Briggs: Player health is important, but Vilma ban is a bunch of B.S.
Posted by Michael David Smith on May 6, 2012, 12:23 PM EDT
2011 NFC Championship: Green Bay Packers v Chicago Bears Getty Images
Bears linebacker Lance Briggs says he favors efforts to ensure that NFL players will live healthy lives long after their careers are over. But he dismisses the notion that the NFL needed to suspend the players involved in the Saints bounty scandal in order to promote health and safety.
Briggs told David Haugh of the Chicago Tribune that the NFLs yearlong suspension of Saints linebacker Jonathan Vilma was a bunch of B.S.
Let me make one thing clear: I in no way condone somebody putting money up to intentionally hurt someone, Briggs said. But bounty or not, what did the Saints do on the field thats illegal? All Ive seen on TV is clean, physical football. You can get those same highlights from any NFL team. . . . Its becoming flag football. Were flying around at 100 mph.
Briggs says the health of NFL players should be an important priority, but he believes its a priority that should be addressed through improved medical care, not through changing the game of football.
Player safety is best taken care of by providing health insurance for players lives, Briggs said. Come on. Its like asking a boxer: Are your injuries related to taking blows to the head? We throw our bodies around. Its physical. Its football. You cant stop the violence from happening.
Providing health insurance for retired players is great, but the best way to care for an injury is to prevent it from happening in the first place. Its difficult to square many players insistence that they want the NFL to take care of them if theyre struggling with health problems later in life with many of the same players insistence that they dont want the NFL to discipline them or their colleagues who break the rules designed to promote player safety.
