Fourth and Goal Unites

by Chad Iamasa/Bleacher Report

Baltimore Ravens rookie, Joe Flacco, may be the first franchise quarterback in Ravens history and the first in Baltimore since Bert Jones in the 1970’s and 80’s.

Bert Jones was the first sports hero I ever had. During his best season of 1976, I was five years old, my son’s age now, I wasn’t completely aware of sports at that point, but I remember watching the Colts on TV with my dad and grandfather.

The photo on this article is his card from the 1977 Topps series. I used to carry this card with me in my pocket everywhere I went. I believe I still have it. Needless to say it’s rather beat up and even in mint condition, it’s not very valuable, but that doesn’t matter to me.

Bertram “Bert” Jones was selected by the Baltimore Colts, as the second overall pick in the 1973 NFL draft with a pick acquired from the New Orleans Saints. Some other notables in this draft were John Matuszak (first pick overall), Dave Butz, Ray Guy, Ron Jaworski, Tom Jackson, Dick Jauron, and HOFers John Hannah, Dan Fouts and Joe DeLamielleure. READ MORE

Alex Byington/Kerrville Daily Times

Suzie Heywood spends a moment with her late husband, retired U.S. Marine Col. Ralph Heywood, at the Kerrville (Texas) Funeral Home. Heywood, a former Detroit Lion who served in three wars, died April 10, 2007. He was 85 and suffered from Alzheimer’s.(AP)

Even at 70 years old, Suzie Heywood refuses to sit back and accept the life of a retired widow.

With the spirit and vigor of someone half her age, and the fire of someone even younger, Suzie has gone toe-to-toe with mountainous men some three-times her size for no other reason than it was the right thing to do.

“When something’s wrong, you try to fix it, and you don’t turn tail and run,” she said simply. “And this is wrong, and it’s been wrong for a long time, and it gave me a passion.”

The widow of the late Col. Ralph Heywood — a 32-year veteran of the Marine Corps who served in three wars and spent four years playing during the National Football League’s heyday —  the former school teacher took up a cause for which she will never receive any compensation — disability benefits for retired NFL players in need.

“Right at first, it was my salvation,” Suzie Heywood said about the time after her husband’s death last year. READ MORE

BY JIM BAUMBACH | jim.baumbach@newsday.com

Former NY Jet Wesley Walker

Remember Wesley Walker? Sure you do. How can anyone here in New York forget the way the former Jets receiver used to make sprinting past defenders look so easy, so effortless.

These days Walker is 53 years old, nearly 20 years removed from his last game in the NFL. And effortless would be the last word his family and friends would use to describe his daily quality of life.

Like so many retired football players, Walker said he is paying a steep price for all those hits he took during his career, which lasted 13 years until 1989. But what makes Walker different from many former football players, however, is that he said he doesn’t specifically know what’s wrong with him. Or how to fix it.

According to Walker, he is in pain, constant pain that stays with him every waking hour. So much so that if he’s not at his job as an elementary school gym teacher in Kings Park, he said he often prefers to be at his Dix Hills home, in his bed, under his electric blanket, watching a movie. READ MORE

By Gary Shelton, St. Petersburg Times Sports Columnist

The Bucs’ first MVP, Dave Pear, with wife Heidi, continues fighting the NFL to get help for retired players. In constant pain, Pear has had eight surgeries. (Seattle Times)

“Your body is the only thing you really own in your lifetime. You can go out and buy another car or another house. You can’t get another body.”

Dave Pear, 1976

The pain will begin early, the way it always does.

It will awaken in his neck, a sharp, stabbing reminder of a fused spine. From there it will reach into his lower back, past the four artificial screws, and become a twisted, torturous ache. By the time it runs down his right side, past the hip that needs replacing, it will feel like a runaway stream of fire.

Dave Pear will pull himself out of his shallow sleep, the way he has done for countless mornings. He will hobble across his house with the shuffle of a gladiator who has outlived the cheers. He will drink his coffee, he will take his pills, and he will read his Bible.

Later, the man with the broken body will gather himself up once more and prepare to take on the might of the NFL. Again.

Perhaps, as you give a little thanks today, as you watch a little football, you could spare a thought for Pear and the others who believe the NFL has abandoned them. READ MORE

After receiving overwhelming support of last year’s Fourth and Goal Toyota Giveaway we’ve decided to do it again, this year with an even better deal. With everyone feeling the pain at the gas pumps we thought a 33 MPG Toyota Matrix will be the perfect prize!

Raffle tickets are only $10 and your odds of winning are increased with only 5,000 chances available for sell.[PURCHASE TICKETS]

Last year’s raffle raised over $25,000 for retired football players in dire need. Over the past year Fourth and Goal has donated over $50,000 to retired football players and families in need and is the leading retired player advocacy group on retired player pension and disability improvements. Currently, Fourth & Goal is engaged in an ongoing dialog with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell to change the pension and disability system and to gain representation for retired players. The organization’s advocacy efforts have been instrumental in the incremental enhancements to benefits for retired players, including the formation of the 88 Plan, named after ex-Colt John Mackey and benefiting retired players who, like Mackey, suffer from dementia or Alzheimer’s.

In addition, Fourth & Goal has been responsible for numerous articles on the issues faced by retired players, in print and electronic media outlets across the country. The organization operates a weblog to keep the public informed, and a private Google Group to provide a forum in which retired players may seek and obtain information and express their opinions.

More on Fourth and Goal

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 that is dedicated to protecting the rights of all retired professional football players.

Fourth & Goal is dedicated to:

• Gaining representation for retired players.
• Advocating for improved pension and disability benefits for retired players.
• Raising funds to provide immediate assistance for retired players in need.

Through our fund-raising efforts, Fourth & Goal has already helped retired players like:

• Former Chicago Bear Larry Morris – MVP of the 1963 NFL championship game – who now suffers from dementia.
• Wayne Hawkins – an Oakland Raiders’ teammate of former NFLPA Executive Director Gene Upshaw – who now suffers from early-onset Alzheimer’s and vascular dementia.
• Brent Boyd, who suffers from depression and other football-related illnesses after a six-year career with the Minnesota Vikings.
• Suzie Heywood, whose late husband Ralph – the only NFL player to serve in the U.S. armed forces in three wars (World War II, Korea and Vietnam) – died of complications from Alzheimer’s in April 2007. Mrs. Heywood sold the couple’s ranch and possessions and moved into a horse trailer in order to afford the care her husband needed.
• Syndi Shy, widow of Don Shy. Don, who died of brain tumors in October 2006 at age 61, was the first round draft choice of the Pittsburgh Steelers in 1967 and played for the Steelers, the Chicago Bears, the St. Louis Cardinals, and the New Orleans Saints in his seven-year NFL career.

PURCHASE YOUR TICKETS ONLINE

MORE INFORMATION ON THE CONTEST

Dear Retired Players:

Jeff Nixon, Retired Player Advocate

When the NFLPA started sending out GLA (Group Licensing Authorization) forms for retired players back in 2000, the concept behind it was good. It gave the NFLPA the right to market us and grant the use of our “image” to a licensee who would then use it in conjunction with, or on products sold at retail or used as promotional or premium items. The best example of this is the John Madden Football video game that is sold by EA Sports.

The players that actually generated the revenue would receive half the money and the other half would be put into an escrow account that would, at some point, be equally shared with all players that signed GLA’s. This type of payment system recognized that all retired players contributed to the success of the sport.

This same revenue sharing policy is currently utilized by all active players. It doesn’t matter if you are a perennial benchwarmer, or the MVP of the NFL, all active players get a check for the same amount of money.

It is important to understand that this policy does not prevent active players or retired players from entering into other ad hoc type agreements with the NFLPA or companies that want five or less players included in their product or marketing venture. In other words, if Peyton Manning or Terry Bradshaw want to do a commercial for a car company then they would receive all the money…..and that’s the way it should be.

Obviously, the revenue generating capacity of current superstar players and Hall of Fame players is greater than that of most players both active and retired, but all of them would acknowledge that football is a team sport and that their achievements on the field could only be made possible by the hard work and contributions of their teammates.

When the NFLPA first issued the GLA’s, I thought that they were finally recognizing this fact. Unfortunately, they did not follow through with their end of the agreement.

One of their excuses was that most retired players are unmarketable. As most of you know, Gene Upshaw made the following statement “We could have the greatest dog food in the world, but if the dogs don’t like it, we can’t sell it. Put that at the top of the story.”

As I mentioned in a prior posting, “If you have the greatest dog food in the world and you can’t sell it, then you don’t have a problem with the product, you have a problem with your Marketing and Sales Department!”

One important thing we discovered as a result of the Class Action lawsuit was this……There is a demand for retired players.

What we desperately need is a marketing and sales department that is working for us and not against us. The NFLPA is not issuing any GLA’s as a result of the class action suit. If they are no longer interested in marketing us then maybe we need to find a new agent!

Believe it or not, the NFL Owners may be interested in marketing and selling us! If they know that they can make some money using retired players, they would be crazy not to do it. Let’s face it, they already own the exclusive right to market our image by selling vhs tapes and dvd’s of football games. Just go to the NFL Films website at:http://www.nflfilms.com/specialorders/ and you can find hundreds of NFL vhs tapes and dvd’s selling for $50 a pop. Unfortunately, we are not receiving any royalties from the sale of these tapes. That could change if retired players worked a deal with NFL Properties to become the exclusive agent for marketing and selling retired player products, services and other promotional items.

Keep in mind the NFL already tried to do this with active players. The league offered money to individual players to abandon the NFLPA and appoint NFL Properties as their exclusive licensing agent. From 1990-92, NFL Properties spent in excess of $30 million in direct payments to players for group licensing rights, obviously hoping to steal enough players so that the NFLPA would not have a sufficient number of recognizable players to attract licensees.

There are other groups and organizations that could also provide licensing agreements, but in order for them to be viable they would need to convince the Hall of Fame Players and a majority of retired players to sign GLA’s. It would be ideal if they kept all retired player’s interests in mind. Does this mean that a retired player with only 2 years of NFL experience and 8 starts should get the same royalty payment as a 10 year Hall of Fame player? No, but a system should be devised that rewards players based on a standard set of criteria.

If the NFLPA will not market retired players, then we need to take action soon to make sure that someone does.

“Marketing is not an event, but a process . . . It has a beginning, a middle, but never an end, for it is a process. You improve it, perfect it, change it, even pause it. But you never stop it completely.” – -Jay Conrad Levinson

Take care,

Jeff Nixon
Buffalo Bills Alumni
Fourth and Goal Board Member

2009 Retired Players Summit

Click HERE to send us your information

In recent months much has been going on in the Cause of Retired Players. Some has been adversarial in Federal Court, some behind the scenes, and some in front of the U.S. Congress.

Different Gentlemen have stepped forward and formed Groups that have actually been raising money and giving much needed help to some former players who have found themselves in dire need with nowhere else to turn. Some of the men who formed these Groups have, because of other commitments in their lives, been primarily concerned in raising financial aid for some of our Brothers who are in very painful and difficult situations, sometimes out of their own pockets and at sacrifice to their other life obligations.

Others have taken on a more aggressive tact and have worked for reform and change in a system that just hasn’t seemed fair to Retired Players.Without pointing any finger you know that there are improvements needed.When our retirement and benefits programs are compared to Major League Baseball’s and the NBA’s there really is no comparison at all.We are in the ancient ages and someone else has always defined what we deserve and are entitled too.

Like me, most of you probably dreamed of belonging to the Fraternity of professional football when you were a kid. It wasn’t about the money.If the truth be told most of you would have played for free as long as you knew that “they” would fix your leg or arm if you broke. We saw the way that professional Prize Fighters were treated after their days in the ring were over but never dream that we would someday be discarded and reduced to begging for a crumb here and there.We did not grasp the unfairness of only playing, on average, three and one half years but not qualifying for our pension unless we played four or five years.We, like the young players today, did not see the irony of living, on average, less than fifty-four years but having to wait until we reach fifty five years of age in order to draw our full pension. As of last year fewer than 500 disabled men out of close to then thousand who played had qualified for disability. This is obviously a system and order that does not fairly serve the average man who plays the Game.

There have been some good men who have tried to improve the System but they have been unsuccessful, for whatever reasons. Consequently some of the Advocates who are outside of the Conventional System in the fight for Retired Player rights have been working very hard to organize a meeting made up of former players from,different parts of the country, different teams, different ages, with different positions and suggestions.These Advocates are unpaid and have spent their own money to force and encourage change in our situation.I am mentioning just a few of these men but please know that there are others as well. The meeting will be scheduled for sometime after the first of the year in one of the Airline Hub cities so that as many of us can attend as possible.Because of tight finances, health restrictions, family and professional obligations and in many of our lives I realize that everyone will not be able to physically be there.We want you there so we plan on doing everything possible to make it possible.We are not meeting to argue and we are not meeting to attack anyone.We are meeting to show that we can organize even though we do not all agree on all issues.

Please register your support for this meeting, whether you can attend or not, by e-mailing your Name, Team, and City/State to the Advocate who is sending this to you. That Advocate will enter you on our Master List of players seeking change. Click HERE to send us your information

Art Dononovan Statue

from Larry Harris/PressBoxOnline.com

A couple seasons back, former Baltimore Colt Bruce Laird and his Fourth And Goal organization that is designed to help retired and needy National Football League players decided to hold a fundraiser.

They picked Colts Hall of Famer Artie Donovan as the honoree for their affair and it was exceedingly successful. As usual, the garrulous Dunny, always the world’s greatest spinner of pro football stories, captivated onlookers to such a degree that organizers decided to commission a statue of the great defensive tackle.

Fred Kail, one of the most highly respected sculptors in the country, was chosen to do the artistic rendering and then the local good old boy network went to work with a will. Former Colts teammates and local sportsmen like Leroy Merritt, Ted Bauer, Frank Culotta, Elmer Wingate, Andy Nelson, Jim Mutscheller, Tom Matte, Vince Bagli and many others contributed their money, resources and time and that was all the prolific Kail needed.

Here’s a story by SportsBusiness Journal detailing the NFLPA’s motion to suppress attorney fees. Normal practice or union attorneys trying to keep legal costs from the active player?

By Daniel Kaplan, Staff Writer, SportsBusiness Journal

The NFLPA asked the judge who oversaw the case pitting the union against a class of retired players to wait to award attorneys fees and to divide the settlement because there is a substantial chance the verdict will be overturned. Last week a jury ordered the NFLPA to pay the 2,062-player class $28.1M for not marketing them properly. In a letter to Judge William Alsup on Friday, NFLPA outside counsel Jeffrey Kessler wrote, “Given the very real possibility that the judgment in favor of the Plaintiffs may be reversed or modified, Defendants believe that it would be a waste of judicial and party resources to now address attorneys fees and a distribution plan.” Kessler pointed to the judge’s own words, who prior to closing arguments told the plaintiffs’ attorneys outside the presence of the jury, “I am saying there are very substantial rule 50 motions that have been made.” Rule 50 motion allows the judge, even after a verdict, to aside a verdict and replace it with his or her own judgment if they think the jury improperly decided the case. The judge could also have had dismissed the charges before the jury got the case. The NFLPA plans to appeal the decision in the event Alsup does not overturn the verdict.

By DAVE GOLDBERG and JOHN WAWROW/Associated Press

Former Player Rep Troy Vincent is candidate for Executive Director

The search committee seeking a replacement for the late Gene Upshaw to run the NFL Players Association has narrowed the field to a little more than a dozen candidates, some with no previous ties to the union or the NFL, a person with knowledge of the search told The Associated Press.

The committee met this week with representatives of Reilly Partners, the search firm seeking candidates to replace Upshaw, who died in August. The union hopes to have a list of finalists set by early next year and select its new executive director at its annual meeting in Hawaii in March.

“The initial book had 25 candidates, and we pared it down to 13 or 14,” union president Kevin Mawae of the Tennessee Titans said. “The next step is to do a little more research on the guys we have. We’ll meet again with the 13 and then pare that down again.”

Mawae declined to identify the candidates who made the cut or discuss their backgrounds.
A person familiar with the list told The Associated Press the candidates who made the latest cut are split between former players and non-players, including those who have careers outside football. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the person is not authorized to release such information.

Among those considered strong contenders are Troy Vincent and Trace Armstrong, two former union presidents. Other candidates that have been considered are Jason Belser, who played safety for the Colts and Chiefs from 1992-2002 and now works for the union; and David Cornwell, an attorney who most recently has represented a group of players appealing suspensions for taking a diuretic that is a masking agent for steroids.

Another potential candidate, agent Tom Condon, has said he is not interested in the job, citing contract obligations to his firm, Creative Artists Agency. He is believed to be advising Armstrong on his candidacy. READ MORE