An invitation for disaster

It makes no sense for NFL players to work out in the heat

Temperatures in Thibodaux, La., and Spartanburg, S.C., are expected to hit 95 degrees this week, and in Stockton, Calif., and Jacksonville, Fla., the forecast is for 90-degree heat. Why should you care about the weather reports for these towns? Because they're the sites of NFL training camps (for the New Orleans Saints, Carolina Panthers, San Francisco 49ers and Jacksonville Jaguars, respectively), and every team in the league will have started preseason workouts by the end of this week. That means that for the rest of the summer, hulking, 300-plus-pound men will push themselves to their physical limits in those and other towns across America.

We can only hope that they won't push themselves beyond their physical limits, as did Korey Stringer, the Minnesota Vikings tackle who died at age 27 of complications from heat stroke during training camp almost a year ago -- Aug. 1, to be exact. Stringer, who weighed 336 pounds, collapsed on a day when the heat index at the team's Mankato, Minn. training camp reached 110, and by the time he was taken to the hospital, his body temperature was 108.8.

The Stringer family has filed a $100 million wrongful death lawsuit against the Vikings, meaning a jury will probably decide the question of the team's liability. In the process, perhaps an equally important question will be addressed: Why do teams require players, especially gargantuan linemen, to work out so strenuously in such stifling heat?

It makes no sense for teams to spend weeks practicing in desert-like conditions, no matter how closely they monitor their players or how well they keep them hydrated. It was dangerous enough a decade or two ago when the biggest players on the field were in the neighborhood of 250 pounds, but now 250-pound linemen are considered puny, and no one bats an eye when a player tips the scales at 325 or above. As the size of players increases (and as the NFL implicitly encourages them to get bigger), the insistence on whipping them into shape under the searing summer sun becomes even more of an invitation for disaster.

Some teams have begun to realize this and now conduct their workouts in indoor facilities when the heat and humidity reach dangerous levels, but many teams don't. Over the next few weeks we will still see plenty of photos of players drenched in sweat on sweltering days, and we'll hear tales of players who were so literally drained from practice that they needed IVs to replenish their bodily fluids.

Athletes don't need to endure overwhelming heat to get in shape. NBA players work out in air-conditioned gyms and weight rooms, and it doesn't seem to hinder their conditioning. NFL teams certainly can't make the case that they need sizzling heat to prepare for the season because most players will play far more games in unusually cold weather than in extremely warm climates. Whether they'll admit it or not, the football coaches and organizations who like their teams to train in high temperatures do so in the belief that it will somehow toughen them up. It's part of the macho theory that whatever doesn't kill you will make you stronger. But what if it does kill you?

To their credit, the Vikings are taking greater precautions to minimize the possibility of another tragedy (though in light of the lawsuit they are careful to stress that their steps are in no way an admission that they were lax in their heat safety procedures before). The new measures including having a physician on the field at all times during practices, installing large tent-like canopies for increased shade on practice fields, and adding portable cooling units in the cafeteria.

But as long as teams are pushing their players to unnecessary limits in brutal heat, even the best precautions will only be protecting a flawed plan -- in some cases, a fatally flawed one.

Sports Illustrated senior writer Phil Taylor writes about a Hot Button issue every Monday on CNNSI.com.

 

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