Former NFL players suing NFL over brain damage

[CathyA]

To me, this is sort of like someone who smoked for 50 years, suing the Tobacco company for getting lung cancer.
2000 former NFL players are suing the NFL for not exposing to them, the harm that repeated head slams can cause. They also are complaining that they were encouraged to be really rough.
Duh!! Come on guys............couldn't you have figured out that repeated concussions is not good for your brain?? :idea:

[puglogic]

Yeah, I agree. It sounds like 2000 former NFL players have managed their money poorly and need a cash infusion. Should they all have been made to sign a waiver that says hitting things with your head day in and day out for a decade might have adverse health effects? Seems kinda silly, but I know it isn't to someone who's suffering from the aftermath. Sad.

[ApatheticNoMore]

Yeah, I agree. It sounds like 2000 former NFL players have managed their money poorly and need a cash infusion.

Oh what do you expect, them to be able to manage their money well? They have damaged brains afterall! Ok maybe that's not really funny, but it's still funny .... :laff:

"From the time before he won the title
Till the referee stopped his last fight
Oh I swear there was greatness there
Till those younger guys put out the light

So now he's in his ever after
With money to last all of his days
Oh but the price makes you shiver, fate's an Indian giver
She giveth and she taketh away" (gorka - dreamstreet)

[CathyA]

I think some of them had damaged brains before they even started in the NFL! :~)

[puglogic]

I picture a lot of hopeful, fresh-faced young men coming out of high school or college and feeling so fortunate to go into the pro sports dream. Perhaps not the sharpest pencils on the block (though of course some are), but not bad people. When you look at how horrible chronic traumatic encephalopathy is, I can't imagine in their shoes I'd ever have thought that would happen. But still - you're hitting your head for years and years and maybe at some point you'd think to ask your doctor what damage might be being done? But then again, what if your doctor is the team doctor, feeding you a steady diet of reassurance so you'll keep playing? ....at what point do you take personal responsibility for not being so bright, rather than blaming the NFL for not acting like a parent? An ugly situation, not one I think about a lot, but icky all the same.

[Sissy]

duh, is the word, DUH!

[JaneV2.0]

".at what point do you take personal responsibility for not being so bright, "

Maybe they hoped they could beat the odds. A lot of these players focused on making it out of poverty on the wings of their athletic ability. Sad business.

[Gregg]

Sad business, indeed. I wonder if the gladiators sued Caesar or if they figured out on their own that there were risks to their chose vocation? The price of fame, as it were.

[JaneV2.0]

I was thinking along the same lines--that these people are risking their lives for our entertainment, and making a fraction of the money team owners are. Libertarians who are quick to chant "personal responsibility" also tout our legal system as the solution to injustices. Then when people do sue, it's all about "personal responsibility" again. Where's the responsibility for promoting brutality and calling it sport? Perhaps this suit will do some good.

Parenthetically, I could hardly have been more personally responsible throughout my life, from putting myself through college to supporting myself all my adult life, and that favorite catch phrase of the right never fails to get my hackles up. We're never allowed to stumble or fail or have a human moment, I guess. Where's the "personal responsibility" of the oligarchs, one wonders. I guess the buck stops somewhere further down the line.

[puglogic]

Where's the "personal responsibility" of the oligarchs, one wonders. I guess the buck stops somewhere further down the line.

You're expecting corporations to act like people? Why, I say, when they have the rights of people, then they should have the responsibilities of people. Oh wait, I guess they already do (http://www.storyofstuff.org/movies-all/story-of-citizens-united-v-fec/).

[JaneV2.0]

"Corporations are people, my friends." --Willard Mitt Romney

I imagine NFL players thought they were being "personally responsible" by seeking a well-paid career to support themselves and their families. If following the rules results in brain damage--oh well. Along with privacy, we as a society seem to have lost even the most rudimentary impulse toward compassion.

[Bronxboy]

Along with privacy, we as a society seem to have lost even the most rudimentary impulse toward compassion.
Kicking people when they're down is considered an act of charity. It is supposed to motivate them to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

[Gregg]

Does anyone here watch the NFL?

[chanterelle]

I think some of them had damaged brains before they even started in the NFL! :~)

While I know you meant that to be all cute and snarky like, but the fact is that NFL methods are used not only on hefty grown men playing professional ball, but in colleges, high schools and even junior high school teams. Coaching is big, big business even at the school level and everyone wants to play and win like the big boys, no matter what the cost to the players down the line.
Repairing shoulder separations and blown knees on 13 and 14 year old football players is horrible enough but the possibility of brain injury/damage caused by a sport should cause everyone to take notice and speak up.
If it takes this type of action to point out that 2000 grown men are impaired for life to get people thinking and talking then maybe it's a good thing.

[CathyA]

That's why my son never played football. Where are the parents of these kids?? Even if there hadn't been this suit come up, common sense tells you that nobody, big or little, should be getting hit that hard on a regular basis.

[Gregg]

It's the happy medium that I think we've lost. I played football all through high school, put thousands of miles on my bike sans helmet, swam in deep rivers, roller skated with no pads, drove a grain truck at age 10, had countless BB gun wars... All kinds of things that should/could/would have killed me because we were a little too far over the edge for most modern day folk's taste. Frankly, knowing there was risk heightened a lot of my experiences. My own kids got some extra cuts and scrapes because they participated in all kinds of activities. I was not about to hold them back simply because there was some risk as long as reasonable steps were taken to minimize the risk. Life in a cocoon is not the same as the life of a butterfly.

[jp1]

I agree that people need to take responsibility. In this case, as their employer, the NFL needs to take responsibility if they've caused permanent injury to their employees. After all, we don't blame the victims in other jobs. I can't imagine telling a soldier "So sorry you're seriously injured, but you knew it was a dangerous job when you signed up. You need to take some responsibility for your actions." Or a factory worker that gets has hand crushed in a machine "Sorry to hear about that, but perhaps you should've considered a different, safer career. Hopefully you've learned your lesson."

The median NFL salary is $770,000 and the average career lasts just 3.5 years. http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_06/b4214058615722.htm That's not really a lot of money considering how long it would need to last someone with a debilitating injury. Especially in today's zero interest rate investment environment.

[catherine]

And what about the risk to all those kids going to college on football scholarships, maybe with sights set on football careers, and maybe not. I admit, I am a college football fan--having had two kids go to Rutgers, we attend (or watch on TV) all the games--and we saw the horrific tackle that turned Eric LeGrand into a quadrapeligic during a Rutgers-Army game. I have become somewhat obsessed with this event and with all the news since then about Legrand because it seems so tragic and I so deeply would like to see him get better, although he has certainly become a true inspiration with his attitude and can-do spirit.

As far as whose responsibility is whose--the responsibility is to inform the players of the risks, and in the event of risk, I believe the institution should bear the medical costs, but not any personal liability (as long as the risks have been acknowledged and assumed by the player).

[Life_is_Simple]

A while back, I found the site "Gridiron Greats," which supports ex-NFL players in times of need. A lot of them have problems due to past injuries:

http://www.gridirongreats.org/stories/

I felt really really bad for being a football fan all these years, as if these guys suffered for my entertainment. I really hope the commissioner does things to make the sport safer.

I was horrified about the Saints bounty scandal. I felt really bad for Brett Favre in the NFC championship game a couple of years ago. I thought while watching it, "Why are they trying to injury him? Why don't the refs do anything?"

Anyway, this issue really bothers me. The sport doesn't need to be that violent.

[Gregg]

The sport doesn't need to be that violent.

I think there is at least a part of the package that says, "yes, it does". And for the same reason that some people watch hockey for the fights and Nascar for the crashes. Football is, by it's very nature, a very violent game. As the participants become bigger, stronger, faster it can only get more violent. It's just those pesky laws of physics at work again. The (mostly young) men who play this game are awe inspiring in their physical conditioning and fans rabidly chase after the the biggest and baddest. At one time I think football was a grand stage and a glorious game. Now I simply can't find any reason to think it is not exactly like the gladiators of ancient Rome. The Colosseum is filled with fans who come to see pain and gore and death. In the end the victors are heroes and the rest are simply disposable.

[puglogic]

Yes, and people used to bring picnics to watch torture too, Gregg. Bring the family, watch someone burned alive or have their intestine slowly extracted. Give the people what they want!!

Just because the public wants it, doesn't mean that the public should have carte blanche to get it. In terms of encouraging a society that continues its evolution into something better, one that doesn't condone this kind of stupidity (like the Saints, like people pounding the hell out of each other ) either the government can step in (horrors to libertarians) OR perhaps this billion-dollar industry can be coerced into policing itself through lawsuits like these. Being hit in the pocketbook has that effect, I've heard. I'm far from decided on the issue, but not being a fan of how the industry is run, I'm fine with anything that forces them to think of players as human beings with a past, present, and future.

It can be a glorious game without being a vicious game.

And yes, I have watched football, so please don't talk down to my autographed Barry Sanders jersey.