Should the NFL take steps to reduce crowd noise in stadiums

Ground-Shaking Noise Rocks N.F.L., and Eardrums Take Big Hit--
"Be LOUD AND PROUD and blow my eardrums out!" one Chiefs fan wrote on Facebook.

The N.F.L. encourages the din.

"Fans know they are going to a football game and not searching for a book at a library," said Brian McCarthy, an N.F.L. spokesman.

But all that noise can come with a serious cost. With peaks for touchdowns and troughs at timeouts, the average volume during an N.F.L. game is probably in the mid-90-decibel range, said Elliott Berger, an acoustical engineer at 3M, which makes protective hearing devices.

Fans accustomed to hollering may scoff at the warnings as nanny-state silliness. But to auditory experts, the danger is very real.

"People think it's cool or funny or whatever, but there is increasing evidence that if your ears are ringing, damage is happening," said M. Charles Liberman, a professor of otology at Harvard Medical School and the director of a hearing research lab at the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary.

"There's something irreversible going on. It's only going to worsen as you get older."

Liberman's research shows that, even if the immediate effects of noise overexposure subside — the ringing, the muffling, the feeling of pressure — ears do not really recover.
"There is a huge range of ear vulnerability," Liberman said, with some people having "tough" ears and others having "tender" ears. "You don't know till it happens to you."

The potential damage includes not just partial deafness and ringing, but also less common auditory abnormalities such as hyperacusis, an intolerance to sound sometimes accompanied by ear pain.

Just about everyone inside a football stadium on game day — players, coaches and fans — acknowledges that the noise is overpowering.
"People say yeah, man, my ears are ringing," said James Filsinger, 48, a Seahawks season-ticket holder, "but it's always in a fun, upbeat kind of way." Sometimes his friends will say that the game left their ears ringing for a week.

"Most people exaggerate about how long it lasted, but it just goes away," he said.

Not always.

"Tinnitus may go away or it may not," said Larry E. Roberts, an emeritus professor and auditory neuroscientist at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. "It may go away but then it will come back. The ringing may well get worse with persistent exposure."

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/17/sports/football/ground-shaking-noise-rocks-nfl-and-eardrums-take-big-hit.html?_r=0

They'll never be able to lower noise levels in the stadium, but they could allow helmets to be outfitted with noise canceling headsets. I don't understand why this hasn't already been attempted.

Originally posted by BrianGO:
They'll never be able to lower noise levels in the stadium, but they could allow helmets to be outfitted with noise canceling headsets. I don't understand why this hasn't already been attempted.

because noise cancelling headsets are fake

Originally posted by zaghawk:

You know in college basketball people the entire student section will jump up and down and scream the entire time the visiting team is on offense. Maybe they should all be told to quiet down and sit down so it can be fair for teams who have poor fan bases who attend games.

Sorry zag but at what point in a basketball game is communication or lack there of as big an issue as it is in a football game? One offense being able to communicate while the other doesn't is a massive advantage in football. Not even comparable in basketball IMO.

A missed signal in basketball might result in a errant pass or someone being out of position. Worst case it results in change of possession, in a game where each team averages between 60-80 possessions. In a football game one missed signal could result in a game changing play or a season ending injury. Communication on offense is not a luxury. Its a necessity. Not to mention the lack of cadence gives the defensive line another massive advantage by getting a crazy jump on the snap. Again the other team does not. The advantage is real. Seahawks fans desperately want to think that their team is just so much better than everyone else why downplaying the advantage they receive from the noise. Just like all the talk from Seattle fans about how much more dominant their team is than everyone else because they blow teams out at CLink. Its all in the noise.

I stand by what I said at the beginning of the season. On neutral ground the Seahawks are mortal. The proof is in the pudding my friend. Still an excellent team and a decent road team just wish more Seahawks fans would learn to differentiate between the team that plays at home and the one that plays on the road where anything can happen. I think its cheap that Seattle is handed 8 guaranteed lopsided wins every year when the team is clearly good enough to compete without it. I'm not advocating change to quieting crowd noise. I do believe something should be done to allow both teams to use cadence and signals in every game, and I don't care how they do it. Speakers in more helmets with the qb mic'd directly to the other players etc. The advantage is too great as it is IMO. May the best team win. Not the team with the most help.

just wish more Seahawks fans would learn to differentiate between the team that plays at home and the one that plays on the road where anything can happen

Why do fans need to differentiate? So us Seattle fans will come accross a little less cocky, or do you believe our cockyness actually has an effect on the team?

Besides that, do you really believe there's seahawk fans that don't realize we create a tremendous homefiled advantage? I mean we actually pride ourselves on that...

Originally posted by hawker84:

just wish more Seahawks fans would learn to differentiate between the team that plays at home and the one that plays on the road where anything can happen

Why do fans need to differentiate? So us Seattle fans will come accross a little less cocky, or do you believe our cockyness actually has an effect on the team?

Besides that, do you really believe there's seahawk fans that don't realize we create a tremendous homefiled advantage? I mean we actually pride ourselves on that...

Because you guys might not be AS annoying

You and I both know that's not possible.

Originally posted by hawker84:
You and I both know that's not possible.

lol

Here is what I would propose:

Speaker/Microphone for the players
Do not permit the stadium operator to tell the crowd to get loud
All stadiums must be reviewed by league office for noise. Enclosed stadiums must include sound dampening technology to reduce the noise to a more tolerable level.
Seattle and possibly dome teams may be required to retrofit stadiums to use sound dampening technology, funded by the league office.

This thread is like the .Nutters complaining about Gore not wearing kneepads. If the Stick was this loud we would all take great pride in it and laugh at the notion of trying to impose noise restrictions.

Here is what I would propose:Speaker/Microphone for the playersDo not permit the stadium operator to tell the crowd to get loudAll stadiums must be reviewed by league office for noise. Enclosed stadiums must include sound dampening technology to reduce the noise to a more tolerable level.Seattle and possibly dome teams may be required to retrofit stadiums to use sound dampening technology, funded by the league office.

If that's the case then:

All baseball stadiums should have the same dimensions, all fences the same length from homeplate
.
All football teams should be forced to use domes for climate control and make them all use sound dampening technology.

All football teams should be forced to use field turf

Get rid of the designated hitter rule in the American league, or add it to the National league.

Stop people from cheering and waving squiggly things during freethrow attempts.

I could go on.

Point i'm trying to make is, every sport/sport team has advantages and disadvantages, is it fair to limit teams advantages, or is it fair to force other teams to step up and compete? In other words SF is building a beautiful new stadium, whey didn't the owner tell the architect i want it loud like KC and Seattle?

maybe not the greatest example. One more thing you guys seem to miss is, while the opposing team is struggling to hear on offense, our team is calling plays and adjustments at the line in that very same noise on defense. So it works both ways.

SEA needs that advantage to win and they f**king know it.

It's fine as is. It's great that the fans can have an impact on the game. You're stadium too quiet? Here's an idea, go to a game and cheer your ass off. It'll help.

The Seahawks are a different issue. It is by far the loudest stadium I've ever been too, and I've been to hundreds of NFL games over the years. Seen fans of all types, but the Seattle fans are actually rather tame.

They are the noisiest in the NFL, you say? b******t. I was at the MNF game against the Saints. I walked all over the stadium and stood and various locations. My observations:

1) There are plenty of fans cheering, but the individuals cheering as you walk by them are not noticably louder than many teams fans.
2) It's not a very hostile envirnoment. I was wearing niner gear head to toe and maybe caught a half dozen cutsie comments along the lines of "You're at the wrong game". Nothing remotely threatening. So, you feel pretty comfortable going to a Seahawks game as an opposting theam fans. Therefore, there are plenty of opposing teams fans at their games (far more than at niner games) and they do not make noice when their offense is operating.
3) There is an insane level of noise than emantes from under the covered sections.
4) The people in that section do not appear any more rabid that the rest of the folks in the stadium (in fact the endzone appears to have the craziest and loudest fans)
5) It's a specific noice that emanates from these covered areas, kind of like a long "ooooooooohhhhh" sound
6) As the opposing team huddles, breaks the huddle and the qb goes through pre snap reads, this "ooohhh" sound consistently gets louder. This happens even though the people that were cheering were already cheering. They are not noiticably or magically louder
7) The consistentcy of the lounder "ooohhh" sound is unreal, some would say inhuman....
8) A multiplicity of speakers line the inside of both overhangs pointed back at the crowd, such that if say you pumped that sound through the speakers, gently turning up the volume as the play clock winds down the sound would bounce off the crowd and towards the field, thus explaining the the covered portion of the field generates the vast majority of the noise.

My conclusion: The Seahawks, without a doubt, in my opinion, pump in crowd noise through those speakers.

Originally posted by ChipDouglas510:
This thread is like the .Nutters complaining about Gore not wearing kneepads. If the Stick was this loud we would all take great pride in it and laugh at the notion of trying to impose noise restrictions.

this

yes because feck the seahawks.