NBRPA TO LAUNCH TV-STYLE LEGENDS TALK SHOW ON HUFF POST

March 27, 2012

For Immediate Release

CHICAGO, ILL. – The National Basketball Retired Players Association (NBRPA), the only Association comprised of NBA, ABA and Harlem Globetrotters alumni, has announced the launch of a new TV-style talk show that will air regularly on one of the most-visited news web sites in the world – the Huffington Post. Holding Court – presented by the NBRPA’s Legends of Basketball will debut in April, 2012 at HuffingtonPost.com – a web site and community that boast more than 50 million users each month.

“The NBRPA and Legends of Basketball brand is all about our members – former NBA, ABA and Harlem Globetrotters players that literally built the game of basketball into the worldwide industry it is today,” said Arnie D. Fielkow, CEO for the National Basketball Retired Players Association. “Holding Court will help us deliver our Legends of Basketball to the Huffington Post’s captive worldwide audience.”

Holding Court will be hosted and co-produced by Huffington Post sports writer Dave Hollander, who will work in tandem with Paul Corliss of the NBRPA to put each program together. Hollander is the author of 52 WEEKS: Interviews with Champions! (The Lyons Press) – his collection of personal stories and stunningly candid interviews with fifty-two famous sports figures including Lawrence Taylor, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Rickey Henderson, George Plimpton, Mariano Rivera, Steve Nash and John Wooden. Hollander was the Executive Producer, Creator and writer for Gate D, a hip, fast-paced variety show for young fans of the New Jersey Nets, which aired on Fox Sports New York in the late 1990s. Hollander was also Co-Creator of Album Covers on MTV2, featuring Dashboard Confessional, Michael Stipe, Guster and The Violent Femmes, 2004.

“I’m like a kid in a candy store,” Hollander said. “Colorful stories you just don’t hear anymore, super-honest and relevant commentary – there’s a huge audience of smart sports fans who want to hear from these guys.”

Holding Court will feature NBRPA Legends of Basketball in candid and lively sit-down interviews on camera with Hollander. The show will debut with Hollander’s interview of Otis Birdsong, a four-time NBA All-Star and the first guard in NBA history to be paid $1 million per season.

Holding Court will air regularly on the Huffington Post and archived episodes will be available at the NBRPA’s official web site – LegendsofBasketball.com. According to eBizMBA.com, the Huffington Post is the sixth-most visited news web site in the world, with 54 million monthly users. Great Britain’s Observer – the oldest Sunday newspaper in the world – recently ranked the Huffington Post as the most powerful blog in the world.

About the National Basketball Retired Players Association
The National Basketball Retired Players Association (NBRPA) is comprised of former professional basketball players from the NBA, ABA and Harlem Globetrotters. It is a 501(c) 3 organization with a mission to develop, implement and advocate a wide array of programs to benefit its members, supporters and the community. The NBRPA was founded in 1992 by basketball legends Dave DeBusschere, Dave Bing, Archie Clark, Dave Cowens and Oscar Robertson. The NBRPA works in direct partnerships with the NBA and the National Basketball Players Association. Arnie D. Fielkow is the CEO, and the NBRPA Board of Directors includes President & Chairman of the Board Robert A. (Bob) Elliott, Vice President Otis Birdsong, Treasurer Marvin Roberts, Secretary Steve Hayes, Past President Dr. George W. Tinsley Sr., Thurl Bailey, Harvey Catchings, James Donaldson, Johnny Newman, LaRue Martin and Danny Schayes. For more information, please visit www.LegendsofBasketball.com.

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And watch the truly super video: http://www.spryliving.com/videos/view/1089778677001/.

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I don’t say it’s “the best ever” because I wrote it, or because hyperbolic subject lines make people open emails. I say it because I believe it. This book is important. It says things that need to be said; things, I think, that will help a lot of people.  Michael is brave to tell it.  I am fortunate to simply be included.  But I can do more. I can ask you to read it, ask your friends to read it, ask your mayors, your congressman, and your clergy to read it.  Because on September 11, 2011 it’ll be 10 years since the attack, and you can be sure there will be articles and interviews and video tape and, well, then there’s this book. Please read it.  Then you tell me – please tell me – where do we go from here?

For more information about the book, click here.

Purchase your copy today!

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So, I went to the Prudential Center in Newark to see the Nets play the Golden State Warriors last night. I think it was as nice of a live professional sports experience as I’ve been to in years. Please don’t stop reading.

I know. I was watching two teams with losing records; one with no shot and one with almost no shot of a postseason, as we head into the 66th game of a long 82 game season. The Nets new ballyhooed acquisition, Deron Williams, couldn’t play. It was cold and damp out and, well, it was night in the Port of Newark, NJ. One was bound to ask to ask oneself is this really “where amazing happens?”

Well, let me tell you what happened: On the court, a close competitive game was played, decided by four points in last ten seconds. I watched the preternaturally talented Brook Lopez hustle, dive (in the second quarter), defend and score the last 9 points of the game — like a star does — to lead all scorers. I watched David Lee, like he does, quietly, appropriately and selflessly accumulate another double-double. I watched Stephan Curry and Monta Ellis dart, slash and score with a repertoire of offensive moves where not one move looked at all like the others. I watched Sasha Vujacic for four quarters personify the charming basketball adage shoot-to-get-hot-shoot-to-stay-hot. I observed Anthony Morrow take and make big shots all night because, you may not have known, he played for Golden State before he went to the Nets and this was his first time “hosting” his old mates. No wonder he scored a season-high 22. Nice little storyline for anyone who knew the story. End to end, for 48 minutes I saw quality professional performances and serious competition. And, “amazingly” there might’ve been only about three dunks the whole night.

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The following is an excerpt from a March 2011 interview with Dave Hollander by Jerry Barca for the Plimpton! Book Club:

Author and sports columnist Dave Hollander is the last person to record an interview with George Plimpton.

Plimpton established the Art of Fiction interview series in The Paris Review, the Plimpton! Book Club spoke to Hollander about the art of interviewing. Hollander, an attorney by trade, gave away the secret as to why he can get away with the sometimes smart-aleck style of his interviews. He offered up the most surprising information he ever heard from an interviewee, and he wondered what Plimpton would think of today’s sports blogger.

Jerry Barca: What did you think of George Plimpton’s work?

Dave Hollander: His work is affectionate and intellectual. He really likes the subject matter he engages. When you read, I guess, what we can call his sports writing, he’s throwing all his powers of observation into it. I don’t find his writing to be clinical as much as it is exploratory. He is like a man who has been dropped on a foreign planet and who is trying to describe everything for all of us who have never been to that planet. And he does it with such affection. Some people try to take a slant or try to make a point. The only point he tries to make is description of what it is he’s writing about. It is often lilting toward humor, but mostly it is affectionate. He is just enjoying himself with tremendous fondness for the subject.

JB: It is interesting what you say about him in describing the foreign planet. I think people mistakenly look at Plimpton as if he performed a series of stunts. That’s not it. He performed the act – quarterback for the Detroit Lions, goalie for the Bruins – but his writing delivered a world readers could only get to by reading him.

DH: To the extent that he coined the phrase “participatory journalist,” he just used that as a jumping off point to talk about everything connected to the subject. That is the uber-extremist investigation of what he was writing about – actually stepping into the shoes of another profession. Contrast that with the trend today of the sports blogger who prides himself on being as far removed from the actual activity, who writes from his couch through the limited lens of media. I wonder what a man who took a punch in the face from (boxing champion) Archie Moore would think of this movement of fan-journalist, not even journalist – fan-opinionator who says, “I’m the real perspective. I’m the more enlightened perspective. Somehow I can connect better with everyone. Read me because I have no direct contact, no primary expertise.” The two couldn’t be more opposite in what they’re trying to do.

There are sportswriters. There are beat writers who go to games. But the word “sports” has been polluted and the connotation for most people when you say “sports” is a professional, corporate, cultural monolith. A commercial experience. It is not what Plimpton or (Norman) Mailer or Joyce Carol Oates or Ira Berkow or any other latter day sports writers saw it as; they saw it as an unlimited real and separate cultural forum that was not a media creation, but a manmade man-played creation. We’re so far away from that, that if you go to an NFL game now, the movement is to put more digital screens and media enhancements in the stadium, in your seat, so the live game can be more like the experience at home, which just blows my mind. What has happened is that the real game – the actual thing – is not enough anymore. How can that possibly be true? But it is. We don’t trust that people can understand it so we’ve dumbed it down. We feel that if you go to the game you’re going to be so bored that we have to give you a TV screen in front of your face so you can follow the actual game.

….

JB: How would you describe your interviewing style?

DH: I would say it is conversational, but deceptively intelligent.

….

JB: Is there somebody you’d want to interview that you haven’t yet?

DH: If you’re looking for someone who transcends sports, but within sports was so far ahead, it’s Bill Russell. I just think everyone should study him and understand just exactly what he accomplished – his understanding of sport and what it took to win, his incredibly high ethical and moral standard as an athlete, which came from him as a human being. They were totally congruent. He refused his induction into the Basketball Hall of Fame when he was offered it in 1974. He said it was for personal reasons and people didn’t understand. They thought it was race related, but he just said, “I just don’t believe in halls of fame. I don’t believe in all-star teams. It’s a team game.”  It makes no sense to him.

Russell was just so far ahead of the game. He was never really in it for the money or the fame. He wasn’t driven by those things. He just woke up every morning and was committed to being the best human being he could possibly be. Oftentimes being that for him came at great expense to potential fame and fortune. I think he was amazing and still is.

To read the complete interview, click here.

Union reps, league spokespersons and media will prattle on about fairness and revenues. The NFLPA may be right that the owners could share a bit more of the loot and still enjoy lots of profit and no lag to their rising franchise valuations. Both the NFLPA and the NFL should own up to their shameful treatment of retirees and to the unavoidable long term injuries that result from their violent but pleasing game. Yet as long as the NFL enjoys anti-trust protections, they really are the only game in town and whether the players believe or not, the league can do well — quite well — without them.

Why am I so sure?

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(Originally Published on AOL Sports, August 2, 2007)

“Josh from Cincinnati”

My little subheading is playing off HBO’s new, hard-to-know-what-the-hell-is-happening show, John from Cincinnati.   I like the show.  Recently, for another publication, I interviewed Austin Nichols who plays the enigmatic, could-be-alien title character.  (Great guy.)

Many people have trouble with the show because it provides no answers.  There’s no resolution at the end of each episode.  You get no rest, just more questions.  You know, like real life.

But why did David Milch, the brilliant writer/producer of NYPD Blue and Deadwood choose Cincinnati as the place where it is believed his pivotal character comes from? Milch doesn’t make random, meaningless choices. Could it be that Cincinnati, of all places, is where the most heartbreaking issues of betrayal, redemption, mercy and forgiveness converge?

Take the story of Maurice Stokes. He was the powerful rebounding forward for the NBA’s 1958-59 Cincinnati Royals. As a result of being knocked unconscious during a game, Stokes suffered post-traumatic encephalopathy, a brain injury that damaged his motor control center, leaving him in coma, permanently paralyzed.  He died at the age of 38.  All-Star games, celebrity golf fundraisers and athletic centers have been named in his honor.  Also take the story of the Cincinnati Reds Pete Rose.  For so long he was the picture of pure baseball. Now he is synonymous with disgrace. Baseball still cannot forgive him.

Then there’s Josh Hamilton.  The current Reds outfielder is a great modern day story of a second chance.  He’ll be the first to tell you he couldn’t have done it alone. His case reminds me of the story I heard told on the hit NBC show, The West Wing, but I’m sure it’s been told in many places:

Man falls into a hole. He can’t get out. People gather around but no one can help him.  A priest comes by and says a few Hail Mary’s, but he can’t get out of the hole.  A Rabbi comes by and reads from the Old Testament, but he can’t get out of the hole.  Then a friend comes by and jumps down in the hole with him. The man says to his friend “Oh great. Now we’re both stuck down here.” The friend says back “Yeah, but I’ve been down here before.  And I know the way out.”

Josh Hamilton got out. Now he’s in Cincinnati, playing baseball.

Your road to recovery has been well documented and celebrated. Now that the spotlight has died down, is this the hard part –  living day-to-day with day-to-day little things?

It’s really not. I wasn’t looking at it before like the day-to-day routine was any different: being with family, going to park and doing my job.  I still get opportunities to share my story in different cities but at the same time it’s really no different to me.

With everything that’s happened in your life, is there a new perspective on what baseball means to you?

It means the same now as it meant when I was six or seven years old. It’s just life.  It’s  not the whole life.  I don’t really have a  new perspective on it.  I just have a new passion for it, I guess you could say.

I guess you could say you have a second chance. Have you ever seen the movie The Natural, or read the book?

Oh yeah. It’s one of my favorite movies.

Do you see any similarities between Roy Hobbes and what you’ve got going now?

A movie is a movie and life is life. That movie’s been out for years and years and it kind of delivers the same message my story does, as far as people making mistakes. It’s all about how you get through those mistakes – overcoming them, learning from them and moving on to the future.

You must really love of the game to come back like this. You didn’t have to come back to baseball you could’ve gotten another job. How much does baseball help keep you on the beam?

When I got drafted and playing those first couple years, I would’ve said baseball was life. It was all I cared about and all I really wanted to do. I didn’t realize how much I missed it until I got back to playing it. And at the same time, I realize now that baseball is not everything. That was the biggest key for me. Life is too big now. Baseball is just something that I can do, that I enjoy doing and something I can do to make a living which is a huge added bonus.

Some people equate Steroids with drug abuse.  What do you think about that?

I never did take steroids. I’ve never understood that if a guy can hit a ball 500 feet, if you can throw a ball from the outfield to where it needs to be or throw it across the infield then why do you need to do it?  But at the same time I can understand looking at it from a guy who’s been in the minor leagues for 8 years, Triple A, still trying to get over that hump. I can understand a guy thinking about doing it then. It’s something I never did because I never felt like I needed to do it. Everybody’s got different opinions on it. Mine is that it shouldn’t be allowed, you knew you weren’t supposed to do it, but it happened and now they’re getting control of it so I think it’s going to make the game more even.

You were the first draft pick overall in 1999, how hard is it to explain to some people that  it’s just as hard to deal with success as it is to deal with  failure?

It all comes down to the choices you make. When you have failure you’ve got a lot of the same choices to make as when you have success. When I got drafted I got almost $4 million to play.  The pressure form everybody else really didn’t get to me. It was the pressure I put on myself to perform.  That was the main thing. At that time it didn’t matter how much I had going or how much money I had or how many things I could get, I was never happy.  I ended going down that road that I went down. Ever since I surrendered and gave it all over to the Lord, it’s been unbelievable how much happier I am. The last couple years out there I had nothing – just my wife and kids – but I put them through hell. Now the last year and half I’ve been happier without material things than I have been my whole life.

In your fight to stay sober what are the triggers you look for?

The main thing is thinking about it. Everyone once in while a thought will pop in my head about the past or using or place where I was a at a certain time and what I was doing there. The key to that is when it pop in, you think about something else. You don’t think about start dwelling on what you went through. You change your way of thinking and tht basically takes care of that.

In recovery they talk a lot about feeling your feelings and how difficult that can be. But is there any better feeling in life than hitting a home run in a major league ball park?

(laughs) Throwing somebody out in a major league ball park. I enjoy doing that more than hitting a home run. Don’t get me wrong I like hitting home runs too. But when you actually see the play develop: You see the guy on 3^rd base or second or wherever he’s at. The ball’s hit. He’s taggin’. You can hear the roar of crow start to come up because they’re getting excited. Then you catch the ball and throw it adn before your eyes, he lays the tag on ‘em.  And then the crowd erupts. That’s something else.

In recovery you often hear about hitting bottom. What was your bottom and how did you know you were there?

I weigh 230 pounds now. Then I was 180 pounds. I showed up on my grandmother’s door. And I could just see it in her face how deathly I looked. If I hadn’t gone to my grandmother’s house that night October 2005, I might not be here right now. I stayed at her house. In the first week I used a couple times there. She knew I was doing it. And she came crying and said she couldn’t take it. She didn’t want to see me like that anymore. I was hurting everyone I loved. They were worrying to death. For some reason that moment made me realize how my life had spiraled down to where it was.

There are people who come into your life in recovery who you could never predict would be there.  Who is Roy Silver and what did he mean to you?

I tell you, Roy, I met him in 1999. He was with the Devil Rays coaching and we briefly talked in passing. I wasn’t again until January of 2006 that he read an article in one of the St. Pete papers where I said I wish I could just get back around baseball environment and have somebody to talk to. He called me. He runs a baseball school down in Clearwater and he said he’d give me that opportunity to do some work around there – vacuum, take trash out, grounds keeping — trade those services for be able to live  there and be around the game.  Him and Randy Holland were two guys that started this facility.  And all we did was work and they’d talk to me about the Lord. We had bible studies on Tuesday nights. Everyone there were solid people, solid Christians. They just loved on me.  When I did something wrong they punished me for it and when things were going good they rewarded me for it. It was such a win-win situation to be around baseball again and be around these kind of people who genuinely see good in others an want them to do better. It was just amazing.

Who is Michael Dean Chadwick?

That is my father-in-law. I went to him about 4 years ago. I wasn’t looking for a job. He owns a construction and land development business. He hired me.  He’s just one of these guys who’s always encouraging. I married his daughter. In our first year of marriage I put her through hell and I know there’s time she just wanted to choke me to death but he’s another one of those guys who just love on you unconditionally. He is a motivational speaker as well. He’s spoken to high school. college and professional teams. He’s just one those guys you want in your corner and will do anything for you.

What’s your relationship like with Lou Pinella?

Lou Pinella!  We first talked in 2003. He had just been named the coach of the Devil Rays. I went to spring training.  Met him. And that’s the time I went missing for four days. He called me in his office and told me I was a great talent and that he saw there was a few things I needed to get fixed, mentally. That was the extent of the conversation. At opening day this year, I went over to him. He hugged me and said he was proud of me. Said he was glad to see things were going well again. He said he never doubted my talent and that he knew I needed to get things under control and he was glad to see I’d done that. He’s always been a great guy to talk to. You can go in and talk to him and you know he’ll treat you like a man and respect what you’re gonna say, and he’ll tell you what he’s got to say.

You regain some things in recovery. But what do feel like you lost that you can never get back?

The time I lost in baseball. You can’t recover that. It was almost four years. I hurt some relationships along the way. Those are things you can definitely work on and amend. The main thing I would tell you is the time I missed.

When you see what’s happening to somebody like Doc Gooden, what goes through you mind?

I feel sorry for the guy. I know there’s a way out. I feel sorry for the family because I know how much pain it puts the family through. Really I just pray for the guy who is  still going through the things he’s going through.  There’s nothing anybody can do for that person unless that person wants to do it for themselves. All I can do is pray. I hope they turn their lives around and I know there’s something they can do to do that. It just makes me realize how fortunate I am to have started making the right decisions and living responsibly.

Even though the things you went through were painful and life threatening, do you feel grateful that you went through what you did to get to where you are now?

Absolutely. When you’re going through it you realize why you’re going through it.  I cursed God many times not understanding why I was going through it. When you come out of it, the light turns on.  I know that if I hadn’t gone through it I probably wouldn’t be married to Katy right now, wouldn’t have two kids, my relations with the Lord wouldn’t be as strong as it is right now, my relationships wit my family wouldn’t be where they are and I wouldn’t be back in baseball. There so much good that come from bad.

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Teams are not just presenting themselves with new players but with entirely new — intentional or unintentional — team personalities. The Miami Heat and their Three Profiteers are viewed as collusive and bratty. Targets are on their backs. The Knicks finally revamped their roster then repulsed everyone, recalling the disgraced Isiah Thomas and unashamedly presaging his return, likely as future GM. No doubt many females on the MSG staff relish the thought of working under him. The Nets poured on the Russian dressing and the Spurs remain an Alamo of isolated, sanctified professional basketball. The Baby Bulls are coming of age. Phil, Kobe and the rest of the Lakers will play hard to get, showing little weakness as they plan to defend a title.

Yet to my mind, one of the more intriguing offseason moves was the hiring of former player “agent” Lon Babby as President of Basketball Operations for the Phoenix Suns. As an agent Babby was known for collecting high profile NBA clients who were top notch citizens off the court. Grant Hill was his first. Then came guys like Tim Duncan, Ray Allen; all good guys. That’s because Babby is a good guy. Instead of taking his 15% cut like most agents do, Babby – an attorney – simply charged an hourly rate like lawyers do. And, as an attorney, Babby was bound by a professional canon of ethics which requires the most expeditious and inexpensive resolutions for his clients. No secret, but no such canon of ethics exist for sports agents.

Is Babby’s ethical standard of handpicking excellent citizens transferable in his new job? Currently, the Suns roster has two Stanford grads, one Duke grad, a Northeastern alum and several four-year college guys. The team boasts former Babby clients – Josh Childress, Hedo Turkoglu and Grant Hill. Plus, there’s Steve Nash who, when he’s not reading Gabriel Garcia-Marquez novels or making sure Africa has potable water, is setting about as solid example for young athletes as anyone in modern sports.

“I wouldn’t call them ‘good guys’” Babby told me “but good character guys. Men of substance… Most of all they need to be tough and we need to win.”

Yeah, I know. You need to win. But while many other teams are creating team chemistry with questionable elements, Babby has collected rare gems who happen to be tough and effective basketball players. Everyone has that corny uncle who used to say, “If you can’t be good, be good at it.” The Phoenix Suns are good and good at it, and I believe there is a correlation between the two. And what’s wrong with managing professional sports franchise that way?

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I bet many gay male athletes feel that way — not part of the community. Their homosexuality is most certainly unacceptable in the professional sports community and their social masculinity — their dress, their humor, their nightlife interests — often fall outside established gay social institutions. Who are their role models? What TV sitcom can they point their pals in the locker to and say “See, that’s the kind of gay man I am.”

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When Dutch scholar Johan Huizinga wrote Homo Ludens: The Play Element in Culture (1938) he made the strong and enduring argument that in the “primeval soil of play” we find the origin of “the great instinctive forces of civilized life,” of myth and ritual, law and order, poetry and science. “Play,” he said, “cannot be denied. You can deny, if you like, nearly all abstractions: justice, beauty, truth, goodness, mind, God. You can deny seriousness, but not play.”

Well my friends, we’ve got plenty of denial going on. And we are hurting from it.

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Sonny Werblin understood the value of star quality in sports long before the rest of his pro football brethren. In 1965, when Werblin, President and part-owner of the formerly New York Titans re-named New York Jets spent a then record-breaking $427,000 to induce Joe Namath to pass up the established National Football League in favor of the much-maligned American Football League, football fans let alone Jets fans thought he was crazy. Werblin’s reply: “A million-dollar set is worthless if you put a $2,000 actor in the main role.” That’s how you build a professional sports franchise. When Werblin actually signed Namath he said, “I don’t know whether you’ll play on our team or make a picture for Universal.” Namath went on to do both. And together, they transformed professional sports, professional football and gave the world a fairy tale called Super Bowl III. The aforementioned still remains the soul of the New York Jets.

Yup, that’s how you build a professional sports franchise. Or that’s how you used to build one.

Things are a little trickier today. You have to integrate your marketing, integrate your media, segment your fan affinity, amp up your fan avidity and be everything for everybody on every channel in every income bracket. As 21st century business of sports whirls dervishly into dizzying levels of media and marketing that would’ve been the Viagra of Sonny Werblin’s daydreams, it is the 2010 New York Jets who seem steps ahead of their fellow ringmasters.

How do you build pro sports brand today?

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To me, Dara Torres represents everything that sports should be. She’s competitive, dignified, tough, smart, independent, clean, and innovative. She’s puts herself out as a role model but not as a corporate prop, or a brand, or a reality show, or some artificial construct existing just to make more money. She does have a new book out on fitness… but really I just used that an excuse for me to talk to her again. Because I think she should be heard more and often. Here, as usual, she does not disappoint.

Click here to read my Q&A with Dara Torres.

The Compton-born, Ivy-League graduate, retired NFL-All Pro Defensive End, co-host of ABC show Winners Bracket, ESPN Football Analyst has been a refreshingly candid and intelligent voice on a range of professional sports issues, most notably gun ownership. He minces no words in our conversation below.

I have three words for you: chronic traumatic encephalopathy. What can you say about that?

Well, with Chris Henry’s death I heard he was diagnosed with that — CTE. I’ve heard of over 50 former players who have had unusual circumstances related to their deaths and were also victims of CTE. It is something of a conversation amongst my circle in a sense that we wonder are we victims of the same thing. What are the symptoms? I think a lot more needs to be known about it. Because if we played under conditions which led to that, obviously we want to be abreast of it and well-informed.

Chris Henry is the first player reported to have CTE while he was playing but he did not know.

Football is such a violent game. Part of the culture is to tough it out and play through injury. Sometimes that means you can go further then you even know. You can ignore things that are obvious symptoms which would tell the common person to go to the doctor’s office but as a football player you may just walk around and this “this is part of the game.” I don’t know the symptoms of CTE but it needs to be addresses and answered in a widespread manner.

Whatever is found out, given the violent nature of football, what can we possibly do about it?

First of all figure out what are the causes. I don’t know enough about it but obviously there must be some linkage to sports where there are collisions.

I think the cause is fairly established: It’s repeated hits on the head.

Yeah, that’s the assumption I was under. What can you do about it? There is some small fine print in the contract in life you sign when you say you want to play professional football, and I think that’s just part of it. Better technology with the helmets, safer techniques in tackling… but we kind of know what we are signing onto. It’s kind of unfortunate that we get to this point where there is CTE even while you play but other than those two safeguards I don’t know what else they can do because guys are still going to go out there and bang.

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Click here to read the Q&A.