The safety crises of football world have a particular morphology. But before Damar Hamlin the cycle had never played out with such intensity and immediacy. In a span of barely 100 hours, the voices of the chattering class went from narcissistic reflection about fandom's complicity in the sport's recreational violence to a collective clapback at the remarkable triumph of humanity. In other words, we went from "down with football" to "up with people" in record time — and without skipping a beat on the NFL's regular season and playoff calendar.
As nearly everyone knows, in a game on Jan. 2, Hamlin, a 24-year-old defensive back for the Buffalo Bills, collapsed on the field of Paycor Stadium in Cincinnati after making a routine tackle. His heart stopped, in an event that was improbable but not unprecedented: a likely case of commotio cardis, cardiac arrest triggered by a blow to the chest.
