Concussions and head injuries are a big problem and concern for the NFL, but one recent study points to a concerning trend in the league: more head injuries happen in higher-stakes games.
In a study conducted for the Economic Inquiry, researchers found that players were 24 percent more likely to suffer concussions in a game where a team was fighting for a playoff spot than in just a standard regular season game.
“The National Football League’s regular-season games are not of equal importance: some games loom larger than others for determining a team’s chance to qualify for the playoffs. We develop an incentive-based measure of the impact of winning a game on a team’s qualification probability to study the relationship between stakes and injuries,” the abstract of the study states.
“We find teams are 24 percentage points more likely to suffer concussions in games where a win secures one team a playoff berth. This is the first evidence to support the risk-escalation hypothesis that injuries increase with a competition’s stakes.”
This isn’t exactly a shocking result, but it’s certainly interesting that the study was able to provide proof that players are willing to risk their health and safety more when the result matters more.
