Guardian Caps — the padded soft shells worn over football helmets — are becoming such a common sight on NFL practice fields that people are increasingly wondering whether they’ll some day be worn in NFL games. The NFL’s Chief Medical Officer doesn’t see that happening.
Dr. Allen Sills told Pat McAfee that there’s value in continuing to wear Guardian Caps in practice and to study the impact of them, but the league has no plans to have players wear them in games.
“When we implemented Guardian Caps in practice we had a whole lot of data from colleges,” Sills said. “Virtually every Power 5 school uses Guardian Caps in practice for football and had for a number of years, so we had a lot of data and a lot of experience to go on. We didn’t have any of that data in games. Nobody has worn them in games. We’re trying to continue to learn, we’re looking a lot at joint practices where Guardian Caps are used. I don’t think the future of the game is about a Guardian Cap per se, I think what we can learn about that is how to design a better helmet, what are the materials that may make a helmet safer, and more importantly how do we not use the head, how do we get the head out of blocking, tackling, all the things that can be done without having to have head contact.”
Guardian Caps may be in training camps to stay, but they’ll stay on the practice field.
