Illustration by Radio
“If you were trapped in a room and you had to break down the door to get out, you wouldn’t hit that door with your head,” says Rex Norris, who runs football for Atavus, a Seattle-based tackling consultancy that has worked with youth, high school, college and professional teams on shoulder-led tackling. After more than a decade of crisis and controversy over concussions and chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or C.T.E., American football organizations are looking to other sports like rugby and wrestling for alternative, lower-risk sacking methods. Never go into a tackle intending to hit with your head.