Thanks. We know better than anyone that a house divided cannot stand. I recall George Allen telling us that with 45 men playing together we couldn’t lose. All of us know what it means to come together as a team. I think we are looking at a small window of opportunity where we can bring all of the parts together: active and retired players. We all played this game and tradition and loyalty keeps us involved. We don’t hang around this game because we are bitter or cannot let it go. We stay with it because our blood and limbs are scattered in stadiums all over the country and we have left an indelible impression and spirit which has made the game what it is today. We stay, because we are the game.

Jim Brown’s presence will always be felt in Cleveland, as Ditka in Chicago, Bednarik in Philadelhia, Bart Starr in Green Bay, John Unitas in Baltimore and Huff in New York. I was lucky enough to work directly with Red Grange while helping to develop the NFL Alumni Golf/Youth Clinic Series. No, we don’t hang around the game because we are bitter or looking for a hand-out. We’re here because we are the game.

Let’s figure a way to connect with the active players so we can help them live better with their retirement, because in our world we know if we all come together, we can’t lose.

Irv Cross

Once the Class Action suit finishes stage one, as Bob suggested, we will be working with experts in the field of Union and Labor law to determine the next steps we need to take to represent the rights of the NFL Retired Players and what could be the corrupt dealings of the NFLPA and its executives.

Tony Davis

Thank you for your support and willingness to work alongside your football brothers. You certainly are an accomplished player and broadcaster, along with numerous other dignified ventures. I appreciate your willingness to get involved in our petition for justice. In order for us to have a legitimate union (NFLPA), there CAN’T be partiality and the divide-and-conquer mentality that exists today between active and retired players. In the near future, current players will become retired players and will face many of the same problems retired players face today unless REAL changes occur that follow the guidelines of the AFL-CIO and ERISA law. Disability expert John Hogan is a champion for justice. He can explain the current illegal and corrupt plan now in existence, along with the long list of conflicts of interest that are pervasive throughout the NFLPA leadership.

Sincerely,
Dave & Heidi Pear

I am writing to express my thanks to Dave Pear for the great job he is doing keeping the retired players informed. I also want to thank you for the work you are doing to help improve retirement and disability benefits for retirees. I have not spoken to John Wooten or anyone else about the meeting in Dallas, but I feel a need to express my view of the incident. I have a sense of embarrassment for the way you were treated and an apology is due you. I know John Wooten. If he invited you to attend the meeting, I am sure he did so with the best interests of all retired players. “Woot” is a man of high character, and has placed himself in harm’s way many times to advance the cause of others less fortunate. I do not have to vouch for John Wooten, because he speaks well enough for himself. I hope this dispute can be over-ridden and you are able to work together.

You are an expert in disability law with a unique understanding of the issues facing retired NFL PLayers. Here are my thoughts. All retired groups should come together as one body. You should educate ex-players of the issues facing retirees and solutions to those issues. After having informed retirees and having a clear understanding of the issues, a representative group will join you in a meeting with the Commissioner for the purpose of presenting a plan to resolve our current disability and retirement issues. You will have the floor during that meeting, and I would love to be there with you.

Thanks for your support of retired NFL Players.

Irv Cross

Please publish this open letter to John Hogan.

John,

First of all I want to say that I am so very sorry – but not surprised – at the disrespectful way that you were treated at the meeting down in Texas. Neither Henderson, Goodell or any of the others had any intention of allowing anyone to speak who is a true Advocate for Retired Players. I am sure that John Wooten meant well when he invited you but he obviously had not checked with the people who continue to fight against fair earned, adjusted benefits and treatment for all Retired Players.

I have not been as aggressive in my advocacy as I have been in the past recently because I have been a little under the weather and I also wanted to see the Trial up in San Francisco reach an initial conclusion. I say initial conclusion because you can bet that our opponents are already getting ready for the first of their appeals should things not go their way. They could have this matter tied up in the Courts for many years to come. They have both the money and legal clout to do so.

Thank you so very, very much for all that you have done to help us up to this point and I hope and pray that you will continue. The people that we are fighting against are wealthy, powerful, influential and dangerous fighters. One of the great Civil Rights Advocates of the 1960’s, Malcolm X, once said that no one has ever surrendered Power voluntarily.

The NFLPA and their Handler Partner (the NFL) will do every thing that they can to stop educated specialists such as yourself from helping Retired Players improve our benefits, treatment and participation in the great prosperity presently enjoyed by the sport of Professional Football.

Those Devils will never voluntarily sit down with us as long as we have informed counsel such as yourself. They will offer us a few crumbs in order to divert public, political and legal attention from the horrible, dishonest and, I believe, unlawful way that they have conducted themselves in regards to the treatment of Retired Players. They didn’t fool me for a minute when they selected those guys for the Alliance without asking a single one of the rest of us if the entire affair was okay with the rest of us. Those guys who are members of that Alliance group were duped themselves into believing that they were going to be allowed to do any damn thing for Retired Players. They must have figured out by now that they are being used and made fools of. That statement is not meant personally in regards to any individual Player.

I like a number of the guys who are Alliance Members but I am also sure that they are all – whether they know it or not – “Judas Goats.” We would be fools to follow members of the Alliance. They should be fighting with our Genuine Advocates and trying to work WITH informed people like yourself John.

We have other “House Servants” who are in the houses of the NFL and the NFLPA. I don’t trust any of them. I must be honest and say that any thinking person out there should be able to see that there is a conflict of interest in any case where the “House Help” claims to be genuinely interested in unfair treatment of the “Field Workers.” They will not risk their favored positions and jobs to help the rest of us.

John, you never played a down in the NFL but you are a real Champion to all of us. Without your help, these fools would use their Labor Lawyers to slaughter us. They are counting on you walking away from this fight.

I am convinced that the NFL and the NFLPA are one and the same when it comes to the matter of Retired Players. I am convinced that they are sure that they can just fight us off until every single one of us is dead.

John, there are many of us who will never quit the fight. I know that you will fight on with us. How do I know that? Well you have been in the middle of it for a long time now and it certainly wasn’t for money because you haven’t made any.

There are certainly going to be more of these “fake meetings” like the one that they shut you out of down in Texas.

Would you consider accepting a retainer of one Dollar ($1.00) from me and any other Retired Player who is willing so that we have a legal agreement that will allow you to represent us in the initial phases of some of these things. Let’s see them hold a meeting then.

Once again, Thank You for all that you are doing. We will organize our leadership in the coming months and we will have a face that fans, the media, politicians and the corporate sponsors and advertisers of the NFL will recognize.

If I die suddenly of a heart attack, a stroke or pancreatic cancer, just before I am called to testify in Court, please have someone look into it. I saw a movie once in which some CIA type group killed a few guys by giving them injections that made it look as though they had died of quick heart attacks. Okay, okay. It was just a movie. Probably no one would ever do anything like that to someone fifteen minutes before they were going to be forced to “spill the beans” on a powerful organization in Court. I was just kidding around. That’s probably a scientific impossibility outside of the movies…

Dave said that he would tell you that I will try to be in San Francisco for at least one day of “The Trial.” I hope to see you there.

Bob Grant
Player Advocate

I would have been able to get you up to speak if I had known about the situation. Isaiah Robertson, the chapter president, and I are very good friends and I know he would have introduced you and allowed you to speak. Maybe we need to get you to Chicago or Philadelphia where Mike or Bruce can give you the opportunity. We need to get your proposal into everyone’s hands – both current and retired players.

The work you’ve done is very important. Once a player is cut or retires, he should be given an educational package informing him of his rights. This is not done today.

So we need you, John. And besides, you’re to old to improve your golf game! Keep in mind – you won’t be remembered for your low golf score but for the footprints you have left behind. One of those footprints should be up the NFL and the Union’s ass.

I appreciate all you have done and would welcome the opportunity of becoming one of your clients. I have been rejected so many times that I feel I would be wasting your time. You can call me any time.

You’re the Best.

Thanks for your help,
Conrad Dobler

We greatly appreciate all your efforts. And the next “open meeting” the NFLPA has, you should be invited and asked to speak and give your expert opinion.

Between you and Bernie some good should come of all this.

This is America, it is our given right to speak at an open meeting.

Dick Bielski
1955 – 1963
Philadelphia, Dallas & Baltimore

John Hogan I mean. Thanks for your great effort on our behalf. Congress isn’t being fooled by the NFL owners business plan modeled after the “merchants of death” the tobacco companies business plan created by Covington & Burling, the NFL’s guiding law firm and Paul Tagliabue’s law firm. The NFL is obfuscating players disabling injuries in the same way the tobacco companies obfuscate the deadly cancers that injure and kill children all around the world. Harold Henderson is a product of R.J. Reynolds tobacco company and schooled in the “merchants of death’s” business plan. John Hogan is our best expert on the fiasco that Goodell calls a disability plan.

The coming change in Washington will enable us to move the Dept of Labor, Dept of Justice and other agencies to move against the NFL and NFLPA’s illegal abuse of players and retired players. Goodell and Henderson should have to cover a kick off or stop an end sweep. A “side letter agreement” can be used to change anything in the current CBA so Goodell’s “wait ’til the new CBA is more of the league’s Delay-Deny-and-Hope-We-Die campaign. Hang in there guys – we’re kicking their crooked butts and we’re just getting started. Thanks, John Hogan, for your time and thought and all your hard work. We are incredibly lucky to have you on our side!

Bernie Parrish

Thanks so much for the time, effort and expense you have provided and taken on behalf of retired players. I can’t but help think that persistence and justice will pay off in the end and those that seek to delay, hamper and impair that process will be outed in time. Please stay the course, as you have many supporters and appreciative former players on your side.

Best personal regards,
Chris Burford
Texans/Chiefs 60-67

Thank you for your insight and courage to speak out on this injustice. Until you so graciously volunteered your time and resources to help us, one of the reasons retired players have been treated with willful malice was because we have never had our own legal representation. You are a good man.

On the other hand our union and the NFL has an unlimited budget to continue to abuse their power. We will continue to petition for justice with zeal and will stand firm until we are vindicated. We will continue to expose their GREEDINESS and dirty deeds.

Dave & Heidi Pear