American Football Sets Players’ Body Mass Index

Objectives. Document American football, National Football League (NFL), Lean State (LS) or Heavy State (FS) Public High School (PHS), sets similar player position mean body mass indexes (BMI). Review health risks related to BMI. Methods. Public accessible 2014-2015 football rosters were used to calculate individual player’s BMI for four PHS teams about each LS and FS Capital City and 32 NFL teams. Mean BMI were compared for male player positions: quarterback (Q), backfield (B), and line (L) players. Results. Q, B, and L mean BMI were not significantly different for LS and FS PHS and NFL, but mean BMI was significantly (P < .01) different for Q or B versus L. Conclusion. Football sets similar BMI for player positions with PHS line prone to obese BMI (considered healthy for NFL players) regardless of regional BMI trends. We propose PHS football set player BMI upper limit 30 to support public health and sports safety goals.