The analogy would be to the tobacco industry. It was and remains a legal product, yet somehow trial lawyers, virtually all of whom were liberal democrats, managed to extort trillions of dollars from an industry that largely supported republicans. This money was supposed to be for injuries suffered by smokers, who had been bombarded since childhood with warnings that smoking was dangerous. Most of the money of course ended up, not with the alleged vicitms, but with the lawyers, the democrat party and various levels of govenrment. Football, not just pro but college as well, would seem to me to be vulnerable to similar lawsuits. Tens of thousands of players have been exposed to unreasonable risks, even if the risks were unknown for much of the time and the players voluntarily assume then now, even after learning about them. The big difference however is that football is more of a democrat industry. Universities, a core democrat support group, use slave labor football players in large numbers, while ownership of pro teams is poltically split. Host cities of pro teams have a large stake as well, and most of them are democrat.
I'm okay as long as they don't ban my favorite sports: 1. Bicycle riding. 2. Girl watching. 3. Shooting a few baskets. (Basketball...Clarification for Lucrum.) 4. Posting on ET.
Basketball was my favorite sport in jr high through most of high school. Even at just 5'11" I could dunk a softball at will. My hands were never big enough to palm a basketball though.
I went through a hunting phase, white tail deer mostly. For the record I never said I hated sports. I just don't enjoy watching someone else play. You want to organize a vacant lot game of football? I'm in. If you're inviting me to watch a game on TV, you better have plenty of free beer cause the outcome of "the game" has no bearing on me.
Years ago when I worked with a couple of guys addicted to gambling I too made a few sports bets. Even then all I cared about was the final score.