The National Football League (NFL) has seen drastic changes in their equipment since their founding in 1920. Fully leather helmets with no face mask, turned into a cheap flimsy moldable plastic with a thin, one barred facial protector, and now into an expensive, solid plastic shell and padded interior helmet with a full face mask and cushioned chin strap.
In the ‘20’s, players wore wool/cotton type sweaters with minimal padding, and thin baggy pants with no padding at all.
Throughout the past century, NFL safety precautions have improved, but in the past 20 years, these improvements have advanced even more and created a safer environment for all positions on the field.
Since 2002, rules have been installed to protect the punter, kicker, and quarterback because they are considered “defenseless players,” and any contact after a play will be an immediate “roughing the passer”/”unsportsmanlike conduct.” Between the 2005 and the 2006 seasons, the NFL started to penalize players for “horse-collar tackles” which is any tackle that involves the grabbing and pulling motion of any part of the shoulder pads or the upper chest plate.
Then in 2009 and 2010, the NFL banned any hits below the knee, as well as any hits to the head or neck area of a defenseless receiver. This helps keep players safe and prevents serious injuries to the nervous system. Then two years later in 2012, the NFL expanded the “defenseless player” name tag to include cornerbacks when making a play for the ball. Cornerbacks and secondary players, like safeties, are now safe from any hits to the head/neck area, and the opposing team is penalized if this rule is ignored.
In 2013 and 2014, the NFL required players to wear knee and thigh pads to avoid serious injuries to the lower body. This lower body safety also included the restriction of all leg wrap tackles which meant no defenders could wrap up and roll on the offense’s players legs.
Extending from 2015-2018, the NFL made significant rule changes on blocking, including prohibiting chop blocks, leaping blocks, and peel back blocks which help protect the defense when trying to tackle the ball carrier. The chop and peel back blocks have never been physically stated in the rule book, but there was always controversy on what call to make when one of those blocks was performed.
As rules advanced in 2019 and 2020, the league created new player protection penalties which emphasized the protection of defenseless players, as well as banning any contact to the helmet. These rules completely changed the world of targeting because the NFL went from only illegal head to head contact to illegalizing any contact to the upper neck and head area.
In 2024 the NFL committee improved player protection once again by changing the kickoff rules to be more rewarding to both sides of the ball and to help reduce the speed and collision of special team hits. The media took to a storm, clowning the league with claims that it ruined the kickoff as a whole and destroyed the physicality of football, but the NFL persisted it was necessary to keep their players safe.
This media hatred didn’t stop there because later in the summer of 2024, the committee banned all swivel hip-drop tackles which was a technique used by defenders around the league to reduce the amount of yards gained after contact. The media went on a rampage in response, even saying that soon the NFL will ban tackling as a whole and it will become a flag-football league.
To improve safety once again, the committee gave players the option to wear “practice guardian caps” in regular season games. These protective pads were extra cushioning on top of the helmet to layer the helmet even more and to protect the players head’s even further.
As technology increases, players get stronger, and the NFL gets smarter, player safety will always be the committee’s top priority. Even if fans are upset about the rule changes every year, it means that they won’t have to worry as much about their favorite player exiting the game on a season ending injury.
