“In the big picture, it should be irrelevant what Roger Goodell or Jerry Jones thinks about the link.” That’s because Nowinski believes we should be past the point of wondering if the link is causal.
“So in the big picture this is nothing more than a ‘Big Tobacco, sowing a seed of doubt’ game plan that only serves to confuse the public,” he said.
“Goodell’s speech was depressing,” Nowinski said. “He’s standing there, saying that, ‘We’re going to let scientists do the right research’ only three months after it was exposed that they weren’t letting the best scientists do the best research when they refused to fund a Boston University-led study, with their supposedly no-strings-attached donation to NIH that was a lie.
“Goodell’s lying so frequently that I almost don’t think it matters anymore.”
ESPN reported that the league opted out of a $16 million grant for the Boston University study, but the NFL denied that. Nowinski believes the NFL was unhappy with the researchers selected by the NIH.
Asked to respond to Nowinski’s various charges, the league instead sent The Post a transcript of Goodell’s answer from Wednesday’s news conference. A follow-up request to specifically address Nowinski received no response.
In another charge that the league is attempting to influence the narrative, The San Jose Mercury News on Wednesday reported that the
NFL’s political action committee has made nearly $300,000 in campaign contributions to 41 of the 54 members of a congressional committee reviewing concussion research.
Thursday, The New York Times published
a lengthy report accusing the league of underplaying the problem by omitting more than 100 diagnosed concussions from a study that was based on reporting from team physicians from 1996 to 2001. The Times said the league had portrayed it as a “full accounting” of concussions; the league issued a lengthy statement saying, “The studies never claimed to be based on every concussion that was reported or that occurred.” The Times then fired back in a point-by-point Twitter barrage.
Boston University researchers found CTE in 90 of 94 brains of former NFL players they examined, although whether that sample is indicative of retired football players in general is unclear. Late players who had CTE include former Dolphins
Earl Morrall and Junior Seau and Pahokee’s
Andre Waters, who played for the Eagles.
