NFL Pain-Killer Culture: John Madden Says Broadcast Announcer Gets Shots, Too
SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) — A day after a
lawsuit filed by former players against the National Football League alleging illegal and unethical administration of pain-killing drugs causing long-term health effects, Hall of Fame coach John Madden offered an anecdote Wednesday of the league’s drug culture extending up to the announcing booth.
In the suit, players such as former San Francisco 49er Jeremy Newberry allege they would line up so team trainers could inject them with the powerful painkiller Toradol without prescriptions or warnings of possible side effects. Other pain medications such as Percodan, Percocet and Vicodin were handed out “like candy,” according to lead attorney Steven Silverman.
During his
Daily Madden segment with KCBS Radio in San Francisco, Madden said at least one announcer has taken advantage of the readily available pain-killing injections. “I know an announcer that goes down to the locker room to get a Toradol shot before a game,” said Madden.
A number of former football players have made the move to the announcing booth after retiring from the game. Madden did not identify the announcer or say if he was a former player, but he said the announcer gets the Toradol injection because he is in pain.
“I think he goes at a different time [than the players], you know, he gets there early, you know, that type of thing,” said Madden. “But he’s gotten Toradol shots.”
According to the lawsuit, “…the NFL has intentionally, recklessly, and negligently developed a culture of drug misuse, substituting players’ health for profit.”
The players seek financial compensation for the long-term chronic injuries, financial losses and long-term health care for future problems they will suffer.
Former-NFL Players File Lawsuit Against the NFL Alleging Illegal Use of Painkillers By The League
by ELIZABETH MURRAY @elizabthmurray
Another summer,
another class-action lawsuit against the NFL. This time, eight former NFL players—Richard Dent, Jim McMahon, Jeremy Newberry, Roy Green, J.D. Hill, Keith Van Horne, Ron Stone, and Ron Pritchard—filed a class-action lawsuit alleging that the NFL supplied them with illegally prescribed painkillers throughout their careers, which led to medical complications such as addiction later in life.
Specifically, the players are alleging:
1. The NFL illegally and unethically supplied players serious pain medications, including addictive opioids, and NSAIDs such as torodol.
2. The NFL did so for financial gain, in order to keep them in competition rather than allowing them to rest and heal.
3. The NFL “fraudulently concealed” the dangerous side effects of the drugs from players.
3. The illegal prescription of these painkillers has led to dangerous medical conditions later in life, including painkiller addiction, stage 3 renal failure and high blood pressure.
More than 500 other former players have signed on to the lawsuit, which was filed today in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, according to lawyers representing the former athletes. They are looking to make the case a class action lawsuit.
An NFL spokesman told Fusion that NFL lawyers have not yet had time to review the lawsuit.
The full complaint outlines how plaintiff after plaintiff went through the same ordeal: illegal prescription of painkillers, deceit about both the injuries and the side effects of the drugs, and subsequent medical damage.
Some excerpts include:
“Named Plaintiff Jeremy Newberry received hundreds of Toradol injections over the course of his career and for many games, would receive as many as five or six injections of other medications during the course of a game. He also would receive Vicodin before, during and after games to numb pain and often during a game would simply ask a trainer for medications, which would be provided without record as to who was receiving what.”
“While playing in the NFL, Mr. Hill received hundreds, if not thousands, of pills from trainers and doctors, including but not limited to NSAIDs, Codeine, Valium and Librium. No one from the NFL ever talked to him about the side effects of the medications he was being given or cocktailing. He left the League addicted to painkillers, which he was forced to purchase on the streets to deal with his football-related pain, a path that led him to other street medications. He eventually became homeless and was in and out of 15 drug treatment centers for a period of over 20 years until overcoming his NFL-sponsored drug addiction.”
"Mr. Green, who received hundreds of NSAIDs (which can cause kidney damage) from NFL doctors and trainers, had tests performed on him while he played in the NFL that showed he had high creatinine levels, indicative of a limitation on his kidney function. No one from the NFL ever told him of those findings. In November 2012, he had a kidney transplant."
Of course, this is the second class-action lawsuit filed against the NFL by former players. In August 2013, the league agreed to a
$765 million settlement with former players who alleged the league lied to players about the physical danger of concussions, which created long-term disabilities for the players that were not covered by league insurance.