This is my second, in a series of blogs, that will compare the muscle-to-bone ratio (MBR) in National League Football (NFL) and NCAA Division I College Football Players. The first blog compared total and regional MBRs in a group of NFL players (n=346) to a group of college football players (n=553).  Because our sample of athletes in both groups is large, we decided to look at different offense and defense position groups in these two populations. This blog will focus on the offensive side of the ball and will compare quarterbacks, running backs, wide receivers, tight ends and offensive linemen. A subsequent blog will focus on the defensive side of the ball and will compare defensive linemen, defensive backs, linebackers and punters/kickers. The data used to compare the total and regional MBRs in NFL and college football players by position is from research conducted in my laboratory [Dengel et al., 2023; Dengel et al., 2024]. If you are interested in a more detailed analysis of the data, I would suggest that you examine these two research articles.  

Of the 553 college football players we examined 326 were offensive players [Dengel et al., 2024]. We compared these college offensive players to the 170 NFL offensive players we studied [Dengel et al., 2023]. In looking at Figure 1 below you will notice that we plotted each of the offensive player position groups (i.e., quarterbacks, running backs, wide receivers, tight ends and offensive linemen) separately. On all the plots, the NFL players are represented by the red bars and the college football players by blue bars. For each position plot, we have included the total MBR as well as the regional MBRs for the arms, legs and trunk. What you will notice with all the offensive position groups was that no differences in total MBR or the regional measures of arms, legs, and trunk MBRs were observed. This is somewhat surprising given the difference in age between the NFL and college football players (24.2+2.6 vs 20.1+1.5 yrs, p<0.0001). One would assume that the extra years of training that NFL players undergo might have altered their total or regional MBRs. However, this was not the case with this data. It may be because the strength and conditioning training that NCAA Division I college football players and NFL football players undergo is similar and there is not a further development of bone or muscle masses. It might also mean that these ratios between muscle and bone are constant.

What does it all mean?

First, the research used in this blog about NFL [Dengel et al., 2023] and college football [Dengel et al., 2024] adds to our overall knowledge about MBR and athletics. It is possible that the MBR will give coaches and athletic trainers another matrix to monitor the effects of various training programs on muscle and bone, as well as the relationship between the two tissues. 

Finally, the data presented in this blog suggest that college players have already established the MBRs. At least that is in offensive players. In our next blog, we will explore the defensive position players to see if there are differences in total and regional MBR between NFL and college football players.

REFERENCES   
Dengel DR, Evanoff NG. Positional differences in muscle-to-bone ratio in National Football League Players. International Journal of Sports Medicine 44:720-727, 2023.

Dengel DR, Studee HR, Juckett WT, Bosch TA, Carbuhn AF, Stanforth PR, Evanoff NG: Muscle-to-bone ratio in NCAA division I collegiate football players by position. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research 38(9): 1607-1612, 2024. 

About the Author
Donald Dengel, Ph.D., is a Professor in the School of Kinesiology at the University of Minnesota and is a co-founder of Dexalytics. He serves as the Director of the Laboratory of Integrative Human Physiology, which provides clinical vascular, metabolic, exercise and body composition testing for researchers across the University of Minnesota.