Concede Thursdays

In the wake of the new Thursday Night deal, it makes sense to cover the obvious.

Thursday Night Football sucks and too many teams are losing key players because of Thursday Night Football.

The Seahawks need to just start to concede Thursdays.

Play only the backups and do it in a highly visible manner.

The cost is the loss of one game. It could easily be argued that the injury toll from Thursday Night football can cost multiple games so I consider it fair game to consider.

Last year I believe we lost Sherman and we lost Kam. Other teams have lost people too on their Thursday Night games.

I do not think the potential loss of one game would hurt that much, and I think it would make a huge splash if teams started to refuse to play starters because of the increased risk of injury.

Whatever weird aversion someone might have to literally escorting the other team to the end zone, the fact remains that several teams have had significant injuries where impact far beyond Thursdays have been felt. And the football itself is crappy anyway, it would probably be more entertaining to just watch a team do a 'parting of the Red Sea' and let the other team score repeatedly.

Not sure it would break any rules, but it would be tremendously entertaining to watch the aftermath.

Fact of the matter is, the league has looked into it and injuries are no more of an issue on Thursday than any other game day.

Your entire point is wiped out with this simple fact.

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stat-analysis/2017/do-thursday-games-cause-more-injuries

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...-injuries-there-arent/?utm_term=.ab42132929ac

Conclusions

There's little evidence from injury reports to suggest TNF games and other short rest periods are associated with different injury rates from the typical Sunday-to-Sunday schedule.

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The Thursday games are hard on the players, but I don't think they cause more injuries than any other game. Sherman's Achilles was ready to pop at any time, and it just happened to be during a Thursday game.

1. The players seem to disagree that is has no impact. They particularly stress the increased risk of injury as the #1 reason behind their concern.

2. The league might 'have looked at the data' but they aren't really impartial. They have a $3B incentive to find ways of interpreting the data that works in their favor.

3. The eye test says otherwise, and the Seahawks seen some outsized injury issues recently on Thursdays. So even if everybody else does just fine with Thursdays, we probably would have been just fine giving up that game and having our injured guys back.


I would be curious to see just how many severe injuries have been the result of TNF, whether in game or practice/prep leading to it.

I still contend it is a risk that might not be worth it. And a cost of a single game isn't terrible considering the potential impact.

TwistedHusky":15nqpo51 said:

1. The players seem to disagree that is has no impact. They particularly stress the increased risk of injury as the #1 reason behind their concern.

2. The league might 'have looked at the data' but they aren't really impartial. They have a $3B incentive to find ways of interpreting the data that works in their favor.

3. The eye test says otherwise, and the Seahawks seen some outsized injury issues recently on Thursdays. So even if everybody else does just fine with Thursdays, we probably would have been just fine giving up that game and having our injured guys back.


I would be curious to see just how many severe injuries have been the result of TNF, whether in game or practice/prep leading to it.

I still contend it is a risk that might not be worth it. And a cost of a single game isn't terrible considering the potential impact.

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Although I wish there were no Thursday night games, there is no way on Earth a team is going to forfeit the game. The Backlash would be astounding from the league, the fans and even the players (No game = no Game check). There is way too much money on the line to forfeit this game and the punishment the NFL would mete out would be far more than any loss you could have of players.

If you want to be a bit more realistic (yet still HIGHLY unlikely) in trying to avoid injuring core players during a Thursday night game, a team (if they were so inclined, and I don't believe any would ever be so inclined) could rest their starters on that day and probably lose, or come to that agreement with the other team that they both do the same (again, I don't see it ever happening in reality). This would be difficult for the NFL to try to enforce, because they truly can't control who starts or who plays how many snaps in any given game and the players association wouldn't let them try to enforce anything like that. I can't stress this enough though; nothing like this is going to ever come to fruition

Well I for one don't like it either. But I looked into it after that carnage fest of 7 players total that went down between the 2 teams and found that info I posted.

That said, no matter how you feel, I can unequivocally tell you that no way in hell always comPete or Paul for that matter will start throwing games over this. Sorry but it is bigger than you or I....or even Sherman.

All we can do is start turning those games off. Voting with your wallet will get through.

Maybe, but it would be hilarious and probably generate some great dialogue the moment an NFL team scheduled to play on a Thursday submitted their roster showing every single starter as Questionable or Unavailable.

You wouldn't have to actually intentionally fumble the ball repeatedly or something blatant.

Just refuse to play any starters that feel 'sick' from Thursday Night Flu. Or replace a bulk of your key starters with backups.

There is a lot of grey area to work with that would probably minimize the backlash. It should be noted, there is backlash when the NBA teams refuse to play their starters and they still do it. It is hard to enforce judgement calls on the player being healthy enough to play.

You bring up a great point...but I would address it a tiny bit differently. I would call it training Thursdays. Training for some of the backups to get into the groove of the system they are now playing in. Get them some snaps in a real time environment. Get them to be what they have potential to be so they can prove they belong on the team going to the next level. So they/we take a hit or two on the scoreboard.....that is gonna happen anyway. Let the rotation be more deep so experience can win the future. Let them understand that they need to be faster on the field and off the field(Arren Wroggers).... There is more for the team to win than just the game.

Thursday games suck because, if your team plays Thursday, you have nothing else forward to on Sunday (if you only watch "your" team).

Concede Thursdays miss the playoffs by one game because its a rival in the division, watch this board implode because we didn't try to win at the end of the season.

chris98251":141cbml0 said:

Concede Thursdays miss the playoffs by one game because its a rival in the division, watch this board implode because we didn't try to win at the end of the season.

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None of that matters if you just have the better kicker. :twisted:

Well, it's still a Twisted Manifesto, but with Bevell gone at least it's something new.

chris98251":ecv1z5uj said:

Concede Thursdays miss the playoffs by one game because its a rival in the division, watch this board implode because we didn't try to win at the end of the season.

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People are going to have to decide..You want wins,playoffs and Championships?

Throw games,use subs and hold players out of game(s) due to fear of injury happening?
There will be no playoffs just like this year if you like this way of thinking.

Right up there with the "Suck for Luck" phenomenon.

:34853_doh:

You know, if this was a private league, done for fun and nothing more, I can absolutely see this as a valid method in trying to affect change in the meta.

But it isn't - it's an entertainment product.

Twisted you act like the players had no control over playing on Thursdays.

The owners wanted to play a full 16 games on Thursday, so they negotiated it into the last CBA............and you know what? The players agreed to it, cause it meant splitting another 500M with the owners.

So cry me a river players, you certainly aren't complaining about the extra money in all your contracts due to the increased TNF revenue.

IMO this whole woe is me by the players, and we have a couple on our team that act like they're indentured servants or something.............is getting REALLY old.

You don't like it? Then next CBA bargain for it. But they won't tell you that part, they just want to get up on their soapboxes.

Sgt. Largent":awg7gwfi said:

Twisted you act like the players had no control over playing on Thursdays.

The owners wanted to play a full 16 games on Thursday, so they negotiated it into the last CBA............and you know what? The players agreed to it, cause it meant splitting another 500M with the owners.

So cry me a river players, you certainly aren't complaining about the extra money in all your contracts due to the increased TNF revenue.

IMO this whole woe is me by the players, and we have a couple on our team that act like they're indentured servants or something.............is getting REALLY old.

You don't like it? Then next CBA bargain for it. But they won't tell you that part, they just want to get up on their soapboxes.

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:34853_doh:

And what if they try to bargain for it and fail? Are they not allowed to complain about it because it was a small part of an overall contract that when push came to shove didn't get play? Are they not able to lament their failures until the next CBA? You have a very binary view of how sausage gets made and how people come to agreements that while are mutually beneficial leave room for improvement from both counterparties.

There is a very pernicious cognitive lapse going on where mutually beneficial imperfect things are suddently thought of as immutable ideals to strive for. This is not like a 30 year mortgage or a 10 year car note, it's a dynamic process that leaves a lot to be desired by both sides but ultimately yields football the majority of the time.

Just close this thread....as has been pointed out, there's no evidence that Thursday night games have more injuries, or more severe injuries. Players just bitch about it because they can, and they prefer a full week between games.

Repetition is not supposed to create truth.

If they cancel Sunday games I bet the injury rate goes way down!

Actually this year the data says the injury rate is higher.

Is it a statistical blip or a trend?

And since the data is being interpreted by parties w a specific benefit if the data shows a certain outcome...how valid are the findings?

Regardless the larger issue is the chance at severe injury.

Also resting starters can have benefits in the next game that mitigates the impact of the single loss.

You are trading one loss for increased chance of having key players for other games.

There are additional factors here:

Was there travel?
Was the game before particularly grueling or overtime?

But I would suggest it might be worth it.

And I don't agree the players agreed to it. The CBA is extremely one-sided due to the specifics of the circumstance. Players have less leverage.