Dear Commissioner Goodell,
I am scheduled for a total left hip replacement on 4/29/08. My Pre-Operative examination revealed, “One of kidney function tests called the GFR was a little low”. I take 5 or 6 prescriptions several times a day.
Question? If I develop kidney problems because of the large amount of medication I take due to football injuries are their any medical programs available?
Please Respond.
Sincerely,
Dave Pear
website; davepear.com
Like this:
Be the first to like this post.
About fourthandgoalfoundation
The Baltimore Colts’ alumni have long been at the forefront of a movement to publicize the pension and disability issues faced by hundreds of retired NFL players. Our efforts on behalf of our teammate John Mackey have grown into a national 501(c)(3) organization, Fourth & Goal, which is dedicated to:
- Gaining representation for retired players;
- Advocating for improved pension and disability benefits for retired players; and
- Raising funds to immediately assist retired players in need.
Bryan,
If you had ever seen some of Dave’s medical records – as I have – you would have a completely different perspective. His life has been turned up-side down by the severe injuries and many major surgeries he has faced over the years. Not to mention the more than $500,000.00 he has had to pay out of pocket for his medical expenses.
He is not asking for any handouts. He is asking for what he was entitled to by his years in the NFL and the football-related injuries that have rendered him totally disabled.
Also, he is raising hell on behalf of all the rest of his brother players and their families who have wrongly been denied what they deserve. I truly admire him for being out in public with his situation. As a result of his efforts, and many others, Congress is involved, the NFLPA has made some improvements, and we are seekin more – not just for Dave and his family, but for all players.
I agree with John and it’s also why I’m on board with helping Dave and the other disabled players get the fair treatment they’ve been cheated out of for too many years. Bryan Cropp’s callous attitude needs a strong response from everyone who has either lived through this injustice directly or has been watching this from the sidelines.
Bryan (and those dwindling few of you left in Upshaw’s corner), I can only hope that you at least understand the importance of a level playing field in playing the game – any game. If and when one side cheats behind-the-scenes or completely in the open (as has been the case with the NFLPA and the Players Alliance) with blatant disregard, then everyone loses in the long run. Perhaps you know some of the lucky players who managed to leave the game intact (at least at this stage of their lives). Or maybe you’re a young fan with a lot of years ahead of you.
But somehow I sense that if you were sold a new SUV tomorrow that the car manufacturer had hidden a known defective part that caused disastrous crashes, you probably wouldn’t hesitate to climb on board a class-action lawsuit to get your share of the pie because of negligence. In reading your remarks about Dave’s consequences as a direct result of his career injuries and the lack of benefits to address these problems at an early stage, your remarks are like telling the families of people killed by that intentionally-flawed SUV, “Get over it. You whine too much.”
What Dave and the overwhelming number of other players have been doing over the past couple of years is bringing more and more of this story to the media and the general public. The momentum that this effort has generated finally escalated to Congressional hearings that will hopefully result in the needed oversight to correct the criminal activities of the few who would subvert the rights of many. I call it adult supervision over the foxes in the hen house.
I’d strongly suggest that you read through the numerous blogs and websites that are now available with strong evidence of all the lying and cheating in a very corrupt and one-sided organization.
John,
I am not saying Dave is not disabled, he may very well be. In all of this discussion, what I can’t get my mind around is the fact that nobody forced anybody to play that brutal game. Every man chooses his course or profession, and with that choice comes consequences. I understand the difference in today’s money as to yesteryears, but that does not change the fact that the men of past era’s knew the situation they were in at the time, and choose to ignore it. Fight for what you think is right, just don’t expect sympathy from every fan who reads a sob story. It is the same as no fan should expect an audience or sympathy with a current player or owner about the tremendous prices we pay at the stadium. In this era of professional spors, it is an understood burden that we go through as fans and because of that understanding, we give up our right to bitch. One can’t bitch about the consequences after the fact when he/she opts to ignore them at the time.
Bryan,
Don’t really want to get into a debate…but police work is dangerous, high risk work. So is firefighting. Those heroes assume the risk when they take those jobs. However, if they are injured on the job, do we just say “Sorry”. No, they are willing to perform these jobs because they can be assured (generally) that if injured, their unions will take care of them and their families. That hasn’t been the case with the player’s union – the NFLPA. These guys are not asking for a handout, and yes they are aware of the consequences. They are willing to live with the pain – but should they and their families have to face financial ruin because of it? Particularly when the NFL is making so much money from their service?
As for players of “yesteryear” assuming the risk…they did not know, and we are still learning the consequences of concussions. They did not know that playing on green colored concrete (a/k/a astroturf) would ruin their joints. As for those who took early pensions, many were probably shocked and misled into taking a lower paying benefit when they learned about a study that indicated that the average life expectancy of a former football player was 55!
John’s absolutely right. Debate is senseless. As someone who’s never been particularly interested in big league sports of any kind, Dave’s story intrigued me mostly because of the clear injustice that I found in it. Nothing more. I tend to think that being a non-sports fan makes me that much more coldly objective in looking at the situation at hand.
Bryan, your attitude is common with some people who only look at the game as entertainment in which a bunch of rich owners pit a bunch of rich jocks around a field of one sort or another, while the fans pay inordinately big bucks for the privilege of paying more big bucks for overpriced beer and hot dogs at an expensive stadium that all of us public citizens got scammed into paying for by owners who don’t want to spend their own money.
That said, here’s some more food for thought for all of you, including Bryan: A lot of young boys grow up watching these sports and aspiring to be the best at it just as other kids grow up aspiring to be the next Einstein or Dale Earnhardt or Bruce Springsteen. The effort it takes to get to the top of any of those respective fields is great and only a select few ever make it to the top of their chosen careers. In football, it takes a lot of physical strength and prowess to make it through high school and then if you’re lucky, you get a scholarship and go on to college football. If you’re really good – and lucky – you get to join a select few and get drafted into the big leagues. But remember – all this time, everyone else manages to make money from the sport: The schools, the coaches, the trainers. Everyone except the players themselves. And there are very onerous rules specifically spelling out the fact that they can’t accept any compensation – monetary or otherwise – so they won’t be “unduly influenced.” So for 10 years of your life, you’re beat up constantly just for a shot a that brass ring, all without any compensation for your passion. If you happen to finally get into the NFL to make some decent bucks – thanks in no small part to the sacrifices made by the earlier generations of beaten and forgotten players – your typical career is usually from 5 – 10 year long. All with the odds going against you of sustaining life-changing injuries. It’s like fish swimming upstream in the spring; few actually make it all the way. For those that do, the compensation should be fair and equitable for all of the sacrifice involved.
But – and this is the but – supposing the very guys who are supposed to be protecting you are cheating and changing the rules every step of the way? And worse – they’ve even been looting and stealing from the very fund and pension from which you were supposed to be getting paid from? And they stack the panels with unqualified (and overpaid) cronies who are supposed to rule on your ability to receive benefits? Worse, don’t forget that the owners pay those team doctors. In his Oakland Raiders days, Dave didn’t realize that he was playing with a broken neck through several critical games because the “doctor” shot him up with painkillers and told him everything was just fine for him to play. All at the behest of Al Davis’ encouragement to get to the SuperBowl and to win it.
And you’re telling players like Dave to suck it up? I can only hope you work in a sedentary job where there are no risks and your boss doesn’t lie to you every day to keep you working under any conditions, my friend. If this was any other business, there would have been a complete change of management a long time ago and a lot of people would already be in jail. It’s no longer even a matter of what’s right; it’s now a question of what’s LEGAL. These guys have broken the law in so many ways, it’ll take years to sort it out and make things right.
Bryan hello–in repsonse to your comment that no body forced anyone to play football, so should I read this as, if they become injured in a job they volunteered to do they shouldn’t be taken care of?
If someone volunteers to become a policemen and they are paralyzed, should they be taken care of?
If someone volunteers to be a fireman and is injured should they be taken care of?
If someone who volunteers to be a teacher, a doctor, a lawyer or a serviceman and they are injured in the job they have volunteered to do should they be taken care?
Come on Bryan
Rob T
I would like to make 2 points to both comments above:
1. Rob, I think most people would make a distinction between police work/public safety and work in the entertainment industry. I believe that is why public tax dollars go into pensions and benefits for those all important workers. They are bettering the community. As that regards to athletes who choose to play football, this occupation is that of entertainment no different than a traveling circus or theater group. That is where I draw the line.
2. Since you choose not to debate John, I will only finish by using some of your own words. Since I already responded to some of your points in the prior point, I will focus on “As for those who took early pensions, many were probably shocked and misled into taking a lower paying benefit when they learned about a study that indicated that the average life expectancy of a former football player was 55!” First, ‘many were probably shocked and misled”? Come on, you are not saying much for the men of that time. That strong willed, determined, disciplined athletes would be so easily fooled by the big bad “man” is hard to believe. Of course there are no numbers for reference in terms of “many” and using a word like “probably” does not a good lawyer make. Further, I have heard a rumor of this “study” re:death by 55, but nobody ever seems to know who conducted it or where it may be. I think many people who are fans of the NFL would welcome this study and as a proponent of this group (based on all of your comments on blogs) I would think you would make sure this “study” is in the public domain so that it may sway cynical minds like myself to your side of the argument. Or, could it be the story of fallen hero’s not preparing for a second career when it is a 100% probability that they will need one. Thus, they take all of there money and hope that some hint of name recognition will allow them the honor of living out a famed former athletes life with gratitude and riches placed upon them by an adoring public whom they entertained for a generation… or maybe just 3-12 years.
Bryan – if you want really recent studies and news, how about THIS one: It’s now being reported in the mainstream media that more and more Astroturf play fields are being closed down at public schools because of the high likelihood of lead poisoning generated just by the daily wear-and-tear of the material. Originally, this space-age wonder was touted by Monsanto as the be-all-and-end-all to replace real turf, thus lowering maintenance costs for everyone. Never mind the undocumented injuries from torn ligaments and damaged knee joints that have conveniently either been undocumented and perhaps even buried by professional football. So based on your logic, all those kids who may have gotten lead-poisoning through absolutely no fault of their own would have to suck it up and kiss their shortened lives goodbye because somebody was thinking of the buck instead of the safety of he very people it was supposed to serve.
Like I keep emphasizing, it’s one thing to play on a level playing field with the same rules for everyone; it’s another thing altogether to keep moving the goal posts and change the rules at will each time you start losing. Like they say in Washington, it’s seldom the crime itself that gets punished; it’s the coverup that comes after it.
Do you really want to find more out for yourself or do you just want to keep denying that something else is going on behind the scenes that you’ve never seen before? Dave Pear just posted a letter on his blog from the Dept. of Health and Human Services that kicked off a study about the shortened lifespan of professional football players. The letter states that the NFLPA approached them to conduct the study with OSHA. We’ve been trying to find the results of that study with little luck so far. The date on that letter? 1991. Conveniently, when other studies came out that showed the average player’s life expectancy was 55 years, the NFLPA set the benefits age at… take a guess. You got it — 55! How convenient. The lying, cheating or outright covering of facts is getting harder and harder to do; this is now the age of the Internet and the fact that we’re now having this open discussion is evidence that there are fewer and fewer ways to hide the truth. But it still falls on your own shoulders to think for yourself AFTER you’ve taken in all the facts as they come up and BEFORE you’ve made up an opinion. You can lead a horse to water but…
If you’re truly willing to open your eyes and your ears, there’s more overwhelming evidence coming up daily. I can only hope that you’re someone with an open mind. Otherwise, you might end up sitting on that train track with the few others left with Gene Upshaw trying to deny the truth as that freight train rounds the bend.
I just saw the Real Sports episode with Dave Pear. I never knew who he was until now. His
story is eerily similar to that of the late Mike Webster; Brian DeMarco and many others.
We can argue that players made a deliberate choice to play football. However, on the
flipside, there have been multiple wrongs from both owners and the NFLPA.
The Raiders organization, starting with majority owner Al Davis, violated or breached
fiduciary obligations to their players when team paid doctors violated their
Hippocratic oaths and misrepresented the magnitude of injury. If the issue was
simply a separated pinkie (Tony Romo) or just the standard bruises and aches,
taking some painkillers to get the pain to a quiet roar is acceptable.
However, Mr. Pear could have been permanently paralyzed or killed by playing with
a (unknown to him at time) broken neck.
I personally believe Pear should also add the Raiders and Al Davis as defendants to
his case.
Second, the NFLPA, using technicalities and interpretations of federal laws and rules (which
can change from year to year. depending upon the power arrangements in DC)
has opted to curry favor with management and the league by denying certain benefits
and misrepresenting the licensing agreements the NFLPA and the NFL have with
third party vendors such as EA Sports; therefore, denying retirees a share of
said revenues.