Despite high-profile QB concussions, NFL says the brain injuries dropped 17% during the 2024 season

There are moments, during any NFL season, when the stakes of an individual game are overshadowed by the realization that a prominent player — like Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts — has suffered a concussion.

There remains significant concern about the long-term neurological fallout that football players can face from repeated brain trauma, but the frequency of concussions is falling.

NFL officials said Thursday that the league recorded 182 concussions in 2024, a total that included practices, three preseason games, and 17 regular-season games. It is a 17% decrease from the 2023 season, when players sustained 219 concussions.

Jeff Miller, an NFL executive vice president who oversees player health and safety, said the figure is the lowest since 2015, when the league adopted a new electronic medical record system for its 32 teams. The number of reported concussions peaked in 2017, at 281.

“Even though we’re really gratified about these concussion numbers that we’re sharing, we want to see the number to continue to go down,” said Allen Sills, the league’s chief medical officer. “We’ve spoken very publicly about our desire to see head contact continue to get out of the game.”

The NFL cited a range of factors that might have contributed to the lower number of concussions.

Players had been more likely to sustain concussions on kickoffs than on plays from scrimmage, Miller said, so the league this season implemented new kickoff rules, which sought to essentially shrink the size of the field, leaving players with less open space to pick up speed.

Sills explained that players whose helmets collided at more than 15 mph were 26 times more likely to sustain a concussion than those who experienced impacts at lower speeds.

“That’s an enormous risk,” he said, “and that’s why we work very hard at continuing to eliminate those types of exposures.”

The new rules led to 332 more kickoffs being returned for yardage than in 2023, Miller said, but those additional opportunities for collisions didn’t result in more brain injuries. Eight concussions were recorded during kickoffs, the same as a year earlier.

Sills said about 35% of NFL players switched to helmets with better safety ratings.

This season also marked the first time that the league allowed players to wear Guardian Caps — the puffy, padded shells that fit atop existing helmets — during the regular season. Sills said about 20 players elected to use the protective coverings.

“We did not see any negative effects from those players wearing the Guardian Caps,” he said.

Knockout hits

The league’s encouraging data didn’t diminish the sense of unease, though, that accompanied some of the season’s most visible concussions.

During a Sept. 12 game between the Miami Dolphins and Buffalo Bills, Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa collided with a Bills defender and dropped to the ground.

The back of Tagovailoa’s head struck the field, and his right arm jutted out awkwardly in a “fencing response,” a reaction sometimes observed in victims of traumatic brain injuries. This marked the second time that Tagovailoa, 26, had displayed a fencing response following a concussion since 2022; the Dolphins placed him on injured reserve, and he missed four games.

(A recent study, led by Harvard Medical School researchers and neuroscientist Chris Nowinski — and inspired by Tagovailoa’s injuries — identified a head-shaking symptom that might help training staff and coaches sooner identify a player who has suffered a concussion.)

A few weeks later, New York Giants rookie wide receiver Malik Nabers appeared to briefly lose consciousness when his head slammed against the turf during an Oct. 3 game against the Dallas Cowboys.

Nabers, 21, missed two games while he recovered from a concussion and later told reporters that he had no memory of suffering the injury, according to ESPN.

Multiple Eagles starters missed time because of concussions this season, including wide receiver DeVonta Smith, right tackle Lane Johnson, right guard Mekhi Becton, cornerback Darius Slay, and safety Reed Blankenship.

Smith and Johnson were injured during a Sept. 22 game against the New Orleans Saints. Smith, 26, sustained his concussion after he caught a short pass and was corralled by several Saints; defensive tackle Khristian Boyd then struck Smith from behind with such force that Smith’s helmet popped off his head. (The NFL later fined Boyd $4,600.)

Johnson’s brain injury was the fourth of his career, and the 34-year-old was observed vomiting on the sidelines. He and Smith missed a game while they progressed through a five-step recovery protocol that the NFL has established for players who have sustained concussions.

The Eagles’ most notable concussion occurred during the first quarter of a Dec. 22 matchup against the Washington Commanders and threatened to derail the team’s season.

On a second and long, Hurts darted for 13 yards, and collided with two Washington defenders; his head thumped against the field.

Hurts, 26, was evaluated in a blue sideline tent, then escorted to the Eagles’ locker room. The team ruled him out with a concussion, and he missed the season’s remaining two regular season games.

On Jan. 10, Hurts told reporters that he didn’t remember the details of what happened after he suffered the brain injury. Two days later, he played in the Eagles’ Jan. 12 wild-card victory over the Green Bay Packers.

“We all get affected by sort of recency bias,” Sills said. “Any time you have a couple of high-profile injuries, it certainly feels like an epidemic of injury. So it’s important that you look at overall trends, and over a pattern of time.”

Hurts had perhaps his most dominant performance of the season during the NFC championship game, when he led the Eagles to a 55-23 win over the Commanders.

The Eagles did not escape that game unscathed, though.

Running back Kenneth Gainwell left the game with a concussion and has not practiced since.