The NFL is a violent sport.  Players get hurt all the time.  Careers get ended all the time.  Retired players have side effects that last the rest of their lives after they stop playing.  The NFL has tried to stop some of the vicious hits, especially on the quarterback but there is no way to stop it from never happening.  In the thrill of the moment, a defensive player rushing the quarterback is not going to be thinking about player safety or any rules that have been put into play.  They are thinking: “hit the quarterback” or “cause a fumble” or “this is my chance to be on Sportscenter.”

The speed of the game, along with the size, strength and power of the modern day NFL player leads hits like the one put on Drew Brees this weekend against the 49ers.  Watching it in slow motion and seeing how whiplashed Brees is by the hit, I have no idea how he is still alive.  People have been posting the GIF of the hit all over the internet and I have seen many jokes made about it.  I will not make any jokes.  After 12 years in professional wrestling and seeing all the head trauma injuries that my friends and coworkers received, I know that CTE and head trauma is no laughing matter.  Retired NFL players are committing suicide at an alarming rate.  One player is one player too many but when it happens so frequently that it is no longer a surprise when you hear about it, that is a sad state of affairs.  Dave Duerson, Junior Seau, Andre Waters, Jovan Belcher, Paul Oliver and more and that doesn’t even get into the list of NHL players, wrestlers and other athletes.  It is a serious issue that I have written about before so I won’t continue to repeat the same stuff.  Just know that I will not be laughing or making jokes about hits like this one on Drew Brees: