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Culverhouse: NFL doctors aren't advocates for players

The Associated Press

Former Bucs president Gay Culverhouse discusses the conflict of interest involving team doctors before a House committee.

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A wire report

Published: October 28, 2009

Updated: 10/28/2009 02:28 pm

WASHINGTON - Football team doctors are an extension of the coaching staff, not a medical advocate for players, former Tampa Bay Buccaneers president Gay Culverhouse told a House Judiciary Committee on NFL brain injuries Wednesday.

Culverhouse, who recently told the New York Times she has blood cancer and renal failure and only six months to live, testified after being in contact with several former players with deteriorating health associated with their careers.

"The team doctor is hired by the coach and paid by the front office," she said.

Players will do anything to stay in a game, even if injured, Culverhouse said. Some worry about falling short of performance bonuses or losing their jobs, so much that they lie about their health to team doctors or receive painkiller injections, she testified.

"Players get to a point where they refuse to tell the team doctor that they have suffered a concussion … [because] they know there is a backup player sitting on the bench, waiting to take their position," Culverhouse said.

"They are a disposal commodity. There is a draft coming up every April, and these players fight to hold on to their jobs and they welcome shots and anything else that will keep them on the field. This is, in my mind, inhumane, and I watched it since the early '70s, and I will tell you that it has not changed."

Culverhouse, 62, served as a Bucs executive from 1985 to 1994 and said she has been around the game since her father, Hugh Culverhouse, bought the team in 1974. The game hasn't changed over the years, she said, although the NFL said it is taking steps to improve players' medical care.

Culverhouse suggest that an independent neurologist be on the field at each game "who can make an independent judgment if he sees a player in the huddle throwing up."

She was also concerned about the impression made on youngsters who see athletes playing despite being hurt. She cited recent controversy over whether University of Florida quarterback Tim Tebow should resume playing within days after suffering a concussion.

She told the Times that after learning about former Tampa Bay player Tom McHale, who died at age 45 with brain damage, she began to call former players to learn about their ailments. Since then, she has become their advocate.

"Team doctors are involved in choosing players," she testified. "They evaluate how severe that knee injury was in college. [A team doctor] has a very vested interest in that player's success on the field. The team doctor dresses as a coach on the sidelines and he acts in many ways like a coach on the sidelines. He is not an independent advocate for the player.

"We've got to stop that."

Andrew Tucker, team physician for the Baltimore Ravens, echoed Culverhouse's assertion that players are prone to hiding information about head injuries.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell also testified, but would not acknowledge a connection between head injuries on the field and later brain diseases while defending the league's policies on concussions.

Under sometimes-contentious questioning from lawmakers — and suggestions about reconsidering the league's lucrative antitrust exemption — Goodell sat at the witness table Wednesday alongside NFL Players Association head DeMaurice Smith.

Both men agreed to turn over players' medical records to the House Judiciary Committee.

Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., asked Goodell whether he thinks there's an injury-disease link. Goodell responded that the NFL isn't waiting for that debate to play out and is taking steps to make the game safer.

"I just asked you a simple question. What is the answer?" persisted Conyers.

Goodell replied by saying a medical expert could give a better answer than he could.

Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., whose husband played in the NFL, asked Goodell how the league was addressing the welfare of retired players during current collective bargaining negotiations with the union.

Goodell said that it's a "priority for the owners and players to take better care of our retired players," but Waters cut him off, demanding specifics.

"We've heard from the NFL time and time again — you're always 'studying,' you're always 'trying,' you're 'hopeful,' " Waters said, pointing a finger in Goodell's direction. "I want to know what are you doing … to deal with this problems and other problems related to injuries?"

When Goodell said that talks between owners and players are in the early stages, Waters said it's time "for Congress to take a look at your antitrust exemption" and that she thinks it should be removed.

A 1961 law grants professional sports leagues antitrust exemption for broadcasting. That has allowed the NFL to sign TV contracts totaling billions of dollars on behalf of all its teams, helping transform the league into the economic powerhouse it is today.

In addition to medical records from the NFL and its union, Conyers wants information on head injuries from the NCAA, high schools and medical researchers to better understand football's health risks.

"We need an expeditious and independent review of all the data," Conyers said, calling the problem a "life and death" issue that warrants federal scrutiny.

"I say this not simply because of the impact of these injuries on the 2,000 current players and more than 10,000 retirees associated with the NFL and their families," Conyers said. "I say it because of the effect on the millions of players at the college, high school and youth levels."

Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, the top Republican on the panel, said that while Congress can highlight the consequences of playing football, "the NFL does not need Congress to referee this issue."

"Football, like soccer, rugby and even basketball and baseball, involves contact that can produce injuries," Smith said. "We cannot legislate the elimination of injuries from the games without eliminating the games themselves."

In his testimony, Goodell said that the league has "reduced red tape, simplified the process for applicants and their families, and sped disability determinations." The league recently commissioned a report which suggested that retired pro football players may have a higher rate than normal of Alzheimer's disease or other memory afflictions — although the league was quick to point out the report did not prove a link.

"We learned a good deal from the report and are actively following up with the 56 players who reported memory problems," he said.

Robert Cantu, co-director of Boston University's Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy, said there is "growing and convincing evidence" that repetitive concussive and subconcussive hits to the head in NFL players leads to a degenerative brain disease known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy.

"The public health risk is already here and we cannot afford to wait any longer to make changes to the way we play sports," he said, calling for rule and technique changes.

Goodell said that he met with Cantu a couple of weeks ago, and based on the discussion, has asked former coach and broadcaster John Madden to work with coaches to ways to identify new practice techniques to reduce risk of head trauma.

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

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