Sooner or later, NFL’s medical doctors and/or groups could hold Tua Tagovailoa off the sphere

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The story surfaced after Tua Tagovailoa was lately positioned on concussion protocol. It goes one thing like this: “Tua should not be taking part in once more this yr.”

It makes little sense. If he’s allowed to return to play this season, why should not he? It could possibly be (prefer it did towards the Vikings again in October), but when he is cleared, he’ll be cleared.

The extra necessary query is just not whether or not he ought to play once more this yr, however whether or not he ought to by no means. The problem is clearly inside the participant’s household. NBC’s Chris Collinsworth defined that when requested throughout a Steelers-Dolphins recreation earlier this yr if his mother and father could be okay with Tua persevering with to play, Tua replied, “I do not know.”

Tua would not need to go away, however he could also be underneath growing strain from his household to cease. And sooner or later, you might end up unable to get your physician cleared to play, very like the previous NFL turned Jarvid Greatest again. Physics is just not on Tua’s aspect. He is smaller than most quarterbacks, and up to now has proven his incapability to defend towards blows the place his head hits the bottom.

The broader query is whether or not Tua’s historical past of concussions will develop into a scarlet letter, prompting the Dolphins to maneuver away from him and different groups to maintain him away. So gamers who’ve a few of them run the chance of changing into the most recent victims of implied collusion.

Rightly or wrongly, those that actually run the league actually acknowledge that it isn’t good for enterprise to commonly elevate controversy over whether or not a participant is concussion-prone. So a wider soccer machine, made up of replaceable elements which might be changed frequently, rejects Tua to recover from this query of if, when, and if Tua will get a concussion once more. There’s a risk.

Regardless of the league’s standard perception that notoriety would not exist, the fixed concussion debate is unhealthy for everybody. This threatens to choke the availability of future skilled footballers.

So the very best consequence for the NFL is perhaps for Tua’s mother and father to cease him from taking part in. could make selections for