Dr. NO!

Lead story for Friday morning: NFLPA Executive Director DeMaruice Smith calls for ouster of Dr. No. – Ira Casson. New York Times‘ Alan Schwarz writes:

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“Ouster of N.F.L.’s Voice on Concussions Sought

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Before everyone and their brother jumps in to try and take credit for it, DeMaurice Smith and his crew have been working with the NFL to protect retired players’ disability benefits during a potential lockout in 2010. So De Smith was right – without the express agreement of the NFL, retired players’ benefits could have been severely impacted by a lockout.

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This just officially announced (click on the letter to enlarge for reading):

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Over the past couple of weeks, there’s been a lot of media coverage on the effects of brain injuries and concussions in football. We’ve seen two articles from Alan Schwarz of The New York Times, as well as stories from The Washington Post and The New York Daily News:

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An incredibly powerful story on football-related brain concussions was recently published in GQ Magazine. The article – titled Brain Game – was written by Jeanne Marie Laskas and covers a lot of ground in how a Pittsburgh pathologist’s research into Mike Webster’s cause of death in 2002 caught the attention of the NFL and its owners to the point where they’re trying once more to bury and/or discredit the studies. If you thought you knew enough about brain injuries, this is one story that will open your eyes and make you mad!

And if this chilling article finally gets to each of you and you haven’t already heard, the Amen Clinic is currently offering free brain scans and followup analysis as part of their new independent study on the impact of brain concussions in the NFL. We need 100 of you guys to sign up so this detailed study can be completed and publicized immediately.

Click HERE to read the original post on how to sign up for the Amen Study.

Here’s an excerpt from that GQ Article – this is a MUST-READ (link to the entire piece Click HERE):

Game Brain

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Most of our readers know by now that Dave’s been in this fight for over 25 years with his Union, the NFLPA, to get justice for himself and his retired brothers. There’s just so much material to go through that the sheer volume can sometimes get overwhelming. The worst part is that it seems almost everything you look at is just another bad chapter in a never-ending novel on the abuse that’s been heaped on the majority of retired players for decades. (We wrote about this in earlier posts – click HERE and HERE and HERE.) After a while, it’s easy to get numb and to start overlooking stuff that’s been right under your nose all along.

In researching material for an upcoming post, Dave dug up this old letter from ADP Benefit Services dated 1997 that outlines an insurance program supposedly offered to all retired players under the Bert Bell/Pete Rozelle NFL Player Retirement Plan. Since receiving this form letter, Dave hasn’t received any additional information or policies detailing his insurance plan benefits. What’s even worse, because he’s been officially designated as a retired disabled football player, he’s been automatically disqualified and completely ineligible for any kind of life insurance now. It seems these guys were offered an “insurance benefit” that they never got to see, while also guaranteeing it would leave them completely uninsurable with any other insurance company. (Click on the letter to enlarge for reading.)
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While the cat’s away, the mice will play. There seem to be lots of conflicting public comments floating around these days. Since when did Miki Yaras-Davis become a spokesperson or advocate for retired players benefits and rights?

From Peter King’s Monday Morning Quarterback on SI.com:

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As most retired football players will wholeheartedly agree, getting qualified to receive benefits from the NFLPA/NFL’s Bell/Rozelle NFL Retirement Plan is a lot like winning the Lotto: If you win, you win big; but your chances qualifying are like a snowball’s chance in Hell.

So it was like a late April Fools’ Day joke when the NFLPA decided to post bragging points about the generosity of their Retirement Plan as part of their spin building up to their Annual Retired Players Convention (read the earlier posts HERE and HERE) to be held in Palm Springs in late May.

Here’s the NFLPA spin on disability benefits as provided by the Bert Bell/Pete Rozelle as quoted from a piece on their site (including juicy comments from the Director of Benefits, Miki Yaras-Davis (they probably call her Director of Benefits because of the great benefits she’s probably receiving for doing her job…):

It can be said that injuries are a part of life in the National Football League. Many players leave the game with some type of injury, and in some cases, retired players later develop conditions that render them unable to work at all. When this happens, the Retirement Plan offers protection through its disability provisions.

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I just received my new semi-annual NFLPA Retired Members Directory for 2009 – 2011 so I thought it might be interesting to share the introductory pages with everyone. These guys must have some of the fastest printers in the country: This edition came hot off the press complete with DeMaurice Smith already listed as Executive Director. (More on this shortly…)

Conspicuously missing is any reference to that notorious GLA (Group Licensing Agreement) which the retired players successfully sued and won in a San Francisco courtroom late last year (and which is currently in appeal by Berthelsen and Kessler). In past editions, the number of signed GLAs were reported to be well over 2900, contradicting the numbers of players who were actually named in the list provided  by the NFLPA during the trial. So I’m wondering: If the NFLPA is no longer offering a GLA to its retired players, does that mean we’re all free to develop, negotiate and promote our own licenses?

PAGE 4:

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You know it’s getting really serious when the AARP features a comprehensive article  on the sorry state of benefits as it applies to the NFLPA’s seniors. As long-time advocates for the retired, the AARP represents a large and vocal bloc of seniors with votes who generally get the attention of our government representatives. The article starts with Willie Wood’s life after the NFL and includes quotes from Mike Ditka and John Hogan. You can read the entire article by clicking HERE.

Thank you, AARP!

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Wow! What’s a poor guy have to do just to get one straight answer around here?

When Dave sent of that letter to AON Corp. President/CEO Gregory Case (click HERE to read that post), we also made sure to CC: copies to several state Attorneys General as well as state Insurance Commissioners who may have direct or indirect jurisdiction over such matters. The responses are still coming in and one of the more interesting ones came from Connecticut State Attorney General Richard Blumenthal (click HERE to read his letter) who stated, “I agree with you that you should have received a copy of your disability policy describing the benefits and obligations that pertain to beneficiaries.”

What’s interesting is that Dave has yet to receive a direct answer to his letter from AON even though it was sent out back on September 25th! And Dave had informed Mr. Case in his letter that he was also inquiring as a shareholder in AON Corp.! Instead, the lawyers got all over it and responded to inquiries from the various state agencies while never once so much as responding directly to Dave. Of course, those letters also attempted to dismiss Dave’s simple inquiry for information as “mischaracterization.”

So it wasn’t too much of a surprise when the NFL’s law firm – our good friends over at Akin Gump – also jumped into the fray by writing to Connecticut Attorney General Blumenthal. (Mr. Blumenthal must be a pretty popular guy from what we can gather.) What did surprise us however was how the NFL had their attorneys get involved (we thought this was supposed to be an NFLPA problem). And the real surprise was the amount of paperwork that Larry Lamade (senior partner at Akin Gump) was able to provide directly to the Attorney General. Dave’s been asking his union, the NFLPA, for copies of much of this stuff for years. But when the big guys start to get interested, suddenly EVERYONE seems to jump on board and old documents seem to mysteriously re-appear rather quickly. We love it! And how is it that the NFL’s law firm manages to access Dave’s personal benefits file – AND send it all along to the Attorney General of Connecticut? Could it be that this whole benefits policy is such a hot potato that it’s got everyone’s attention suddenly?

Here’s the letter from Larry Lamade to Attorney General Richard Blumenthal (click on each page to enlarge it for easier reading):

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Maybe it’s the Thanksgiving weekend coming up or maybe the retired players’ disability problems are finally coming to the forefront in the media. Right after the St. Petersburg piece came out on Dave, Jim Baumbach wrote a story on Wesley Walker (New York Jets) in Newsday. Some clips from the story:

Coming from an athlete who competed on the highest stage, who overcame being legally blind in one eye to succeed as one of the league’s premier receivers of his era, those are not words used lightly.

“I may not have played this game, or, who knows, maybe I still would have, because I loved playing so much,” Walker said. “But I certainly would have treated things differently.”

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Many of you already know that when Dave played with the University of Washington Huskies and went into the NFL playing for the Baltimore Colts.  Then it was on to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the expansion draft. When they traded him over to the Oakland Raiders, he was part of the winning Superbowl XV team in 1981. (And Gene Upshaw was his teammate.)

Dave still has a big following back in Tampa and a recent article by Gary Shelton in The St. Petersburg Times talks about Dave’s battle for benefits (or lack thereof) from the NFL and NFLPA. Some quotes:

What bothers Pear, what angers him and saddens him and drives him, is the constant denial of benefits to veteran players by the NFL Players Association.

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We felt it was appropriate to wait until Labor Day to post a comment and link to the beginning of what is shaping up to be a comprehensive series on the basics of disability benefits in the NFL. Ed Miller of The Virginian Pilot wrote the first part Seeking Basic Benefits With Dignity (Part One) this past Friday. For any of you who may just be finding out about all of this now, it’s a great place to learn many of the different sides to the story that’s becoming even more intriguing with the recent passing of NFLPA union head, Gene Upshaw. The piece is well-written and backed with some solid stats and research. We can only hope it adds to the renewed calls for reform.

You can read the entire piece by clicking HERE. Here’s a clip from Ed Miller’s article:

“Football takes its toll. A 144-page Congressional Research Service report titled “Former NFL players: Disabilities, Benefits and Related Issues” opens with a classic understatement summarizing both the allure and the cost of the game:

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Well, the statement for my August T&P Disability Benefit arrived in the mail today and it’s business as usual. The Benefits fund has deposited another $2,980.60 directly into my bank account and it’s another $352.73 short of the $3,333.33 that they’re supposed to be paying me (based on $40,000 ÷ 12 = $3,333.33). And there’s still absolutely no explanation on their monthly statement that tells me how they arrived at their payment or where the $352.73 went to!

Here’s a copy of that statement (you can click on the image to enlarge it):

And there is absolutely NO doubt that they know I have no federal or state withholding as it’s clearly stated at the bottom of the statement.

And still no explanation or answers back from Paul Scott, the Benefits office, Commissioner Goodell or even our friends over at Akin Gump and The Groom Law Group.

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