NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — In the world of Fantasy Football, it's been a tough season for Nick Bauer when it comes to injuries.
"Most of my lineup is probably injured most games, so yeah, it’s hard," said Bauer. "If they’re not available to play, it’s kind of hard."
But sometimes it's easy to forget that fantasy headaches represent real-world injuries. It's a quandary the NFL has been facing for years: how do you keep the spirit of the game while also keeping players safe from concussions and permanent brain damage?
"This is something we don’t know a lot about, right?" said Dr. Douglas Terry, a neuropsychologist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.
Dr. Terry and his team at Vanderbilt are studying the way football players are impacted by head injuries, using a tool you might not expect — a customized mouthguard.
"They look predominantly like normal mouthguards," said Terry.
But inside the mouthguards are tiny sensors. When they're connected to the internet, they can paint a colorful picture of some of the head injuries that football players can sustain. "The level of force, the level of acceleration," he said. "Where the hits tended to come from, so it seems like this person tends to be hit more on the left side of his helmet."
This is why the NFL has recruited Vanderbilt University and seven other college football teams to have some of their players wear these smart mouthguards during practices with contact and actual games. Over the course of this season and beyond, the research project will continue to collect data, with the hopes that eventually they'll be able to come up with a road map for the future.
"Really, to try to understand where we can intervene in this pathway — whether that be with equipment, with changes in rules, and a variety of other things that will make it inherently safer for youth and young adults," said Dr. Terry.
One day, this technology could even go way beyond brain studies.
"If the data leads to something to say, 'alright, can this be used in a real-time way? What can we take from this, and can we intervene, and should we intervene quickly?' But the science isn’t there yet," he said.
In the meantime, Bauer hopes his players can stay healthy. It's a current fantasy that could one day come true.
"Anything that can help is really good," said Bauer.
Currently, the research project also involves four NFL franchises wearing the smart mouthguards. On Vanderbilt's squad, 40 student-athletes are participating in the research.
