If only cleaning up dirty hits were as easy as chewing some Orbit gum... Last week in Episode 60, I discussed a hit by New York Giants veteran defensive back, Leon Hall on Green Bay Packers wide receiver, Jordy Nelson. Nelson was diagnosed with fractured ribs as a result of the hit. I described this hit as being "dirty" and I then when on to talk about how the NFL missed an opportunity to change the self sacrificial culture that exists in football and protect future players. In both criticizing and defending Leon Hall's actions on the field, I discussed an article written in 2009 by Malcolm Gladwell titled, How Different are Football and Dog Fighting? I highly suggest reading/listening to Episode 60 and watching the video of the hit below before continuing with this article/episode. I always want to hear listener's feedback on each episode, but I was particularly interested in what people had to say about this hit. I never want to come off as being anti-football because frankly, I love football. Some of my best memories come from playing football as a kid and I want every kid to have the opportunity to play the game, but in the safest possible way. In my humble opinion, the best way to do that is by changing the culture. After posting Episode 60, I proceeded to tag as many Facebook friends as possible, who I thought might have an opinion on the subject. Being from NJ, I received responses from Giants fans, friends I grew up playing football with, football Dads, former youth football coaches, current high school coaches, a former division 1 college football equipment manager and even one New York Giants beat writer. I screen shotted all of the comments and some trends definitely came up, which I discuss in length in Episode 61. Define Dirty... From most of the comments, the definition of 'dirty' was always in question. What makes a hit dirty or clean? Most consider a hit to be dirty if the player's intention was to injure an opponent on a particular play. Unfortunately, there is no way to go into someone's head and replay what they were thinking at the moment of impact. So by this definition, it is nearly impossible to ever call any hit 'dirty.' However, I feel a more appropriate description of the type of hit that we would all like to see removed from the game are UNNECESSARY & AVOIDABLE hits on defenseless players. My definition of an unnecessary hit would expand the current unnecessary roughness rules to include any hit at or below the knees, any hit to the head or neck, and all hits where contact is initiated with the helmet or facemask on defenseless receivers. The rules listed below can be found in the PLAYER CONDUCT section of the NFL Rulebook. ARTICLE 6. UNNECESSARY ROUGHNESS. One of the descriptors of the penalty is "using any part of a player’s helmet or facemask to butt, spear, or ram an opponent violently or unnecessarily." ARTICLE 7. PLAYERS
