re: #407 SteveMcGazi

The NFLPA didn’t have the same information the NFL did. The league was actively suppressing information about brain injuries, and it took years before they even set up a concussion protocol for the league (and years more before the league clamped down on the protocol to insure safety of the players).

The NFLPA is among the weakest of the player unions for athletes. And the NFL is among the most tightly controlled of the league offices.

Goodell made sure to keep the issue from breaking out for as long as possible, because the evidence that the league had was that if parents knew that the damage could start as young as Pee Wee with a cumulative effect, that’s the end of the league as parents wouldn’t let their kids start with the sport.

There’s no other way to sugar coat the way the league has operated re: brain injuries. No other sport requires the kind of contacts that football does - with athletes throwing their bodies at each other at mind boggling speeds, and every single play involves a direct collision.