and those they funded). At what
point do we say -- OK, maybe the evidence isn't 100%, but isn't there enough
evidence to suggest something is wrong?

* [http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/22-burden-of-proof](http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/22-burden-of-proof)

~~~
minikites
>the counter evidence (primarily from tobacco firms and those they funded)

One of those that they funded was Malcolm Gladwell himself:
[https://shameproject.com/profile/malcolm-
gladwell-2/](https://shameproject.com/profile/malcolm-gladwell-2/)

------
kareemm
Sometimes it becomes obvious whether you'll be on the wrong side or right side
of history. When we look back on this in 20 years it's become clear to me that
the NFL's stance on CTE and Kaepernick will have them squarely on the wrong
side of history.

~~~
ghostbrainalpha
Yep... but 25 years from now they will have "Kaepernick Day" once a year, and
give everyone a free bobble head and everyone will be free to celebrate the
NFL guilt free.

Despite the fact that most of the teams will still be owned by the same
individuals, and definitely the same families....

IF I was a conspiracy guy I would almost think that all the flag waiving and
controversial decisions are designed to distract us from the fact that the NFL
is the world's sketchiest non-profit. Not only does it not pay taxes as an
entity despite its CEO's $31 million dollar salary, but the teams receive
billions in tax payer funds to build the new stadiums they require.

And they must have these new stadiums to stay competitive with the other NFL
franchises... who just got new stadiums. It's a crazy arms race to keep your
NFL team, and no one is talking about that fact that we could also level the
playing field by having all the states agree NOT to build stadiums with tax
payer dollars, instead of letting the NFL play different tax bases off each
other to extract the maximum dollars from us.

~~~
jedberg
The NFL isn't as bad of a tax scam as you make it out to be. The central
coordinating organization doesn't pay taxes, but that's because they
distribute all the money they make to the teams, which DO pay taxes, and lots
of them. That's why cities are happy to subsidize them. Because with the
revenue sharing, they get taxes on money that wasn't even made in their state.

Building stadiums with public money and then charging the public to enter is
really crappy, but in the end it does in fact benefit the location in some
cases.

And you can see the pushback already starting. San Diego and Oakland wouldn't
build new stadiums, so those teams moved. One went to LA, where they are
building a new stadium with Olympics money which will be used by the Chargers,
and Las Vegas was happy to bring in all the extra people to gamble. So in both
cases those stadiums will probably be net positives for their cities.

~~~
ghostbrainalpha
I'm from Las Vegas and that's not a great description of the situation.

The vote to approve the stadium will rank as one of the top 5 most corrupt
things to ever happen in our city... which was formerly ran by the mob.

And think about this... the capacity of the stadium is 65,000. If all 8 games
are SELLOUTS, and every single attendee looses $100 to the casinos after every
single game, that's 52 million dollars. So it would take about 20 years to pay
for the Billion dollar stadium.

Obviously thats disastrously simplified, but if you think we can pay for this
stadium with just a small tax on the increased revenue.... that's way way off.

~~~
jedberg
Presumably that person coming to the game is not only betting, but is also
staying at a hotel, eating a few meals, flying into and out of the airport,
and gambling at the hotel. It's how you guys make most of your tax base, so
I'd assume an increase in the tax base would be good.

Now the new traffic on the other hand...

~~~
masonic
As a Raiders season ticket holder, I can assure you that their division games
(Chargers, Chiefs, Broncos) don't draw well. The visitors that draw, when you
get them, are Steelers, Pats, Cowboys, maybe Chicago if their uptrend
continues. But being Vegas is a wild card; there will be an attraction to
Vegas, though not necessarily the stadium, on game weekends.

------
cooperadymas
If we set aside the concussion issue for a moment, the story boils down to a
sports announcer that admittedly said, " I decided long ago that I had
misgivings about football, and I tried to use the forum they gave me to make
those points."

In other words, Costas doesn't like football and used his air time during
football games to talk about how he doesn't like football. Why would anyone
keep him on the air? I don't think we need to brew some crazy conspiracy
theory to explain this.

~~~
scarmig
The implicit assumption here is that a news organization has the duty to
provide only favorable coverage to its subjects. Presumably for fear of
alienating them with bad coverage.

------
foobaw
Disastrous PR incoming. Did NBC not foresee this biting them back?

~~~
throwaway5752
It must be a PR coup for those responsible, because you are blaming NBC,
rather than the NFL.

~~~
deminature
How are NBC not at least partly culpable in this?

~~~
bredren
Not that I believe this but the article says "McCarthy says the NFL did not
ask NBC to remove Costas from the Super Bowl."

------
baumy
Adding some context since I suspect much of the HN crowd may be unfamiliar -
this is being published by ESPN, who previously have suspended and fired
employees for calling out the NFL and its commissioner [0][1]. Not saying
there isn't a story here, but to me this reads like a very hypocritical hit
piece.

[0] [https://www.si.com/nfl/2014/09/24/espn-bill-simmons-roger-
go...](https://www.si.com/nfl/2014/09/24/espn-bill-simmons-roger-goodell-
suspension)

[1] [https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/early-
lead/wp/2015/05/08...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/early-
lead/wp/2015/05/08/bill-simmons-is-leaving-
espn/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.9b5fd8dc6fb4)

------
kevin_b_er
We can see that "legendary" means nothing in the face of perceived profits.
Greed is the only true factor that rules that everyone wants to pleasantly
ignore.

But it means all of NBC is compromised by the NFL. Their reporting is
compromised by money. They cannot be trusted to truthfully and fully report on
the real implications of American football and its danger to health.

Its shame to see honor and professionalism dying in news to in favor of greed,
but with money bound to sports it was bound to happen there sooner than later.
Costas just had enough history and was from a better era, to delay the impact
of greed over integrity.

------
Kye
I only knew of him as that guy who wouldn't stop talking over the 2008 Olympic
opening ceremonies. I never tried watching again when I found out NBC owned
the rights for years.

This is one thing where he _should_ be allowed to talk.

------
tengbretson
Why do we think football players are incapable of weighing the risks when
choosing whether or not to play?

~~~
EliRivers
People in general are bad at judging risks, worse still at trying to judge the
risk of head trauma decades down the road from now, especially with the number
of people involved loudly pitching for their views to take sway.

I've no doubt some of them have the training and understanding to examine the
data (math majors in college - must be some, I'm sure), run the statistics and
pick out noise from signal, which I expect wouldn't be an easy thing given the
long stretches of time and the many confounding factors involved, but I expect
few of those capable of it even try, so the majority are left with the same
vox-pops and media segments everyone else has on the subject.

Couple that with the macho attitudes and self-image in the sport, and that the
entertainment needs to keep working for the sport to keep making money
(nothing entertaining about permanent head trauma), and that the people having
to judge these risks are young males being offered life-changing opportunities
and sums of money, and it seems that the default position here should be that
we consider football players incapable of weighing the risks (much as we
should, by default, consider people bad at judging risks).

Why would we think they _are_ somehow especially capable of judging the risks?

~~~
tengbretson
Making poor eating decisions can cause bodily harm much quicker and more
severe than repeated concussions from playing football.

Should the default position also be that we don't deem adults to be capable of
weighing the risks when choosing what food to eat?

~~~
asveikau
You brought this up as an "ah ha! I caught you in your absurdity!" kind of
thing. However it is absolutely true that the US needs to better regulate food
ingredients to shield consumers from their bad decisions. Right now the
industry is set up to exploit how easy it is to make those poor decisions and
become addicted to them, and most food ingredients for sale are consequently
more calorific than they need to be.

(Some personal context for me: I lost 100 lbs over 2017-2018. So I have some
experience both unwittingly falling in the trap and successfully getting out
of it, the latter part seems pretty rare from what I can tell.)

~~~
tengbretson
I don't think we share enough common ground to have any further useful
conversation about this.

~~~
asveikau
OK. I will ask this of you though. I don't know if you are in the US to
witness this or somewhere else. But next time you are in a crowded restaurant
where all the portions are in the thousands of calories.. Look around you at
all the people wolfing it down. And maybe ask: how many of these people do
this regularly? How much exercise do they get to balance it out? How did these
people get into this cycle, binging day after day? How irritated would they
get if you took it away from them? Is it their fault, or are they stuck in
some kind of bad loop? Was that cycle entered into well informed or something
else?

Losing 100 lbs caused me to think about this, and the answers are very
depressing.

Even for any given meal or ingredient, there has been a change. Look at videos
of 70s and 80s America, the average person is way more fit. Or, to take a
random example, I re-read the novel "Cannery Row" a few years ago. Now, it's
fiction, though based on some real people. It takes place in the first half of
the 20th century, and one character is said to drive regularly from Monterey
to Los Angeles, a sedentary activity, stopping _several times_ for burgers.
Not once does it say he was overweight, nor do I think the real person he was
based on was. Could it be that a 1940s burger was better for you than a burger
today?

------
resters
For anyone who has ever wondered why American Football is so popular in the US
in spite of being fairly boring to watch (and in spite of being fairly
unpopular nearly everywhere else in the world), the NFL receives significant
funding every year from the US Government and is part of the PR strategy to
promote military enlistment as a patriotic act (1).

I'd argue that many Americans view watching football to itself be a patriotic
act.

NBC removing Costas for speaking out about the injuries is significant because
increased awareness of concussive and spinal column injuries would have no
negative impact on the entertainment value of the sport. Nobody wants to see
athletes who have worked their entire lives to get to the NFL suffer career
ending injuries.

So why suppress Costas? His effort to spread awareness was viewed as
undermining the foundation of the game. The idea that the athletes are
extremely tough, etc. Worrying about injuries makes the game less manly, and
it is the association with manly duty and physical strength that makes the
tie-in with military and patriotism so powerful.

It's really absurd how Football announcers have these gruff, hyper-masculine
voices and how the entire sport coalesces nearly every negative aspect of
masculinity and bro culture (2).

In reality, the NFL has blocked overhead cameras from the telecast (3) because
they would reveal significant coaching and execution mistakes that would make
the sport seem far less professional.

1) [https://thinkprogress.org/nfl-dod-national-
anthem-6f682cebc7...](https://thinkprogress.org/nfl-dod-national-
anthem-6f682cebc7cd/)

2) [http://theconversation.com/big-game-days-in-college-
football...](http://theconversation.com/big-game-days-in-college-football-
linked-with-sexual-assault-92725)

3)
[https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2012/01/wh...](https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2012/01/what-
the-nfl-wont-show-you/252240/)

~~~
mulmen
This post is full of unfair generalizations and misinformation.

> For anyone who has ever wondered why American Football is so popular in the
> US in spite of being fairly boring to watch (and in spite of being fairly
> unpopular nearly everywhere else in the world).

People watch the NFL because they find it entertaining. It's not boring to the
fans and viewers. NFL football is a carefully constructed entertainment
product that goes to great lengths to remain competitive and engaging to
audiences. There are no teams outside the United States so it's not surprising
there is little viewership outside the US.

> the NFL receives significant funding every year from the US Government and
> is part of the PR strategy to promote military enlistment as a patriotic act
> (1).

The money "provided by the US government" is specifically provided by the US
military for recruitment purposes, it is not a significant part of the NFL's
revenue (that comes from advertisements). It is also not the only place the US
Military spends money for recruitment. They also sponsor a drag racing team,
created a video game, host air shows and public events on bases and have two
air show teams that tour the country.

> NBC removing Costas for speaking out about the injuries is significant
> because increased awareness of concussive and spinal column injuries would
> have no negative impact on the entertainment value of the sport.

That's wrong. By raising awareness of the injury risk viewers now know the big
impressive hits they like to see have real potential consequences. This makes
them less entertaining to watch. This reduces appeal for advertisers and
directly threatens the NFL's core business. I am not defending what the NFL
and NBC are doing here but it's really not complicated to follow the motives
(money).

> So why suppress Costas? His effort to spread awareness was viewed as
> undermining the foundation of the game. The idea that the athletes are
> extremely tough, etc. Worrying about injuries makes the game less manly, and
> it is the association with manly duty and physical strength that makes the
> tie-in with military and patriotism so powerful.

The NFL is only tangentially associated with the military and even then only
before games and even then only starting around 2009. The selling point of the
NFL is not that it is "manly", the selling point is potential (suspense) for
and eventual realization of lot of action and excitement.

> It's really absurd how Football announcers have these gruff, hyper-masculine
> voices and how the entire sport coalesces nearly every negative aspect of
> masculinity and bro culture (2).

Amazon has a female announcing team for their Thursday night coverage. Many of
the announcers were previously NFL players, it is not surprising they would
have male voices. I don't see any connection to bro culture whatsoever other
than "bros" like to watch football, just like a lot of other people.

> In reality, the NFL has blocked overhead cameras from the telecast (3)
> because they would reveal significant coaching and execution mistakes that
> would make the sport seem far less professional.

The NFL is selling an entertainment product. This is editing.

~~~
resters
> NFL football is a carefully constructed entertainment product that goes to
> great lengths to remain competitive and engaging to audiences

How do you reconcile that with the NFL not wanting Costas to spread awareness
of serious injuries?

~~~
mulmen
Easy, it makes the product less entertaining and appealing. I even explained
that in my response.

> By raising awareness of the injury risk viewers now know the big impressive
> hits they like to see have real potential consequences. This makes them less
> entertaining to watch. This reduces appeal for advertisers and directly
> threatens the NFL's core business.

