New Year’s Resolutions: Clearer Rules For Hitting In Contact Sports In 2017

As we look toward a new year, it’s a great time to step back and evaluate things in order to make some changes and improve over the next 12 months.

However, in the world of sports, change is constant and new years come much more often than the first day of January. That means there’s much less time to reflect and the mistakes that plague some sports just continue to fester.

Take the ever-changing rules for contact in football, hockey and other full contact sports. With the “hit zone” constantly changing and what constitutes an illegal hit becoming more and more ambiguous, players, coaches and fans alike are struggling to keep up. And that’s causing some issues for leagues like the NHL and NFL.

There’s a clear lack of consistency in the officiating of contact. While one officiating crew calls games overly conservative — throwing flags just to be safe, even when no penalty occurs — another may completely miss multiple helmet-to-helmet hits or contact to the head and neck area. This creates inconsistency and poor play across the league from game-to-game and week-to-week.

It’s truly affecting the entertainment value of the sport too. Whether it’s sloppy, penalty-filled games that last forever, a call that decides a crucial game, or refs who seemingly make up the rules as they go along, the product of our contact sports has declined. It’s no wonder ratings were down this season for the NFL.

Of course, fans are now also more educated about head injuries, which also changes the way we watch the sports. Football — and other contact sports like hockey and lacrosse — is different than it used to be. The days of punishing hits, teams with nicknames like the Purple People Eaters and ESPN segments like “Jacked Up” are long gone.

There’s no doubt that fans and athletes — some more vocal than others — miss the hard-hitting, tough, physical play of the past. But the benefits of the changes clearly outweigh the cons. We all love the big open ice hits or bone-crunching plays over the middle of the field, but we also now understand the damage those players incur from those hits.

We want our athletes to have longer, more successful careers and better health after leaving the game. Whether they’re role players or superstars, no one should have to live their remaining years in constant pain because of the beating they got paid to take for three to seven years.

So what resolutions could leagues make this New Year’s? Simplifying the rulebook would be a start.

From players and coaches, to fans and even officials, no one appears to fully grasp the rules of contact — or what a catch is, but that’s a whole different matter. The officiating and implementation of the rules needs to be much clearer and everyone involved should be on the same page.

No one wants to watch slowed down, penalty-riddled games. No one wants to watch inconsistent calls or officials determining the outcomes of games.

If leagues like the NFL, NHL and contact sports alike want to continue to evolve and thrive, they need to begin closing the gap on officiating by streamlining the rulebook and clearly defining legal versus illegal hits.

Not just for the safety of the players, but for the sake of athletics in general.

Sports like hockey and football need time to reflect and make New Year’s resolutions just like us. Why are the rules on what is or isn’t a legal hit so inconsistent? Shouldn’t there be clearer definitions for the rules? Tell us what you think in the comments below.

Protect From Contact

Author Bio

Travis Armideo, marketing manager at Gladiator Custom Mouthguards, is a lifelong ice hockey player. He began playing for various clubs at a young age and continued onto junior teams, while also playing lacrosse at the collegiate level. Travis is still heavily involved in athletics, coaching high school and youth ice hockey athletes, as well as playing men’s league ice hockey on a regular basis.