August 18, 2024
With the NFL in its third year of requiring players at certain positions to wear spongy, protective Guardian Caps over their helmets during many practices, some players have taken it a step further, wearing the caps during preseason games.
Six players — five members of the Indianapolis Colts and an offensive lineman for the Pittsburgh Steelers — wore Guardian Caps during the opening weekend of the NFL preseason. That came after the league informed players that the caps could be worn during games this year.
Colts safety Rodney Thomas II, a third-year player, said he plans to keep wearing a Guardian Cap for all preseason games and might continue that into the regular season.
“I just feel like going through practice … it didn’t feel like it was inhibiting me or anything like that. … You just gain more protection and different things from wearing it,” Thomas said by phone last week. “So I just figured, ‘Why not?’”
The NFL said it applauds the players’ decision and would welcome anyone who opts to wear Guardian Caps during the regular season.
“I think we always thought that there would be a chance that a player would,” Jeff Miller, the league’s executive vice president of communications, public affairs and policy, said by phone last week. “And the fact that six wore it the first preseason game is an indication of that. I don’t think those numbers are surprising. I do think we’ll continue to work with players who are interested in … the Guardian Caps or the new helmets to try to encourage them to get to the best technology.”
The NFL said in April that players’ helmet options for this season include five newly developed models that outperformed all previous helmets in lab testing that simulated on-field collisions. The league said it would waive the requirement to wear Guardian Caps during practices for players who chose one of six specified new helmet models. According to Miller, more than 200 players have switched to high-performing helmet models.
“That’s a really encouraging development because it’s not easy to try something new,” Miller said. “The players involved deserve a great deal of credit. And the equipment managers deserve a great deal of credit for being open to trying something new and different. So if you’re having … well more than 200 players wearing brand new helmets and the half dozen that wore the Guardian Caps, players are very much prioritizing safety. And that is a really positive development for them and for the league.”
The caps are pillowy, padded shells affixed to the outsides of players’ helmets. For games, unlike in practice, players wore coverings over the Guardian Caps, matching the color and logo of the helmet.
Thomas and star tailback Jonathan Taylor, the 2021 NFL rushing leader, are among the Colts players who have worn the caps this preseason. Steelers guard James Daniels did, too.
“High schools are wearing them in practices,” Miller said. “Colleges are wearing them in practices. … It normalizes them [to players].”
Two years ago, the NFL mandated that linemen, linebackers and tight ends wear Guardian Caps in training camp practices. Last year, the league added running backs to the list of required positions and extended the mandated use to contact practices during the regular season. This year, the requirements include players at all positions except kicker, punter and quarterback. Teams already prohibit quarterbacks from being hit during practice.
“They had made it mandatory for all the preseason [practices] and different things like that,” Thomas said. “And then I just figured it was mandatory for the preseason. So to go throughout all the preseason and get used to the collisions and everything like that with it on and then jump right into the full-speed, live-action games and then [have] that all of a sudden be the first time that we didn’t wear it — I just wanted to keep it consistent throughout the whole preseason to see how it went.”
Some players have been critical of the look and feel of the caps and have wondered whether wearing them affects their performance. Those were not issues for Thomas.
“It felt good to me,” he said. “It felt like the same as practice. I couldn’t really tell the difference.”
The NFL estimates that the force of an impact is reduced by about 20 percent if both players involved in a collision are wearing Guardian Caps. According to the league’s injury data, players at the position groups required to wear Guardian Caps experienced an approximately 50 percent decrease in the rate of concussions during preseason practices over the previous two years.
“I’m going to wear it the rest of the preseason games,” Thomas said. “And then I’ll probably end up wearing it throughout the season, too.”
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported that Daniels also plans to wear a Guardian Cap during regular season games.
“Hopefully more and more people start wearing them,” Daniels told the newspaper. “I truly believe they help, so I’m glad the NFL is allowing us to wear them. Hopefully every week people start wearing them more and more. I’m excited for it.”
Miller said the league informed players simultaneously about the possibility of wearing Guardian Caps in games and the new, high-performing helmet models. The best helmets now give players the protection they would receive from wearing both a Guardian Cap and a traditional helmet, Miller said, without the additional weight from a cap.
“We’ve seen a lot of players go into the Guardian Cap-optional helmets in the first couple weeks — more than a couple hundred — which is a very fast adoption of a new helmet,” Miller said. “Usually it takes a year or two for players to move from what they’re in to something that’s newly introduced. So seeing … well more than 200 players try the Guardian Cap-optional helmets means that people are aware of new technologies and want to engage with them.”
The league said in February that, according to its injury data, players suffered 219 concussions during regular season and preseason practices and games last season, about the same as the total of 213 from the 2022 season. From 2015 to 2017, the annual number of concussions was as high as 281.
The NFL has attempted to use player education, evolving protocols, rule changes, revised practice and training schedules, and improved equipment and helmet technology to address head injuries.
“I think getting all of this in front of the players so that they can make informed decisions makes sense,” Miller said. “And I think a little bit of what we’re seeing ultimately is that the Guardian Cap is a really positive technology and a really positive bridge as the technology continues to improve in helmets to the point where we can reach another level of safety that we couldn’t have anticipated just a few years ago.”