Goodell on Brady (the greatest) and Kaepernick (unrecognized)
By Art Spander
He is the son of a politician, a U.S. Senator from New York. No surprise that Roger Goodell can maneuver so well through the tough times — and yes, the most important sporting league in America has them — and the difficult questions.
He is 61. NFL commissioner for some 14 years, paid enormously ($40 million annually) and, when needed, able to slip past the criticism and doubt like a great running back through would-be tacklers.
This is Goodell’s week, the annual week for the Super Bowl, “America’s Great Time Out,” it’s been labeled. And Goodell, as did his recent predecessors, the late Pete Rozelle and John Tagliabue, gets his glory and his grief, the latter when he addresses and responds to the media.
Rozelle, eagerly — hey, he helped create the Super Bowl back in 1966 — and Tagliabue, reluctantly, held their sessions on the Friday before the game. A couple years back, Goodell switched it to Thursday.
He was well prepared this Thursday. He’s always well prepared.
A one-time prep football star in suburban New York — Goodell’s career at Washington & Jefferson College was ruined by an injury — he pays attention both to game plans and possibilities.
Very little catches him off guard, whether it’s the understandably repetitive queries about the lack of African American coaches for a league in which 70 percent of the players are black; or the somewhat oddball query whether Tampa, host for this Sunday’s Super Bowl LV, will get the game in a “normal,” year, not haunted by the pandemic, when fans again will be permitted.
"I don't know when normal will occur again," Goodell confided.
Nor, he could have added, does anyone else.
The new normal, if that’s the proper label, is to have as many media on Zoom calls as are in the room. Yes, journalists from some locations were there in flesh and blood. But so were journalists from as far away from Florida as Great Britain, via video conferencing.
Each constituency had its own requests, whether about Goodell’s relationship with Tom Brady, for whom the commissioner’s 2015 suspension for “Deflategate” was overruled, or what thoughts he had on Super Bowl LVI at the $5 billion SoFi Stadium in L.A., which opened last fall and where there hasn’t yet been a game with spectators.
“Tom Brady has shown himself to be probably the greatest player ever to play the game,” said Goodell about the 43-year-old quarterback who will start for Tampa Bay in his 10th Super Bowl game.
“His leadership, his ability to rise to the big occasion,” Goodell continued, “to make everybody around him rise ... and he’s one the great guys. I’ve known him for about 15 years. I think he’s going to continue to be a great player. I’m glad he’s going to play a few more years.”
Ben Volin of the Boston Globe — remember, for 20 years Brady was with New England — wanted to know whether Goodell punishing Brady back in 2015 was “the right thing to do.” That never was answered directly.
Goodell was more candid about Colin Kaepernick, who after leading the 49ers to Super Bowl XLVII in February 2013 was ostracized because a few years later he knelt during the National Anthem to protest racism.
Urged by then-President Donald Trump, team owners refused to sign Kaepernick as a free agent. In 2016 Goodell actively advised teams to bring in Kaepernick, but none did.
“We wished we had listened to our players two years ago,” said Goodell, which was as contrite as someone in his position could be.
“I said very clearly back in June (2020) that he deserves recognition. We started working with the players’ union and Black Lives Matter. He and other players brought the issues to us. We are now working with them.”
Too late to save Kaepernick’s career, but in time to help others. Goodell is nothing if not attentive.