Chicago Bears linebacker Lance Briggs grew up idolizing Junior Seau, and he believes head trauma from a 20-year NFL career played a role in the former NFL great's suicide on Wednesday.
But even as Briggs draws that dark connection, it hasn't changed how he feels about the discipline handed down in the "bounty" case.
Briggs called the season-long ban of linebacker Jonathan Vilma "a bunch of B.S.," and doesn't believe the league can improve player safety on the field.
"Player safety is best taken care of by providing health insurance for players' lives," Briggs said, according to the Chicago Tribune. "Come on. It's like asking a boxer: 'Are your injuries related to taking blows to the head?' We throw our bodies around. It's physical. It's football. You can't stop the violence from happening."
Briggs said all he's "ever seen on TV is clean, physical football" when watching the Saints. Brett Favre's ankle disagrees.
"It's becoming flag football," Briggs said. "We're flying around at 100 mph. In our mindset, to say I need to literally go 5 percent lower (on the body) within a split-second -- how do you do that?"
This story manages to combine two of the most grating NFL subplots of the moment at once: The "NFL is now just flag football!" Guy and some more premature linking of Seau's tragic death to a football-related brain injury. Next topic, please.
