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notahomer
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Heard some of the math and from many players perspectives, its a sweet deal, $$$-wise for the NFL teams. I get it. A billion dollars is a lot of money usually but in the NFL math....not so much. Rules will be changed and processes improved. I love watching football but the side of a poor wife having to look after a player who at that time was ignorant of the long term effects of pro football, kinda makes me feel bad. Its not my fault but I certainly would rather see changes in the game if it will lead to longer better health outcomes for players in the future....
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notahomer wrote:Heard some of the math and from many players perspectives, its a sweet deal, $$$-wise for the NFL teams. I get it. A billion dollars is a lot of money usually but in the NFL math....not so much. Rules will be changed and processes improved. I love watching football but the side of a poor wife having to look after a player who at that time was ignorant of the long term effects of pro football, kinda makes me feel bad. Its not my fault but I certainly would rather see changes in the game if it will lead to longer better health outcomes for players in the future....
Hard to say what steps the NFL will take--beyond staging a continuing PR campaign about how seriously they take player safety. My fear is that they'll take solace from the fact that, now that the issue has been addressed, and there can no longer be any doubt in any player's mind that long-term brain damage can result from head injuries suffered from playing football, the league will more-or-less leave it at that. Actually, I'm not sure, at this point, what they can do to make the game safer at the same time as not altering the attraction of the game for fans, who, let's face it, are, in part, attracted by the violence of the game.
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KnowItAll wrote:this is stupid. its like soldiers trying to sue the army and govt because they got seriously hurt in a war zone. Its not tiddly winks out there. Players know that there is high risk of both short term and long term injury, sometimes serious, yet they still choose to play. Often it is the players who hide injuries and or ignore medical advice that choose to go onto the field when they have no business doing so. Football leagues are forever trying their best to find better ways, rules and equiptment, to protect the players as much as possible. Fact remains, if you choose to risk life and limb to make millions in a short time, then you the player, in the end, are the most responsible. No one holds a gun to their head and makes them play It will never be purrfect. Football cannnot be played in a bubble, unless you want to completely wrap the players in bubble rap.
This is laughably naieve on so many levels.

It took 30 years and a couple of player deaths just to get coaching staffs to address the issue of dehydration and allow players to have water on practice fields. Ever hear of Kory Stringer?

And this is before we get to issues surrounding damage to knee and ankle injuries. Anyone who thinks players "knew the risks" at any informed level prior to the mid 1990s needs a real education on the issues at hand. MRI machines didn't even exist before 1980. Concussion research wasn't even available in substantive detail until the late 2000s. Injuries to elbows, ankles and knees that are now heal able through surgery weren't even researched and performed until the late 1970s.

There is miles worth of difference between "knowing there are risks" and being "properly informed of the risks". Even further when you discover the NFL knew about specific risks of which it failed to inform it's players.

And this assumes the leagues had the first clue as to how to take care of their players when they did know. Which they didn't. I mean, if only there were books written on the topic that detailed how incompetent teams and leagues are at dealing with health issues around their players. It took a career ending injury to Tony Simmons before the CFL got around to penalizing horse collar tackles, and this a full year after the NFL realized that they were screwing up players knees.

There's enough blaming the victim and corporate benevolence and trust in your post to make an American Republican ask you to throttle it down a little bit.
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http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/sus ... or-players
Another Brutal Hit for the NFL’s Players

By Susan Milligan

August 30, 2013 RSS Feed Print Comment (3)

The NFL has agreed to pay $765 million for treatment, exams and research related to concussions and other head injuries suffered by players. And anyone who thinks that's a good deal for the players needs to have his head examined.

It sounds like a pretty good chunk of change, at the outset. But it's less than a tenth of the annual revenues of the NFL, which makes billions of dollars hosting what have become gladiator-type competitions. It's far less than victims have received in other settlements involving tobacco or breast implants. And, of course, the NFL – ever arrogant – is paying the money on the condition it not accept any responsibility for the damage done to players over the years.

So you think professional football players are overpaid, and the settlement is pretty good for athletes who willingly got onto the field and subjected themselves to head-butts and full-body tackles by 300-plus-pound opponents? Tell that to the families of former players Junior Seau and Ray Easterling, who committed suicide after suffering head injuries. Tell it to Buffalo Bills quarterback Kevin Kolb, who suffered concussions in 2010 and 2011 and again in a pre-season game last week against the Washington Redskins. The last injury, the Bills fear, may be "career-ending." Kolb is 29.

The settlement is less than the value of the league's least-valued team, the Oakland Raiders. It's a fraction of the estimated $2.5 billion the league is believed to be liable for had the litigation continued.

The surviving injured players were in a terrible situation. The league, after all, with its rich owners whose main contribution to the game consists of sitting in a luxury box and watching men put their health and very lives at stake in a game that has become increasingly aggressive and dangerous, can drag out a case for years. The men in desperate need of care don't have that luxury.

The NFL says it wants to make the game safer, and to learn what dangers the game can do to players' health. But the $10 million in the settlement assigned to research and education is a pittance. Further, ESPN pulled out of a joint investigation with PBS on a series the network is soon to show on the damage the game is doing to the human brain. The official story is that the two networks sparred over editorial control, but the New York Times reported that ESPN's withdrawal came after a "combative" meeting with NFL execs. And there's a strong financial relationship there: ESPN pays the NFL $1.9 billion a year to air Monday Night Football.

Football's a great game, but it can't survive if it's not made safer for the players. The hits the athletes are taking on the field are brutal. The hit they took with the paltry settlement and lack of responsibility accepted by the NFL is worse.
Relatively small settlement, I agree. Could the players have done better? Dunno ... Probably not. I don't think there are any ethical decisions being made here. Multi-billion dollar business decisions. Bargaining decisions. Legal decisions.

Further steps: Take head shots out of the game. Look at helmets as weapons, as well as protection for the wearer. After that, look at knee and ankle injuries, and the issues there.
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cromartie wrote:
KnowItAll wrote:this is stupid. its like soldiers trying to sue the army and govt because they got seriously hurt in a war zone. Its not tiddly winks out there. Players know that there is high risk of both short term and long term injury, sometimes serious, yet they still choose to play. Often it is the players who hide injuries and or ignore medical advice that choose to go onto the field when they have no business doing so. Football leagues are forever trying their best to find better ways, rules and equiptment, to protect the players as much as possible. Fact remains, if you choose to risk life and limb to make millions in a short time, then you the player, in the end, are the most responsible. No one holds a gun to their head and makes them play It will never be purrfect. Football cannnot be played in a bubble, unless you want to completely wrap the players in bubble rap.
This is laughably naieve on so many levels.

It took 30 years and a couple of player deaths just to get coaching staffs to address the issue of dehydration and allow players to have water on practice fields. Ever hear of Kory Stringer?

And this is before we get to issues surrounding damage to knee and ankle injuries. Anyone who thinks players "knew the risks" at any informed level prior to the mid 1990s needs a real education on the issues at hand. MRI machines didn't even exist before 1980. Concussion research wasn't even available in substantive detail until the late 2000s. Injuries to elbows, ankles and knees that are now heal able through surgery weren't even researched and performed until the late 1970s.

There is miles worth of difference between "knowing there are risks" and being "properly informed of the risks". Even further when you discover the NFL knew about specific risks of which it failed to inform it's players.

And this assumes the leagues had the first clue as to how to take care of their players when they did know. Which they didn't. I mean, if only there were books written on the topic that detailed how incompetent teams and leagues are at dealing with health issues around their players. It took a career ending injury to Tony Simmons before the CFL got around to penalizing horse collar tackles, and this a full year after the NFL realized that they were screwing up players knees.

There's enough blaming the victim and corporate benevolence and trust in your post to make an American Republican ask you to throttle it down a little bit.
When you factor steroid use into the argument, then maybe KnowItAll's comments are not so naive. Athletes take performance enhancing drugs, knowing full well that side affects can be catastrophic.

There was a survey done that I heard about where they ask Olympic athletes if they could take a legal pill that would allow them to reach their athletic goals (Olympic medals), but would take 10 years off their life span, would they take such a pill. I don't remember the numbers, but a disturbing number of athletes responded that they would take the magic pill.
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cromartie wrote:
KnowItAll wrote:this is stupid. its like soldiers trying to sue the army and govt because they got seriously hurt in a war zone. Its not tiddly winks out there. Players know that there is high risk of both short term and long term injury, sometimes serious, yet they still choose to play. Often it is the players who hide injuries and or ignore medical advice that choose to go onto the field when they have no business doing so. Football leagues are forever trying their best to find better ways, rules and equiptment, to protect the players as much as possible. Fact remains, if you choose to risk life and limb to make millions in a short time, then you the player, in the end, are the most responsible. No one holds a gun to their head and makes them play It will never be purrfect. Football cannnot be played in a bubble, unless you want to completely wrap the players in bubble rap.
Cromartie is right that a lot have suffered due to ignorance or old style thinking that it is a tough game and man up and take the hits and water is for the weak. When I played with less head protection in helmets we did use our heads to hit and spin off a tackle but it was not known that it was dangerous. The irony is that the helmets now are so much better as are the shoulder pads but as they say these now contribute to injuries of opponents these days.

The military analogy is a good one as despite what we know about the human mind and post traumatic stress syndrome we still seem to do little for returning veterans from some of the most horrid circumstances mankind has ever seen. I doubt we pay them 1/5 of what they are worth. We cheer them on as they go overseas and the politicians are so proud rah rah rah but the irony of the soldier chopped to death in the UK recently was he was wearing a t-shirt IIRC that was for a charity raising funds to take care of vets. I suspect they too need to do learning about stress, etc.

It often takes a suit like this to get attention.

The more they can take the head shots out of the game the better. The suit against helmet manufacturers is the part that a bit concerns me as I can see a company saying forget it - let's just make golf clubs and basketballs.
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cromartie
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The military analogy is a good one as despite what we know about the human mind and post traumatic stress syndrome we still seem to do little for returning veterans from some of the most horrid circumstances mankind has ever seen.
No, the military analogy is a terrible one. Players prior to about the mid 1990s had disturbingly little idea about just what specific long term damage would inflict upon their bodies over the long term. And a fair amount of knowledge was withheld, either for the short term benefit of the team or out of incompetence on the part of the program/team to which the player belonged. People have known the consequences of war since man first started fighting wars.

A better analogy is cigarette smokers. For over a century, people had a vague idea that smoking was probably not good for you. It wasn't until the mid 1950s that we began to understand just how bad (and the science worked past the attempts to cover it up, which is what cigarette companies were ultimately held liable for, at least in the US).

In both cases, we know enough now that we can say that players who have entered the league after 2009, as per the terms of the settlement, have pretty darn full disclosure about what they're getting into, particularly when it comes to concussions. Just as we can say now that you have a blatant and disturbing idea of what will happen to you when you start lighting up cigarettes. But if you started smoking in the 40s and 50s, really prior to the point where warnings were put on cigarettes, then you absolutely have a case.
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cromartie wrote:
The military analogy is a good one as despite what we know about the human mind and post traumatic stress syndrome we still seem to do little for returning veterans from some of the most horrid circumstances mankind has ever seen.
No, the military analogy is a terrible one. Players prior to about the mid 1990s had disturbingly little idea about just what specific long term damage would inflict upon their bodies over the long term. And a fair amount of knowledge was withheld, either for the short term benefit of the team or out of incompetence on the part of the program/team to which the player belonged. People have known the consequences of war since man first started fighting wars.

A better analogy is cigarette smokers. For over a century, people had a vague idea that smoking was probably not good for you. It wasn't until the mid 1950s that we began to understand just how bad (and the science worked past the attempts to cover it up, which is what cigarette companies were ultimately held liable for, at least in the US).

In both cases, we know enough now that we can say that players who have entered the league after 2009, as per the terms of the settlement, have pretty darn full disclosure about what they're getting into, particularly when it comes to concussions. Just as we can say now that you have a blatant and disturbing idea of what will happen to you when you start lighting up cigarettes. But if you started smoking in the 40s and 50s, really prior to the point where warnings were put on cigarettes, then you absolutely have a case.
No. Trying to equate concussions with cigarette smoking is laughably naive and a terrible analogy. Concussion injuries are much more serious than smoking tobacco. It's not the league's fault that players bash into each other with their heads. If the players tackled with their arms and legs like they should have been taught in Pop Warner there would be little problem. The league has little culpability, as was borne out with this joke settlement paid out over 5 years which allows the NFL deny responsibility and keep its concussion research secret.
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JohnHenry wrote: Concussion injuries are much more serious than smoking tobacco. It's not the league's fault that players bash into each other with their heads. If the players tackled with their arms and legs like they should have been taught in Pop Warner there would be little problem. The league has little culpability, as was borne out with this joke settlement paid out over 5 years which allows the NFL deny responsibility and keep its concussion research secret.
You aren't seriously comparing lung cancer to concussions. Or are you being purposely obtuse to the comparison?

In both cases, people had a vague idea that what they were doing was detrimental to their health.

In both cases, the companies in charge (though the NFL doesn't have to admit to this as per the settlement) actively withheld information from those who chose to participate the degree of severity of their participation, with through willful malice, ignorance, or both.

In both cases, as the science improved, people became able to make more informed decision, both when they chose to or chose not to participate in the activity, and when to quit said activity.
If the players tackled with their arms and legs like they should have been taught in Pop Warner there would be little problem.[/quote[

That's hilariously naieve. The object of the game is to bring a player from a standing position to the ground. To suggest heads would never get jostled, hit or otherwise tossed around or bumped if people just "tackled properly" is asinine. Do you have any idea how Reggie Brown, Mike Utley, Michael Irvin and Kevin Everett all had their careers ended (and, in the case of Brown, nearly lost his life)? Let me help you out here, it wasn't because they were making non-form tackles. You don't need to go any further back this pre-season than Kevin Kolb's concussion to find that premise to be absurd on it's face.
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The players' association could probably get more but it will take years of litigation and huge amount of dollars to lawyer fees.
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CFL fines Riders' Brackenridge for hit on Argos' Kackert

The league penalized Brackenridge for a helmet-to-helmet hit on Toronto Argos running back Chad Kackert. Tom Szczerbowski/Getty Images

The CFL fined Saskatchewan Roughriders safety Tyron Brackenridge on Wednesday for delivering a dangerous hit in a game last weekend.

The league penalized Brackenridge for a helmet-to-helmet hit on Toronto running back Chad Kackert during the Argos' 31-29 win Saturday night.

Kackert suffered a concussion on the play and is listed as day to day.

As per league policy, the amount of the fine was not disclosed.
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WestCoastJoe wrote:
CFL fines Riders' Brackenridge for hit on Argos' Kackert

The league penalized Brackenridge for a helmet-to-helmet hit on Toronto Argos running back Chad Kackert. Tom Szczerbowski/Getty Images

The CFL fined Saskatchewan Roughriders safety Tyron Brackenridge on Wednesday for delivering a dangerous hit in a game last weekend.

The league penalized Brackenridge for a helmet-to-helmet hit on Toronto running back Chad Kackert during the Argos' 31-29 win Saturday night.

Kackert suffered a concussion on the play and is listed as day to day.

As per league policy, the amount of the fine was not disclosed.



Dee Webb, come on down.

Good, Brackenridge deserved a fine, IMO.......
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http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/02/us/dan-ma ... ?hpt=hp_t2
Dan Marino sues NFL over concussions

By Steve Almasy, CNN

updated 1:42 AM EDT, Tue June 3, 2014

CNN) -- Dan Marino, considered one of the greatest quarterbacks in National Football League history, is suing the NFL over concussions, according to court documents filed last week in Philadelphia.

Marino, a Hall of Famer who starred for the Miami Dolphins for 17 seasons, and 14 other former players filed a civil lawsuit in federal court that says the league knew for years there was a link between concussions and long-term health problems.

Dan Marino was considered a durable quarterback during his playing career. he was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2005.

The document asks for monetary damages to be determined at a jury trial and for medical monitoring for the former players.

Each player submitted a short-form complaint that contained standard language that they suffer from brain injuries and exhibit symptoms that have developed over time.

Marino joining lawsuit changes everything

The document doesn't specify the nature of Marino's injuries.

The NFL didn't immediately respond to CNN's request for comment.

Marino, 52, was considered one of the most durable quarterbacks in the NFL and once started 99 games in a row. Known for a quick release, Marino still holds several NFL records. He was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2005.

Other former players involved in the suit are Richard Bishop, Ethan Johnson, Chris Dugan, Anthony Grant, Mark Green, LaCurtis Jones, John Huddleston, Erik Affholter, Toddrick McIntosh, Dwight Wheeler, Jackie Wallace, Moses Moreno, Peter Manning and Bruce Clark.

In a separate case in January, a federal judge declined to approve a proposed $760 million settlement of claims arising from concussions suffered by NFL players, saying she didn't think it was enough money.

The estimated 20,000 class members over the settlement's 65-year lifespan would include former players with early dementia, moderate dementia, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, amyotropic lateral sclerosis and/or death with a postmortem diagnosis of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a brain disorder.

Sol Weiss, one of the lawyers who filed the Marino group's lawsuit, is also one of the attorneys who settled the class action concussion case with the NFL.
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Dan Marino Joining Concussion Lawsuit Changes Everything

By Mike Freeman, NFL National Lead Writer
Jun 2, 2014

If you think NFL players who sued over brain injuries are just a bunch of bitter old men...

If you think they're suing because they're broke...

Or desperate...

Or lazy...

Or don't want to take responsibility for their past decisions...

Please allow me to introduce you to someone. You may have heard of him. His name is Dan Marino.

Marino has joined thousands of players in suing the NFL over concussions. There are dozens of Hall of Famers who are in on it as well, including Eric Dickerson and Tony Dorsett, but with all due respect to stunning talents like Dickerson, an eternal name like Marino's puts this lawsuit into an entirely different stratosphere.

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There is now an increased level of credibility. Marino's name won't be so easy for the skeptics to dismiss. In effect, he has armored the plaintiffs in this case better than they could have ever dreamed.

I spoke to someone close to Marino late Monday night, and that person said there are no indications Marino is desperate for funds. He's not lazy. Never has been. You don't set or hold more than two dozen passing records being a bum. I've also known Marino and interviewed him several times. He never struck me as someone who would file a baseless suit.

What's scary about this is that Marino was never known for concussion problems. Troy Aikman and Steve Young were. Neither has filed against the NFL, but that may be because both have network jobs and are still close to the league. Marino recently lost his analyst position at CBS and may have simply decided now is the time.

But there was one game where he did get a concussion, and it shows how different football was then and now.

It was 1992, and Marino was in a close game against the Seattle Seahawks. Toward the beginning of the fourth quarter, he temporarily left the game with a concussion. He'd return later in the contest to throw the game-winning pass.

"When he came out of the game in the fourth quarter, he wasn't sure where he was," Dolphins coach Don Shula said at the time.

He wasn't sure where he was, yet he went back into the game.

Said then-Dolphins backup quarterback Scott Mitchell of Marino: "He's so tough that you could cut off his legs and he'd still play."

Jeff Glidden/Associated Press

That was the mentality of the sport. You played. No matter what. No legs, no functioning brain? So what. Get your ass in the game.

The players could have said no, but that called your courage into question, even in Marino's case. He had to play no matter what. Now, the decision is taken out of the players' hands. Then, it wasn't. They went back into the game unless everything was broken.

Shula said that Marino was cleared by doctors to play. In today's NFL, Marino would have been forced to sit the remainder of the game. He would have then needed to pass a series of concussion tests to play in the next one.

This is where the concussion lawsuits get interesting, and Marino adding his name only intensifies this entire issue. Did doctors then send players like him back into the game knowing there was the potential for long-term damage to the brains of players? Did they put winning the game over his health?

Victor Baldizon/Getty Images

Marino says in the lawsuit he suffered from "repetitive, traumatic sub-concussive and/or concussive head impacts." He played for 17 years. Was Marino part of a legion of players who suffered dozens or even hundreds of concussions and never said a word—just played on?

What Marino's name also does is take this issue deeper into mainstream America. Sure, people know Dickerson, but Marino is still a household name. This could bring an entirely new focus to the issue.

"Despite its knowledge of the grave risks that players have been exposed to because of Defendant's gross inaction and/or concealment of safety information," the lawsuit states. "Defendant carelessly failed to take reasonable measures to develop appropriate and necessary steps to alert players to their risks of debilitating long-term illnesses."

Another day, another player sues the NFL over its past.

Only this time, the name is one of the biggest ever, and the concussion issue will never be the same.
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And now there is this by Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk:

Marino to withdraw from concussion lawsuit
Posted by Mike Florio on June 3, 2014, 2:16 PM EDT

Hall of Fame quarterback Dan Marino is suing the NFL for concussions. Unless he isn’t.

At a time when Marino’s motivation for suing seemed to be unclear at best, Marino reportedly will withdraw from the concussion lawsuit that lists him as one of the new plaintiffs.

“It was never Marino’s intention to initiate litigation in this case, but to ensure that in the event he had adverse health consequences down the road, he would be covered with health benefits. They are working to correct the error,” an unnamed source told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

To get that protection, Marino didn’t need to file suit. The proposed settlement will cover him; all he has to do to have the benefits is, frankly, nothing. If he doesn’t file suit and doesn’t opt out from the settlement, he’ll be part of it.

Lawyer Sol Weiss will now face questions about how Marino’s name landed on a lawsuit if that wasn’t his wish. It’s possible Marino signed something that he didn’t realize would result in a suit being filed. Indeed, as he reportedly negotiates with the Dolphins for a front-office job, suing the Dolphins and the rest of the NFL’s teams isn’t the ideal tactic.

It’s also possible, as suggested earlier today, that Weiss hoped to get as many names as possible under his umbrella, so that he’ll get more of the nine-figure award of attorneys’ fees. Possibly sensing that preliminary approval of the nine-month-old settlement is coming, Weiss pumped up his docket by more than a dozed players.

Then there’s the possibility that Weiss is frustrated that the settlement has languished on the desk of Judge Anita Brody, and that in lieu of asking her for a ruling (lawyers who ask judges for rulings risk getting rulings the lawyers don’t like) Weiss brilliantly filed a suit with Marino’s name on it, trusting that it would create enough buzz about the pending settlement to get Judge Brody to finally grant her blessing to it, so that the settlement process finally may proceed.

Regardless, it will apparently proceed without Marino as a named plaintiff. Which means nothing to his ability to secure benefits, if/when he develops a severe cognitive impairment that entitles him to payment.
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