Here is a summary of a really interesting article the New York Times had on their website about concussion protocol.

The New York Times article "Diagnoses Of Concussions Increase By A Third Over Last Season" by Ben Shpigel discusses the drastic increase in concussions this year. The article focuses on three major reasons for the increase, the first being that the league has commissioned Nero-trauma consultants on the sideline and is now allowing medical personal to call timeouts during games. The second is players are allowing trainers to know when they are hurt more often, being hurt especially head wise has been considered a weakness in the NFL as far back as anyone can remember, but decisions like Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger decision to remove himself from an important game because of double vision symptoms, suggest change in the NFL's culture. The final reason is that more concussions in general are being diagnosed, the injury of Rams quarterback Case Keenum helped to push for this change, Keenum was violently thrown to the ground by a Ravens defender and then allowed to stay in the game, this generated a lot of bad publicity for the NFL and confused higher up officials on why he was allowed to stay in the game after he was clearly injured.

This change in the NFL's policy has the potential to be very beneficial in the long run for securing player safety, and decreasing brain related damage that has plagued older ex NFL players with damage like dementia. As a devoted fan of the NFL and someone who played football in high school. I am hopeful that these improvements will not only help professional athletes, but also somehow trickle down in to improving youth safety, because at the end of the day the most important part is preventing serious and life threatening injury.