OTL: His Game, His Rules
ByDON VAN NATTA JR.
September 13, 2015, 3:02 PM
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This story appears in ESPN The Magazine's One Day, One Game issue on newsstands March 8. SUBSCRIBE TODAY »
\tBEHIND THE CLOSED doors of a Capitol Hill chamber, Roger Goodell sits on a panel with an Army general before a rapt audience of two dozen lawmakers. The NFL commissioner swaps ideas with four-star Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III about how to better protect the brains of the young people who fight America's wars and play America's game. They also discuss changing the \"warrior mentality\" among soldiers and players, who keep fighting and playing through pain. The parallel is unmistakable: To detect and treat traumatic brain injuries, the U.S. Army and the NFL are partners in survival.
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ENLARGE NFL commissioner Roger Goodell met with a U.S. Army general and lawmakers to discuss brain trauma.
Military Veterans' Caucus \tThis was on Sept. 12 of 2012. Clad in a navy blue business suit offset by a bright yellow tie, Goodell, 54, jots notes as Austin speaks. Almost 7,000 soldiers deployed in Afghanistan have sensors embedded in their helmets to record concussive events, Austin tells Goodell. Another general muses that it's easy to imagine that someday the Army's sensors will be embedded in every NFL player's helmet.
From Capitol Hill, Goodell races to a luncheon interview at the W Hotel before a crowd of fans. The interview, initiated by the league office, is conducted by a friendly questioner from the Politico website who allows Goodell to combat a swirl of bad news, from the league's lockout of the referees to a run of negative player-safety studies. On that most important issue, he tells the awed audience, in his methodical manner of speaking: \"Player health and safety is an issue that we've always been focused on. It's always been a priority.\"
Three years earlier, on another, more unsettling visit to Capitol Hill, Goodell was ripped by House Judiciary Committee members and former players. Repeatedly, he was pressed to acknowledge a link between playing football and cognitive erosion. Despite the fact that the league's retirement board had already made the link internally years earlier, he refused.