Maybe someone smarter than me can interpret this, because I’m not understanding how they came to their conclusion. According to this study, the average number of injuries during Sunday games was 21.4 compared to Thursday games at 21.7 but the difference is “negligible”. I feel like they didn’t take into account the fact only one game is played on fewer Thursdays, as opposed to the majority of games taking place every Sunday.
Link to study: http://www.fortunejournals.com/articles/the-effect-of-thursday-night-football-on-injuries-in.pdf
injury rate is an important factor of course, but not the only one. players and teams have to make adjustments to how they play on a short week. these adjustments are an intangible, yet may impact the situation greatly. all i’m saying is, don’t just look at the injury rates and say, nah thursday is fine. just the eye test alone on thursday games warrants those games a closer look. the games traditionally lack the overall skill level, we’ve all seen it, some players just don’t look as sharp. perhaps they are guarding against injury or a previous lingering injury more, which then may ironically be more dangerous at times, especially when other players are playing full speed ahead. many factors about the short week need to be considered.
>games traditionally lack the overall skill level, we’ve all seen it, some players just don’t look as sharp
I think this is more from everyone getting a TNF game now and not just the best-rated teams. There are bad games going on Sunday at noon all the time, but nobody’s paying attention because there’s 5 other games going on. If the teams are good (higher skill, better disciplined) they’re probably not playing on Sunday noon as often.
no
yes