The future of football is one of the more talked about subjects in sports and media these days, and some of the biggest names in broadcasting addressed the subject this week.

Speaking Tuesday night at a roundtable discussion at the University of Maryland was NBC broadcaster Bob Costas, who has hosted Football Night in America on NBC, USA TODAY Sports columnist Christine Brennan and ESPN’s Tony Kornheiser and Mike Wilbon. They spoke at Maryland’s annual Shirley Povich Symposium, named after the late Washington Post sports columnist. The panel touched on several topics in sports and journalism, but none more than the future of football, according to USATODAY.

“The cracks in the foundation are there,” Costas said. “The day-to-day issues, as serious as they may be, they may come and go. But you cannot change the nature of the game. I certainly would not let, if I had an athletically gifted 12- or 13-year-old son, I would not let him play football.”

Costas said the NFL’s stance of looking for more information and continue to study the dangers of the sport will only hurt its own cause.

“The more information (that) comes out, the worse it looks,” Costas said.

The impact could trickle down to other levels of the sport.

“But then where’s the talent pool for college? What happens to college football?” Costas continued. “The whole thing could collapse like a house of cards if people actually begin connecting the dots.”

Kornheiser also weighed in on the issue and compared the current state of football to boxing’s demise. Safety concerns could eventually make the game obsolete, Kornheiser said.

“It’s not going to happen this year, and it’s not going to happen in five years or 10 years,” Kornheiser said. “But Bob is right: At some point, the cultural wheel turns just a little bit, almost imperceptibly, and parents say, ‘I don’t want my kids to play.’ And then it becomes only the province of the poor, who want it for economic reasons to get up and out.

“If they don’t find a way to make it safe, and we don’t see how they will … the game’s not going to be around. It’s not.”