Fourth and Goal Unites

from Dave Pear

It was obvious after the meeting that the NFL’s in house attorney, Harold Henderson, tried to do an end run with his attempts to get real information to the retired players. Here’s the follow up on our Snowing in Dallas (click HERE to read that) post about Commissioner Goodell’s visit to Dallas. Many of you were well aware ahead of time that John Wooten had invited John Hogan to the meeting in Dallas. As a courtesy, we decided not to publicize his trip, with hopes that John Hogan would be given some time to actually address many of the issues he has personally encountered with the NFLPA’s disability program (or lack thereof). But that was not to be. John was initially turned away from the “closed” meeting and then allowed to take a seat but was told he couldn’t address the group about his findings and ideas. John left the meeting before it finished and then received an interesting e-mail from John Wooten (after we posted Snowing in Dallas) denying he had invited John Hogan to attend. What was more interesting however was another e-mail that came in after Wooten sent that e-mail out to John Hogan AND Harold Henderson. Henderson then sent a short and terse e-mail back to John Wooten and it sure looks like he doesn’t know too much about the Internet and e-mail either (like our good friends at Akin Gump!). Looks like Henderson clicked on that REPLY ALL button and sent his message out to John Wooten as well as John Hogan and several other people in the NFL organization: Jeff Pash, Peter Abitante and Deborah Pugliese). Pash is an Executive VP and an attorney, Abitante is their PR flak (?!!) and Pugliese is Goodell’s secretary. Now why would Henderson have to keep their PR counsel informed? READ THE E-MAIL HERE

During yesterday’s (10/12/2008) episode of FOX’s NFL Sunday co-host Terry Bradshaw made what was an impromptu statement on the issues surrounding the NFL and NFLPA and the retired player. Here’s what he said….

“I’ve had it with the NFL and the Players Association. I’ve had it with their lip service towards hundreds of old-timers. We have so many older players out there, guys my age and older who made this league great but there’s no money for the surgeries that they need to fix broken hips and to pay for artificial knees. Some old-timers simply need extra money just to keep their home and their families together. I know a lot of players from my era; Howie’s too, who are reaching out and raising money. A lot of these former players are doing a better job than the league and the union are doing. There isn’t a better business in America than the NFL. We all love this game. Millions of you watch and pay for suites and tickets and TV packages and that’s why the NFL will gross over $7 billion dollars this season. This league is so wealthy that I know at least 10 billionaires who own teams, any of which could write a check to fix this. We love pro football so much that its about time, like Warren Beatty preached in that great football move, “Heaven Can Wait,” that the commissioner should yell, ‘Hey, let’s be the good guys, lets take care of everyone.’ Take one percent of that $7 billion this year and next and there’s enough money to take care of every old player who needs it. Come on everybody, let’s be the good guys and do what’s right.”