## Facts

- Dale Hackbart, a Denver Broncos defensive back, was injured during a 1973 NFL regular-season game against the Cincinnati Bengals in Denver.
- After a Broncos interception and return, Hackbart attempted to block Bengals player Charles “Booby” Clark and ended up on the ground, kneeling and watching the play.
- The trial court found that Clark, acting in anger and frustration and without specific intent to injure, struck Hackbart with his right forearm to the back of Hackbart’s head and neck with enough force to knock both players forward.
- The blow was not part of a live block or tackle and violated professional football rules and general playing customs prohibiting striking an opponent in the head or neck.
- No penalty was called; neither player reported the incident to officials at the time.
- Hackbart later developed serious neck problems and sued Clark for tort damages and the Bengals under respondeat superior.
- After a bench trial on liability, the district court entered judgment for defendants, reasoning that the accepted violence of professional football placed even intentional batteries outside judicial review and limited remedies to game and league discipline.

## Issues

1. Whether tort liability for an on-field injury in a professional football game is barred as a matter of law because of the sport’s violent character.
2. Whether a player’s implied consent to participate in professional football includes consent to intentional, rule-violating blows delivered out of anger and frustration.
3. Whether liability may be evaluated under tort standards (including negligence) rather than rejected as non-justiciable.

## Decision

- The Tenth Circuit reversed the judgment for defendants and remanded for further proceedings.
- The court held that professional football is not exempt from tort law and that on-field conduct can be actionable when it exceeds the game’s rules and customary practices.
- The court rejected the district court’s broad view that implied consent and the sport’s violence categorically bar civil recovery.
- The case was remanded for application of proper tort standards, including consideration of negligence and damages.

## Legal Principles

- Participation in a contact sport implies consent only to contacts and risks within the rules and customary scope of the game.
- A player does not impliedly consent to intentional acts that violate established rules and playing customs, particularly gratuitous strikes unrelated to legitimate play.
- Courts may use the sport’s rules and customs as evidence of the boundary between permitted contact and actionable misconduct.
- Internal enforcement mechanisms (penalties and league discipline) do not displace ordinary civil tort remedies for conduct outside the accepted scope of play.
- Sports-injury cases may be analyzed under negligence principles in addition to intentional tort theories when the facts support such claims.

## Conclusion

The Tenth Circuit held that the violent nature of professional football does not create blanket immunity from tort liability; players consent to ordinary, rule-consistent contact, not to intentional, prohibited blows outside the game’s rules and customs, and the case was remanded for further proceedings under proper tort standards.


Hackbart v. Cincinnati Bengals, Inc., 601 F.2d 516 (10th Cir. 1979)