Dave Pear's Blog

Posted with the express consent of Irv Muchnick from his blog Concussion Inc.:
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Published January 10th, 2012

Rep. Linda Sánchez

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Posted with the express consent of Evan Weiner:

THE BUSINESS AND POLITICS OF SPORTS

Are sports fans resilient or suckers?

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Here’s the entire half-hour Nightly Business Report episode hosted by Rick Horrow, broadcast on Seattle’s KCTS9 this past Monday evening, as discussed by Clyde Werner in yesterday’s post. It’s an incredibly revealing insight on the intricate business side of the Super Bowl and how the NFL continues to squeeze every penny of possible revenue from this global franchise. (Click on the PLAY > arrow to view and you can enlarge it to full screen by clicking the enlarge icon in the lower right corner when the video starts.)

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Posted with the express consent of Evan Weiner:

Randy Cross: Time NFL Owners Took Care of Discarded Players

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With the lead-up to Super Bowl and daily press conferences filled with posturing on both sides, some real news came out from NFLPA Executive Director DeMaurice Smith this afternoon regarding The Groom Law Group – THEY’RE FIRED! After years of being on the inside working both sides of the fence and writing one of the worst disability and pension plans in any industry, someone finally took notice and did what should have been done years ago.
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Bernie Parrish has been pointing out the deep conflicts of interest where The Groom Law Group has placed itself: They worked for the NFL, they worked for the NFLPA AND they wrote the Bert Bell/Pete Rozelle NFL Players Retirement Plan. We’ve written a lot about this on our blog – including several pieces from Bernie – covering my personal experiences with trying to apply for my disability benefits under Groom Law Group’s ridiculous rules. And my personal experiences are atypical of the way most retired players are treated when they apply for their rightful benefits. Groom Law Group has taken millions from all sides to the detriment of the retired players – they collected nearly $600,000 from the NFLPA alone in 2008 according to the PA’s LM-2 on file. (Look at the Related Posts below this post or just click HERE to see what a search brings up for Groom Law Group on our blog).
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I can only hope that this will be the start of real change in the way retired players are treated and looked upon by its own Union. And perhaps it may not be too much to hope that retired players will finally be given an opportunity to participate and shape their own futures.
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On a more minor side note, Smith was also asked about Drew Brees’ earlier comments regarding retired players. His answer: It is an “immoral decision” for today’s players not to acknowledge the players who came before them. Ben Lynch has more details on today’s press conference over at RetiredPlayers.org (Click HERE to read Ben’s coverage).
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After a crazy 2009 (like the rest of us), Conrad Dobler has still managed to hit the media trail and come out swinging before Super Bowl. After 32 surgeries, Conrad nearly lost his leg late last year to a massive MRSA infection. (You can read that earlier post – click HERE.) But Conrad’s back and he’s been lighting into the NFL and the NFLPA in a couple of recent interviews. Conrad comes from old school football when characters were actually welcome. And he played the part well. Ask any older fan and most of them will still speak of Conrad fondly, regardless of whether they loved or hated him on the field. In today’s world of football, The Commissioner is now all too happy to act like the nasty teacher with the ruler trying to keep the students in line for his headmaster owners. All you have to do is look at Chad Ochocinco’s escalating fines to match his on-field antics to bring some levity to the game. Those owners don’t really want the fans to identify with any players on the field (other than those multimillionaire quarterback stars that they completely control) because it  would give them faces off the field and into retirement. Consider this a salute to Conrad Dobler for still being who he is!

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Maybe we should be thanking DeMaurice Smith. After all, he signed the 2008 LM-2 even though he didn’t step into office until this Spring. Some of these items seem to be listed out in more detail than last year and there are other details that weren’t disclosed in the 2007 LM-2. continue reading »

We’re still spending some time poring over that 2007 LM-2 filing from the NFLPA and, like everything else they do – there’s always surprises tucked into every corner. The LM-2 as close as we can get to audit-type numbers as we can find right now. We spent a lot of time trying to locate and download that document from the Dept. of Labor’s website (click HERE read that earlier post) and eventually, a friend in the media pointed us in the right direction. But before we finally discovered where to find it, we actually went ahead and placed an online order for a printed copy of the document to be sent out by US mail. Of course, we had no idea the thing would be well over 800 pages long at a cost of 15¢ a page! So we were somewhat relieved (it would have cost us well over $120 for one complete copy!) but also perplexed when we got this message back yesterday from the US Dept. of Labor (click image to enlarge for reading):

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