New Orleans Saints "bounty" scandal

[Sigaba]

Originally Posted by Horned Frog

Pedoncodoc,
It's my understanding that in the early 1900s football as we know it began to diverge from rugby, most noticeably at first with the allowance of the forward pass. Other rules followed until the game exists as it does today.
When the forward pass was instituted (in colleges of course; no pro ball at the time), hits started getting bigger and injuries started getting worse. I seem to remember reading that some players died, but I don't remember the source so I hav no data there. The first pads derived from the scrumcap, it was made thicker, more rigid and more padded which of course is now a helmet. In my experience with playing both sports for a few years, rugby players get hurt a lot more. However, I've only seen one really serious injury during rugby, a severe concussion when a player was driven into a goal post. In football I've seen broken femurs, concussions, torn up knees, bad juju. So I think football has more serious injuries when they do occur.
Rugby hurts more though, so why would you bother playing football?

FWIW, the following link will take one to a Library of Congress webpage. The webpage has links to newspaper articles on football during the early 1900s and the efforts of progressives (especially Theodore Roosevelt) to reform the game in order to limit the number of fatalities <<LINK>>.

[Badger52]

New Orleans Saints head coach Sean Payton was suspended without pay for the 2012 season by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, and former Saints defensive coordinator Gregg Williams was banned indefinitely on Wednesday because of the team's bounty program that targeted opposing players.

Handing down sweeping and serious punishment for a system that paid out thousands of dollars when hits knocked specific opponents out of games, Goodell also suspended Saints general manager Mickey Loomis for the first eight regular-season games next season, and assistant coach Joe Vitt for the first six games.

In addition, Goodell fined the Saints $500,000 and took away their second-round draft picks this year and next.

Payton and Loomis took the blame for violations that they acknowledged "happened under our watch" and said Saints owner Tom Benson "had nothing to do" with the bounty pool, which reached as much as $50,000 in 2009, the season the Saints won the Super Bowl.

Takin' one for da Boss.
Rest of link here.

[orion5]

Originally Posted by Badger52

Takin' one for da Boss.

I'm not sure if you're implying the Benson family was in on it and Payton is the fall guy. I seriously doubt Tom Benson got involved at this level of detail, and Rita either.

[akv]

The Saints likely weren't the only team doing this, and were made an example off. I don't have a problem with their penalty, I also don't see much pussification in the NFL, these are bigger faster men than anytime in the sport who knock the crap out of each other. There are 260 pound LBs running sub 4.5, these days, that would have been a defensive lineman size with RB/WR speed in the past.

These bounties warrant stiff punishment for two reasons one, it's a QB driven league, targeting elite QB's like Manning, Rodgers, Brady, makes the NFL very nervous, (who wants to watch a Curtis Painter vs Brian Hoying matchup?)

Second note the reaction in support of the commisioner here by current and former players, especially the latter. Retired players can voice their opinions without being subject to league discipline. There seems to be an unwritten code among NFL players, hard hits make the game, but don't deliberately go for knees or heads, the former can end a career or livelihood and the latter can lead to very bad things.

A team bounty which offsets fines for illegal play isn't where the NFL wants to be, they have a great product and don't want to jeopardize it.

[Badger52]

Originally Posted by orion5

I'm not sure if you're implying the Benson family was in on it and Payton is the fall guy. I seriously doubt Tom Benson got involved at this level of detail, and Rita either.

Not at all; poor phrasing on my part I suppose. In the midst of alot of dominoes it seems to be have been a stand-up comment to make.

[orion5]

Originally Posted by Badger52

Not at all; poor phrasing on my part I suppose. In the midst of alot of dominoes it seems to be have been a stand-up comment to make.

Post-Katrina the Benson family did a lot for the city of NO, way beyond the pigskin, and I doubt would have promoted this "win at all costs" behavior. But then again, Sean Payton was regarded as an all-around "good guy" so who knows...

On my local ESPN talk radio yesterday they were talking about how 100% of the teams in the league have, or have had, bounties on hits. But most have never been caught. They spent a lot of time talking about how not to get caught and how to punish the snitches. No mention of not doing things you know are wrong to begin with.