Domestic Violence Punishments in the NFL

The way that professional athletes are punished for violent crimes is something that the leagues need to put an emphasis on. As media coverage has risen in regards to athletes being violent, specifically against women, the fans understanding of its severity has risen along with it. As currently constructed, the NFL allows for too much bias, lacks deterrence, and does not focus on helping the athletes. These are the main points that my presentation focus on. In the next CBA, something like my idea needs to be put into place. This can then be extended to all violent crimes in professional sports leagues. My idea is to appoint a seven person committee that holds meetings and essentially runs a civil court. Two players' association representatives, two league office appointed representatives, and three jointly appointed "experts". There needs to be an adequate amount of diversity on this committee because we can subconsciously have biases towards members of our in-group. A player, on their first offense, gets a maximum suspension of six games. The main recourse of the first offense is to help the athlete to make better decisions. Changing the focus to rehabilitation for athletes will help resolve the issue as much as it can, and will end up being a positive for the NFL both morally and monetarily.