On a fateful night in Dublin, Ireland, the excitement of a historic NFL game twisted into a horrifying nightmare. Skylar Thompson, the backup quarterback for the Pittsburgh Steelers, became the victim of a brutal assault and robbery in the city’s bustling Temple Bar district. The incident not only sent shockwaves through the sports world but also ignited a fierce firestorm of controversy over the NFL’s safety policies amidst its aggressive global expansion. The biggest question now is: Is the NFL prioritizing profits over the well-being of its players?

The Outrage of NFL Owners and the League’s Response

News of Skylar Thompson’s assault spread like wildfire across social media platforms, unleashing a torrent of fierce criticism directed at the NFL. Fans and commentators alike questioned the league’s preparation for international games, especially concerning security. One commentator bluntly asked, “Where was NFL security? Seriously, if you’re the National Football League and there were issues like this in previous international games, i.e., Brazil last year, where you pretty much told the players not to leave their hotel rooms, you need a greater security presence.”

This outrage wasn’t confined to American fans. A Dublin politician weighed in, calling the attack an example of “ongoing dangers in the city center,” acknowledging that this was not an isolated incident but part of an alarming pattern that had been building for months, or even years. This confirmation from a local official amplified concerns that the NFL might have overlooked security warnings when planning the Dublin game.

Irish residents also expressed a complex mix of embarrassment, frustration, and anxiety about how such attacks could tarnish their city’s reputation. While many were quick to assert that Dublin’s crime problems do not define all of Ireland, they couldn’t deny the reality of what was happening in certain areas of the city center, particularly at night. One local commentator lamented, “Sadly, my hometown is becoming ever more dangerous. It is routine to see no visible police in busy city center locations.”

The NFL Players Association (NFLPA) Responds

The NFL Players Association (NFLPA), which represents the interests and safety of players, issued a statement that balanced concern with professionalism. However, it contained an unmistakable undercurrent of criticism toward the NFL’s international expansion strategy. The NFLPA specifically mentioned “the protections and well-being of our player members while playing international games.” This implicitly signaled that overseas contests present unique and inadequately addressed safety concerns.

NFLPA Executive Director Lloyd Howell Jr. has been a vocal critic of the NFL’s push for more international games, stating, “The NFL can’t go international and then come back and add an 18th game without addressing the risks involved.” This comment links two separate but related issues: the physical toll of additional games and the logistical and safety challenges of international travel.

Comparisons to Past International Incidents: An Alarming Pattern

Thompson’s case also brought back memories of previous controversies surrounding international games, revealing a pattern of inadequate planning and player protection. During the 2024 game in Brazil between the Philadelphia Eagles and Green Bay Packers, players reported slippery field conditions that raised serious injury concerns. The playing surface, which had to accommodate soccer matches and other events, was not properly maintained or configured for American football, creating hazardous conditions.

That Brazil game was already controversial for other reasons. The NFL had advised players not to leave their hotel rooms due to safety concerns, essentially placing the athletes under a form of voluntary house arrest. The contrast between the precautions in Brazil and the apparent lack of similar safeguards in Dublin raised troubling questions. If the NFL was aware enough of potential dangers in some international locations to restrict player movements, why weren’t similar protections implemented for the Dublin game?

The Impact of International Expansion on Players

Beyond the immediate safety concerns, the Thompson assault illuminated deeper structural issues with the NFL’s approach to international expansion. Critics argue that these games create significant competitive disadvantages for participating teams, with long flights, jet lag, and disrupted routines increasing fatigue and injury susceptibility. The physical demands of international travel—crossing multiple time zones, adjusting to different climates and altitudes, dealing with unfamiliar food and accommodations—all take a toll on athlete performance and recovery.

For instance, the Minnesota Vikings faced back-to-back international games in 2025 in Dublin and London, creating extended time abroad and early bye weeks that disrupted their entire season rhythm. Teams also lose home-field advantage when home games are turned into neutral-site contests, affecting their playoff chances. The Los Angeles Chargers, for example, lost a key home opener to a game in Brazil in 2025, which was seen as unfair to their efforts to build local support and create the kind of home-field atmosphere that provides a genuine competitive advantage.

The Silence of Roger Goodell and the NFL Office

Meanwhile, Commissioner Roger Goodell and the NFL front office have remained conspicuously silent on the specifics of the Thompson incident, offering only vague assurances through intermediaries. This silence is particularly noteworthy given Goodell’s repeated public statements about expanding the NFL’s global footprint. The commissioner has spoken enthusiastically and repeatedly about the potential for growth in markets around the world, painting a vision of American football as a truly global sport rivaling soccer in international reach. But he has been far less vocal about the challenges, risks, and genuine costs such expansion entails.

When pressed about player safety concerns related to international games, Goodell’s responses have typically focused on assurances that the league takes these matters seriously, without providing specific details about enhanced security measures, protocols, or concrete steps being taken to protect players.

The Fateful Night in Temple Bar

On Friday morning, September 27, 2025, when the Pittsburgh Steelers arrived in Dublin, Ireland, the team was buzzing with excitement about making NFL history. They were about to participate in the league’s first-ever regular-season game on Irish soil, a milestone moment that would see them face off against the Minnesota Vikings at the iconic Croke Park.

After settling into their accommodations at Carton House, an upscale resort roughly 45 minutes from Dublin’s bustling city center, some members of the traveling party decided to venture into town to experience the famous Irish hospitality. Among those who made the trip was Skylar Thompson, the Steelers’ backup quarterback. At 28 years old, Thompson was in his fourth NFL season and his first with Pittsburgh, having signed with the team in January 2025 after three years with the Miami Dolphins.

What should have been an exciting international adventure would instead become a harrowing experience that would shine a spotlight on player safety concerns during the NFL’s aggressive global expansion. Thompson wasn’t even scheduled to play in Sunday’s game. He had been placed on injured reserve on September 10, 2025, with a hamstring injury, making him ineligible to suit up against the Vikings. But as a member of the traveling party, he was there to support his teammates and experience this historic moment for the franchise.

Standing at 6’2″ and weighing 219 pounds, Thompson was a professional athlete in peak physical condition, someone who had spent his entire adult life training his body to withstand the brutal demands of football. Yet, what happened next would demonstrate that even elite athleticism offers little protection against the dangers of urban crime in unfamiliar territory.

On Friday night, Skylar Thompson was jumped and robbed by a group of assailants in Temple Bar. He suffered minor injuries but was reported to be okay and remained with the team. The incident occurred in Dublin’s Temple Bar area, one of the city’s most popular tourist destinations, known for its vibrant nightlife, traditional pubs, and cultural attractions. This neighborhood, situated in the heart of Dublin’s city center, draws visitors from around the world with its cobblestone streets and iconic red-bricked facades. But beneath the tourist-friendly veneer, Temple Bar has become increasingly known for something far more sinister in recent years.

Thompson was overpowered by a group of attackers who left him bloodied and shaken—a professional athlete reduced to just another crime statistic in a city grappling with rising street violence. His cell phone was among the items stolen, and he sustained minor injuries, including possible concussion-like symptoms. Thompson was briefly hospitalized for treatment but was released and returned to the team.

The Lack of a Police Report and Investigation

Perhaps most troubling was what didn’t happen in the immediate aftermath. Ireland’s Minister for Justice, Jim O’Callahan, stated that there had been “no formal reports to local police,” raising serious questions about whether proper law enforcement protocols were followed. Why wouldn’t a violent assault on an NFL player warrant an official police report? Was this a decision made by Thompson himself, perhaps discouraged from pursuing local law enforcement action? Or was it the team’s legal counsel advising against formal reporting to avoid complications or delays that might interfere with the game schedule? Or does it reflect a broader institutional approach within the NFL to handle such matters internally, keeping them away from local authorities and out of official records that might become public?

No arrests have been made, and no specific descriptions of the perpetrators have been publicly released, leaving the assailants free on Dublin’s streets, potentially free to target other victims. This lack of law enforcement engagement means there’s no official investigation, no effort to use surveillance footage from the heavily monitored Temple Bar area to identify suspects, and no warning to other tourists or visitors about the specific threat.

Dublin’s Surging Street Crime

The timing of this attack couldn’t have been worse for the NFL’s international ambitions. The league has been aggressively expanding its global footprint, with Commissioner Roger Goodell openly discussing plans to host up to 16 international games per season, potentially including locations in Asia. These games are viewed as crucial to growing the NFL’s worldwide fan base and, more importantly, its revenue streams. But the Thompson incident exposed a fundamental flaw in this expansion strategy: the league may be prioritizing profits over the safety and well-being of the very athletes who make these games possible.

The attack on Thompson wasn’t happening in a vacuum. Dublin has been grappling with increasing concerns about street crime, particularly in tourist-heavy areas like Temple Bar. Just days before Thompson’s assault, another high-profile incident had made headlines when an English tourist was left critically injured after a savage attack in the same Temple Bar area. That victim, a man in his 40s visiting Dublin with a family member, was rushed to Beaumont Hospital, where he underwent emergency surgery for serious head injuries.

These weren’t isolated incidents. In August 2023, a British tourist was attacked by a group of youths in an unprovoked attack. In December of that year, another male was left with serious head injuries following another unprovoked assault. The pattern was clear and well-documented: Dublin’s city center had become increasingly dangerous, particularly for visitors who might be unfamiliar with the area’s trouble spots or who could be easily identified as tourists with valuable belongings.

Skylar Thompson’s Personal Battle Off the Field

For Skylar Thompson, this was a particularly cruel turn in a life already marked by extraordinary challenges. The young quarterback had already faced more adversity than most people experience in a lifetime. At just 5 years old, Thompson lost his mother, Teresa, to stage 4 breast cancer and his grandfather, John, to pancreatic cancer around the same time.

“My mom got diagnosed with stage four breast cancer, and then my grandfather, my dad’s dad, got diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, and both were given a short time to live. At a time, you know, where I was very young and that didn’t make sense to me what that was, I had no idea what cancer meant,” Thompson recalled. “So my dad was just basically explaining to me that they both were very sick and that our lives were going to change a little bit.”

Accountability: A Pervasive Problem

The assault on Skylar Thompson in Dublin wasn’t an anomaly in the world of professional sports. It was the latest and most high-profile entry in a disturbing pattern of attacks on athletes, both at home and abroad. Understanding this broader context is crucial to grasping the full scope of the problem facing the NFL and other professional leagues as they navigate the intersection of celebrity, wealth, public schedules, and criminal opportunity.

Just months before Thompson’s incident, former NFL star Richard Sherman became another victim when thieves burst into his Seattle, Washington home while his family was inside. Sherman’s wife, Ashley, posted to her Instagram story, “The kids and I are physically okay, very shaken up. Waking up to intruders outside your bedroom with a gun is something no one should have to experience.”

In late 2024, a coordinated series of burglaries targeted some of the NFL’s biggest stars, exposing how vulnerable even the most famous and wealthy athletes can be, despite security systems, gated communities, and all the protections money can supposedly buy. In October 2024, burglars broke into the homes of Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes in Missouri and tight end Travis Kelce in Kansas as the team took the field for Monday Night Football. Mahomes, who had given a tour of his custom home in the Netflix documentary “Quarterback,” found himself victimized despite all his security measures.

Police say burglars stole $20,000 in cash from Travis Kelce’s home and damaged the back door. His girlfriend at the time, Taylor Swift, was at the game, and afterward, she and Kelce reportedly did not return to his house, staying elsewhere until they felt safe returning. This detail reveals how such incidents ripple outward, affecting not just the primary victim but everyone in their orbit, disrupting normal life and creating an atmosphere of fear and vulnerability.

What connected many of these cases was their calculated, methodical nature. These weren’t crimes of opportunity or random break-ins; they were carefully planned operations by sophisticated criminal enterprises. One of the big vulnerabilities for professional athletes that everyone knows is that their schedules are published. When they’re playing at home, when they’re playing away, it makes them attractive targets. These burglars had a clear and consistent modus operandi: they targeted high-profile professional athletes while they were known to be away from home, based on publicly available schedules.

Conclusion

The pattern is clear and deeply troubling: professional athletes, because of their public profiles, predictable schedules, and perceived wealth, have become prime targets for criminals of all types. And while the NFL has issued security alerts to teams and provided some guidance, the fundamental question remains: is the league doing enough to protect its players, especially when it asks them to travel to unfamiliar international destinations where local law enforcement capabilities and priorities may differ significantly from American standards?

The Dublin incident has sparked necessary conversations about what player safety actually means in an era of global expansion. It’s not enough to ensure the playing surface meets standards or that medical personnel are on hand at games. True player safety means considering the entire player experience, from the moment they board a plane for an international trip until they return safely home.