We were all excited when the NFL finally got rid of Ira “Dr. No” Casson as Co-Chair of the NFL’s “Mild” Traumatic Brain Injury Committee. What surprised us was the selection of Dr. Richard Ellenbogen as co-chair of the newly-named NFL Head, Neck and Spine Committee. Dr. Ellenbogen hails from Harborview Medical Center in Seattle as chief of neurological surgery and has been very proactive at the state level in legislation regarding concussions in youth athletics.
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George Visger was the perfect poster-boy for NFL brain concussions to contact Dr. Ellenbogen: Incredibly intelligent, well-spoken and very vocal as a perfect spokesman on the long-term damage from severe brain concussions that resulted directly from his career in professional football. George has been relentlessly involved with a two-pronged approach to the NFL’s concussion problem: The NFL needs to be held to the same standard as any employer in America when it comes to taking care of its injured employees – both active and retired – and clear rules need to be put in place to ensure worker safety both on and off the field. Last month, George proposed a detailed set of rules that address the most important issue facing the NFL, the NFLPA and its employees. The proposed rules were the result of collaboration among a group of retired players who worked with George to develop some guidelines that have been long overdue. We think they make a lot of sense and it covers ALL players with a common sense approach that only players with first-hand experience could develop.
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On a side note before we present the Visger Rules, we had sent a proposal to DeMaurice Smith several months back as the Amen Clinic trials was closing to see if the NFLPA would be interested in funding brain scans for active players BEFORE and AFTER they started their careers, as well as brain scans for all retired players. After seeing the need to continue helping the retired football players, Dr. Amen had graciously offered an incredibly discounted rate for any and all players sent to any of his clinics. Our proposal was simple: ALL active players would have a SPECT scan before starting their careers as well as when they retired; and ALL retired players would be allowed a brain scan as a new benefit. The cost would have been relatively minimal (considering all the money we see wasted every year as disclosed in the annual LM-2 filings) but the impact and effect would be invaluable to each and every player for a lifetime. George’s proposal goes even further: Each active player would also be required to have annual brain scans as an integral part of their mandatory checkup regimen. With the medical technology available today, each player and the Union could easily be provided with up-to-the-minute information on their entire physical condition that’s complete and accurate to help prevent further injuries. We felt that the proposal was the right thing to do and very pro-player (pro-employee – which is what Unions are supposed to be). Given the League’s recent gestures in this direction, the timing couldn’t have been better for the PA to initiate such a plan. After all, what could the League have to say against such a proactive move? This could easily be a high priority issue during any CBA negotiations which is why we felt it was important enough to present the idea directly to DeMaurice Smith. There has been absolutely NO response since the proposal was sent to them in April. We have no idea why this wouldn’t be a perfect issue for the Union (the retired AND active players’ Union) to take up with the League right now to show real unity by protecting all of its men – past and present. As with everything else, it seems we’re all still waiting just for a response…
Mercury Morris has recently been discussing an investigation into the NFL and its handling of the retired players’ disability and pension benefits. Here’s his synopsis of what he’s made available to select members of the media so far:
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I want to tell you about a story I would like to read about Roger Goodell. I only recently discovered that Roger Goodell, while serving under Commissioner Paul Tagliabue, sat as the 7th non-voting member of the Retirement Board. That means Goodell has been aware of all of the disability and retirement misconduct that occurred from the mid 90′s to the present. I recently met with Federal investigators on three occasions to discuss filing charges – both criminal and civil – against the Retirement Board and the Groom Law Group. Goodell has been scamming the public about his “honest effort” in helping the retired players that he’s perpetuated in the media. When we did the story last May about the Retirement Board making up a provision to exclude me from representing other retired players whose benefits had been compromised with the sole intent of saving these multimillionaire owners money, I wasn’t aware that Goodell had put Harold Henderson in that very same seat he had occupied to oversee the obvious corruption at the hands of the Retirement Board. Out of my meeting with the investigators, it was disclosed to me that the Department of Labor has been working with the Retirement Board to cover up disability and retirement pension misconduct from the Bush administration (helping big business) to the Obama administration attempting to cover it up.
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The devastating part of this story is that when they passed this phony exclusion-by-felony rule, the two people I had been representing were basically left to fend for themselves. Dwight Harrison had a son who committed suicide after Dwight’s disability benefits were taken away. His retirement benefit money which amounted to $130,000 was then used to pay the Groom Law Group for attorneys’ fees. Because of this, his family broke up and his son later committed suicide. The Retirement Board, under Goodell now have blood on their hands. Marian Klein, the widow of the late Dick Klein, lost her home because the “across-the-board benefit increase” that was given to everyone else was denied to her. Again, I was closing in on proving that both criminal and civil acts had occurred against a retired player’s widow for no other purpose than to beat her out of $200 a month. Although they could never explain to her why she wasn’t entitled to this benefit that everyone else got, without me there to scrutinize their actions, they basically told her, “We lied about your exclusion, we have no real answer, and you’re still not going to get the benefit.” She too has gone through tough times, caring for her son who is now in the late stages of his battle with cancer. She had to move in with him after losing her home because of these people.
So here we are well into our third year with Dave’s Blog. When Dave first decided to document and present his experiences in dealing with his life after football, we had no idea just how many people wanted to read his story or how many – or how few – other retired players were suffering the same fate.
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Over these past couple of years, we discovered there were a lot of different but similar accounts of all the ways that retired football players have been denied their earned benefits. Just when you thought you’d heard it all, a new one comes along.
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This past weekend, we read a post on the National Football Post about Conrad Dobler’s most recent struggles to survive after 30 surgeries – including 10 knee replacements – all while still looking after his wife, Joy, who has been a quadriplegic since 2001. (Read the article – click HERE.)
Last week, we received a couple of copies of the current Bert Bell/Pete Rozelle NFL Players Retirement Plan(released in April 2009) from different sources. After reviewing and comparing them, we’ve confirmed that we have an accurate copy of the plan and we’re posting it here for everyone.
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We’ve uploaded the entire document on Scribd for easier access and viewing.(Click on the FULL SCREEN button to enlarge it for easier navigation – hit the ESC key to close. You can also click the DOWNLOAD button to save a PDF copy for printing and reading.)
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And just as with that NFLPA 2009 LM-2, if you find any interesting items to point out, please feel free to share them with everyone in the Comments Section.
Here’s the full video of the Congressional Forum held on May 24, 2010 in New York City on Key Issues Related to the Identification and Prevention of Head Injuries in Football (2:16). You can see the witness list on the Judiciary Committee site (click HERE).
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You can click on the FULL SCREEN button in the lower right corner of the vimeo window to enlarge the video for easier viewing.
With the growing firestorm from DeMaurice Smith’s recent comments about retired players’ relations, we forgot to mention that the Congressional Judiciary Committee held a Forum this past Monday (May 24th) in New York City on Key Issues Related to the Identification and Prevention of Head Injuries in Football. Among the people speaking were Dr. H. Hunt Batjer and Dr. Richard Elenbogen, the two newly-appointed co-chairs of the NFL’s “Mild” Traumatic Brain Injury Committee – er, wait – they changed it to the NFL Head, Neck and Spine Committee! So what happened to concussions and brain injuries? Did they just magically disappear? We almost miss Dr. No!
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Much of the focus was on high school injuries but there were some interesting questions posed to the group in general and to the NFL’s doctors in particular. It looks like we’re still going to be waiting a while for some clear answers.
With things continuing to heat up in the off-season between the NFLPA and the NFL during a no-CBA year, the real issues that continue to at the forefront for retired players will never change: disability and pension reform, as well as access to medical care after football. These issues have made their way into the mainstream media and have certainly gotten the attention of our representatives on Capitol Hill. Nonetheless, a whole new set of apologists have come on the scene to point fingers at the messengers. In recent months, we’ve started to see more attack posts blaming the messengers for not coming up with solutions. To answer some of these people – at least in part – we haven’t even begun to point out everything that’s wrong yet! And if you can only waste your time criticizing everyone else, maybe you might consider putting up a few suggestions of your own? Or maybe the NFL’s got your tongue?
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We’ll use that as an introduction to today’s post. Over his lifetime, Irv Cross has been involved with football at almost every level both on and off the field, as well as with athletics in general. As one of football’s senior spokesmen, Irv’s seen and learned a lot over the years.
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Irv recently sent in one of his ideas on health insurance for all retired players – it makes so much sense that we can understand why no one’s thought about it yet.
In our last post, we covered another NFL benefit offer for retired players and we mentioned the popular myth that the NFL (and Gene Upshaw’s NFLPA by association at the time) perpetuated for decades was that most retired players had dramatically shortened lives and many of you would be dead by the time you were 55. A lot of the older players have confirmed that this was the general information being given to them over the years.
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Dave recently dug up a letter from former NFLPA PR flak, Frank Woschitz, sent out back in 1993 (!). Most of these documents speak for themselves but we’ve redlined some particularly interesting sections. (Click on thumbnails to enlarge for reading.)
Some people just can’t seem to keep their hands out of the cookie jar. Or maybe it’s more like getting their fingers stuck in the till. Our friends over at AON Consulting have popped back up on the radar screen once again. A couple of weeks ago, Dave received another important communiqué from his good friends at the NFL Player Care Foundation. It was a reminder about this program for discount prescription drug benefit.
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For those of you who are just joining us, you can read more about AON Corp. by clicking HERE(this will bring up a list of past posts on AON). AON has been involved with the NFL and the Bert Bell/Pete Rozelle NFL Players Retirement Plan for years. They’ve provided the actuarial statistics on all of the players to the owners and the Plan.
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Since starting this blog, a lot of other retired players have told us the same story, with some of them actually hearing this advice from Gene Upshaw. Many of you have written us about how you were “advised” to take reduced early benefits because you were only expected to live to 55. Why wouldn’t you believe them? They had actuarial data (from AON) to show that retired players had dramatically shortened life spans from playing football. Of course, once you took the lower pension, you were stuck with it. That was one of the reasons so many of the old-timers are still only receiving a few hundred dollars a month in retirement “benefits” today – hardly enough to even cover real health insurance (if they can get any). With friends like that INSIDE the Union, who needed enemies?
Read into it what you will but we don’t recall too many times when the NFLPA has stepped into an arbitration hearing for a retired player in the past. What we really have a problem understanding is why the NFL insists on asking for arbitration anyway. Wouldn’t it have been easier – and a whole lot smarter – just to have paid these guys their Severance Pay in the first place?(Click on the images to enlarge for easier reading.)
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And here’s the section the NFLPA letter refers to in the current CBA:
NPR’s Tell Me More with host, Michel Martin, interviewed Dr. Eleanor Perfetto and Brent Boyd this morning. Dr. Perfetto recently filed a lawsuit on behalf of her husband, Ralph Wentzel, who played lineman for the Pittsburgh Steelers and the San Diego Chargers from 1966 – 1973; her lawsuit is the first workers’ compensation claim for dementia resulting from brain injuries incurred while playing football. Ralph Wentzel is now living in an assisted living facility with severe dementia. The NFL’s Plan 88 is covering his assisted living costs ($88,000 a year). Brent Boyd was an offensive lineman for the Minnesota Vikings and was diagnosed with early onset dementia 4 years ago. (Brent’s website is HERE.)
Dr. Eleanor Perfetto
Brent Boyd
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You can read the entire transcript on NPR’s site – Click HERE. You can also listen to the 13-minute interview by clicking on the Play arrow on the player below:
Dr. Daniel Amen introduces and summarizes his recent breakthrough study of nearly 100 retired NFL football players’ brains using SPECT scans at his Amen Clinics. This summary chronicles some of the time line and history of how the study came about and the subsequent negative reaction from the NFL. Scientific evidence continues to mount for the case linking brain concussions to long-term brain damage and we can only hope that brain health finally gains a prominent place in all professional sports.
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The good news? Dr. Amen and his Director of Research, Dr. Kristen Willeumier, have also been working proactively to develop a tailored regimen of supplements and healthier choices to improve brain function for each of their study participants. And results so far have been very positive.
A new study to be released this Friday will reveal some very surprising numbers and statistics in comparing major global sports and professional athletes. While American football is unquestionably the most lucrative professional team sport on earth, most people – especially football fans – will be completely shocked to realize that football doesn’t even place in the Top 10 for salaries. Who’s Number 1? MLB’s New York Yankees is the top team with an average annual salary of $7 million while the NBA is the richest league (!). The NFL is among the cheapest, ranking below cricket!
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From The Independent in London: “The report covers 211 teams, drawn from the world’s richest competitions. While the Yankees are the best-paid team, basketball’s NBA is the best-paid league, followed by cricket’s IPL, the MLB and then the Premier League in fourth.”Read the rest of their story HERE.
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SportingIntelligence (read their story HERE and more on their study HERE) which compiles that annual salary study, has a chart with the numbers (1 £ = approx. US$1.45) :
We swear – we’re NOT making any of this stuff up! Looks like we are now officially going into CYA time and people are coming forward with more documentation on Burt Grossman’s missing $40,000 Severance Pay. These documents just arrived this morning from Burt’s attorney, Daniel Anastasia, via Burt. We hope the PA continues to take ownership of this and starts to question the issue of Severance Pay for all the other retired players. A lot of them are also only now discovering that they haven’t been paid (including Lionel James who has gone through an almost identical stonewall process like Burt). Be sure to read our prior post this morning from Irv Cross that includes the language in the ’82 contract covering Severance from that agreement – click HERE to read it.
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It’s also interesting to see that the very same people who were supposed to be handling retired players benefits are among the same ones now scrambling to pick up the dropped ball on Severance Pay. (Many of our readers might still recall the fantastic detail and concern Dave was given when he applied for his reimbursements from hip replacement surgery from 2008 -read about that HERE and HERE.) And – Burt’s missing W-2 has now apparently been found and it’s part of this set of documents! Now all we need to see is either an endorsed check with his signature on it or a new check – WITH INTEREST – sent along to Burt or his attorney immediately.
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Click on the thumbnails to enlarge for easier reading.
We were all excited when the NFL finally got rid of Ira “Dr. No” Casson as Co-Chair of the NFL’s “Mild” Traumatic Brain Injury Committee. What surprised us was the selection of Dr. Richard Ellenbogen as co-chair of the newly-named NFL Head, Neck and Spine Committee. Dr. Ellenbogen hails from Harborview Medical Center in Seattle as chief of neurological surgery and has been very proactive at the state level in 
With things continuing to heat
In our last post, we covered another NFL benefit offer for retired players and we mentioned the popular myth that the NFL (and Gene Upshaw’s NFLPA by association at the time) perpetuated for decades was that most retired players had dramatically shortened lives and many of you would be dead by the time you were 55. A lot of the older players have confirmed that this was the general information being given to them over the years.
Some people just can’t seem to keep their hands out of the cookie jar. Or maybe it’s more like getting their fingers stuck in the till. Our friends over at AON Consulting have popped back up on the radar screen once again. A couple of weeks ago, Dave received another important communiqué from his good friends at the NFL Player Care Foundation. It was a reminder about this program for discount prescription drug benefit.
A new study to be released this Friday will reveal some very surprising numbers and statistics in comparing major global sports and professional athletes. While American football is unquestionably the most lucrative professional team sport on earth, most people – especially football fans – will be completely shocked to realize that football doesn’t even place in the Top 10 for salaries. Who’s Number 1? MLB’s New York Yankees is the top team with an average annual salary of $7 million while the NBA is the richest league (!). The NFL is among the cheapest, ranking below cricket!
We swear – we’re NOT making any of this stuff up!