Weak Coverage

Those of you who watched the Broncos-Bills Week One game will be happy to know that Kevin Everett survived that hit. His spine was merely “scissored,” as orthopedic surgeon Dr. Andrew Cappuccino announced on Sept. 10th. With luck, the 25-year-old tight-end will one day regain the sensation in his legs and find another job. But don’t count on the National Football League (NFL) funding a recovery—the Bills have already cleaned out his locker.

Injuries like Everett’s spinal-snap are all too common in professional football. Unfortunately, the NFL’s lack of continuing interest in the player is just as predictable.

The average NFL player is employed for three to five years. During that time he spends several hours per day ramming his head into tacklers with up to 2,000 pounds of force (roughly the equivalent of you or me smashing our bare skulls against a brick wall repeatedly). In between possessions he retreats to the sideline for shots of Vicodin, Lidocaine, and encouragement to do it all over again. “Off-season” is a myth. “Injured reserve” is for cowards. The athletes contribute to the circus of blue-collar combat 24 hours per day, 365 days per year. But the consequences of an NFL career are extreme and often unknown to the fans: the average veteran at any position dies before he turns 55, the age at which he can finally begin to draw full pension.

The NFL uses up its laborers and then leaves them unprotected in the pocket. A Congressional hearing this past June revealed a pattern of conduct by the league that denies retirees the money to which their injuries entitle them. The game rakes in $7 billion per year and causes more bodily harm than any other. And yet fewer than 3 percent of applicable veterans—men plagued by brain trauma, dementia, and paralysis—succeed in obtaining disability benefits.

But surely the retirees can pay medical expenses with the money they made as players right? Unfortunately, no. The violent nature of football often renders athletes incapable of providing for their families. At career’s end their bodies are broken and multiple concussions have numbed their brains to the point where they cannot remember the hits that placed them in such miserable condition. Hospital and prescription bills suck up the money quickly, especially in the case of players from the 1970’s and 1980’s, whose salaries were but a pittance compared to those of today. The inability to lead a normal life forces former athletes to live off their pensions, which amount to no more than a sub-poverty $12,000 per year.

The 32 owners are certainly the masterminds behind the league’s shady treatment of its pastime superstars. But far more deplorable is the action—or inaction—of the NFL Player’s Association. The NFLPA, led by former Oakland Raider guard Gene Upshaw, has turned its back on its own. Despite the existence of a $1 billion NFLPA fund for retirees, the tax forms from 2006 show that only about 120 succeeded in obtaining disability benefits, for a total of approximately $9 million. The union, which is expected to work with management to provide for veterans who built the league, will simply not dole out the dough.

Why in such a lucrative industry, do the heroes of America’s greatest game have to live in agony and poverty? Some, like former Jaguars guard Brian DeMarco, have been homeless. Others currently rely on the charity of old coaches. Upshaw claims that players understand the nature of the game and should expect to provide for themselves after the big-time. “There is no job that you can work for five years—10 if you’re lucky—and then believe that you’re never going to have to work another day in your life,” he said during the hearings. True, but most jobs don’t turn the employee’s brain into brain soup after five years. According to the New York Times, the neurologists who performed the autopsy on former safety Andre Watters, dead at 44, found that he had the deteriorated brain of an 85-year-old man.

Upshaw is also quick to assert that the union represents only active players and the hotshots cannot be expected to forfeit a piece to old-timers no longer bringing in revenue. This statement is false on two accounts. First, the NFLPA fund money is provided almost entirely by the ownership. There is little reason that current players should vote to withhold pension payments absent of Upshaw’s pressure. Second, the league continues to make bucks off the names and feats of vets; it sells memorabilia, shows old film on ESPN Classic, and maintains the Hall of Fame.

The retirees’ case against the league is one against pure greed. This year Gene Upshaw will make $6.7 million—the highest salary for a union official in American history. At the very least, the NFLPA should push management to allow disabled vets access to full pension at an early age. Disabled veterans should be able to provide for their families before the last Hail Mary. Perhaps, if the owners and union truly have souls, they will support Kevin Everett’s family until he is back on his feet—or at least until he can feel them again.



Raúl A. Carrillo ’10 lives in Lowell House.