Head Games

Sean Pamphilon and I are friends.

Ok, facebook friends.

But we worked for the same company.

In the same department.

Twice.

And while we were never quite BFFs, we always got along.

And I always respected his work.

But I never respected him more than I did a few weeks ago.

That’s when Sean did something most people would never even consider.

He did the right thing.

Oh, there are many people who would disagree.

Including a close friend of mine.

When I asked this friend what he thought of Sean Pamphilon.

He said “who?”

“You know, the guy who released the audio tape.”

The audio tape of New Orleans Saints assistant coach Gregg Williams threatening every bone in the 49ers body.

“Oh that guy,” he said.  “He just did it for the attention.”

“Have you heard the tape?” I asked, with a protective miff in my voice.

“No.”

“Well I think you should.”

That’s when I paraphrased some of the things I heard on the tape.

Exact quotes have never been my thing.

I told him that this was not your typical rah-rah, go get ‘em football speech.

No Gipper here.

This was Gregg Williams going for the throat.

Actually the head.

• "We've got to do everything in the world to make sure we kill Frank Gore's head. We want him running sideways. We want his head sideways."
• "Kill the head and the body will die. Kill the head and the body will die."
• "Every single one of you, before you get off the pile, affect the head. Early, affect the head. Continue to touch and affect the head."
• "We need to find out in the first two series of the game, the little wide receiver, No. 10, about his concussion. We need to f****n put a lick on him."

Those are exact quotes.  The cleanest ones.

There were so many F bombs on that tape, I thought I was listening to a voice mail from Alec Baldwin.

At the time of this meeting, Sean Pamphilon was directing a documentary on former Saints player Steve Gleason.

Gleason is dealing with a disease called ALS (perhaps better known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease).

As part of that documentary, Pamphilon was recording that Saints team meeting.

A meeting that took place the night before their January 2012 playoff game in San Francisco.

Williams knew the cameras were there.

But I guess he didn’t care.

I’m sure he does now.

You see Gregg Williams is done.

Done as a football coach.

At least for now.

And hopefully forever.

Like Happy Days is for Henry Winkler.

Gregg Williams is BountyGate.

A role that he will never outlive.

You see Gregg Williams was the ring-leader in a big bucks bounty program.

A program that paid Saints players cold hard cash to physically harm the players on the other team.

Knock Brett Favre out of the game.

Pick up your 10 grand.

Amputate his leg.

That’s worth 20.

When the NFL learned of this practice they approached the Saints.

And the like an eight-year-old with his hand stuck in the cookie jar, the Saints lied.

“Who dat?”  

“Me?”  

“I would never deliver such opprobrious conduct.”

Ok, that’s me paraphrasing again.

But upon further investigation, the NFL found more smoking guns than an NRA convention.

Guilty!

Guilty as could be.

And within a few weeks the NFL marched seven Saints (and former Saints) off the field.

Head Coach Sean Payton was suspended for the entire 2012 season.

Without pay.

As was linebacker Jonathan Vilma.

The team got fined $500 grand.   And lost a draft pick.

As for Williams.

He skipped out on New Orleans like he was George Bush.

Taking a new job with the St. Louis Rams.

But the NFL hunted him down and promptly suspended him too.

Indefinitely.

According to dictionary.com, indefinitely means unlimited.

In the NFL, indefinitely means forever.

As it should.

Williams was suspended on March 21.

Two weeks later Sean Pamphilon released the tape.

Pamphilon said his conscience would no longer allow him to sit on the sideline without the world knowing what he knew.

You see Pamphilon didn’t technically own the tape.

The Gleason family did.

And they wanted no part of this.

You know, what happens in the locker room where guys are being paid to end the career of other players.

Stays in the locker room where guys are being paid to end the career of other players.

Fortunately Pamphilon didn’t feel the same.

In a 5,735 word blog he posted on April 4th, Pamphilon explained why he did it.

If it weren’t for the fact I feel deeply that parents of children playing football MUST pay attention to the influence of men who will sacrifice their kids for W’s, I would not have written this.

Ok, that’s only 36 of those 5,735 words, but it pretty much sums up how Pamphilon was feeling.

He did it for the kids.

He did it for the parents.

He did it for the good of a game that he has been “a religious fan for 35 years.”

Pamphilon touched on a series of subjects in that blog.

Including Gregg Williams.

He was ordering his players to maim in as many ways possible.  Plain and simple.  He was the only one in the room willing to go into his pocket to reward it.

He spoke about Jonathan Vilma.

Vilma couldn’t have been classier.  If Jonathan Vilma ever paid a man $10,000 to hurt another man, I need a cancelled check or a verified cash payment by two witnesses.  If the Jonathan Vilma I met did what whoever leaked this crap says he did, you could cut his jersey in tiny pieces, put it in a cereal bowl and feed it to me slowly, while selling it on pay-per-view. 

Pamphilon also spoke about Dave Duerson.

Who?

Dave Duerson.

A guy who never played for the Saints.

But he did play in the NFL.

For 11 years.

He went to the Pro Bowl four times.

And won two Super Bowls.

Dave Duerson was a very good NFL player.

Was.

He died on February 17, 2011.

A self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Suicide.

Before he pulled the trigger, the 50-year-old sent a text.

To his family.

He told them he wanted his brain used for research.

Research of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy.

CTE.

The “progressive degenerative disease of the brain found in athletes (and others) with a history of brain trauma.”

A disease linked to depression.

In order to preserve his brain, Duerson shot himself in the chest.

Two months later, neurologists at Boston University confirmed what Duerson had thought all along.

He had in fact suffered from this disease which had been linked to concussions.

Duerson wasn’t the first.

And he certainly won’t be the last.

The list of NFL players who have suffered concussions is too long for this blog.

It’s even too long for Sean Pamphilon’s blog.

In just the last two seasons, there have been nearly 400 concussions in NFL games.

That’s more than one every two games.

Odds of seeing Tim Tebow complete a pass are lower than that.

Now there has never been a football player alive who hasn’t been aware of the dangers of the game.

And there has never been a parent in the crowd who didn’t fear for the safety of their child.

And there has never been a paycheck uncashed because the game was too risky.

Junior Seau cashed a paycheck for 20 years.

Unheard of for an NFL player.

A quick google search will show that other than those wussy kickers, the average life of an NFL player is like three years.

Seau destroyed those odds.

Like he destroyed quarterbacks.

Playing in 12 consecutive Pro Bowls.

But it came with a price.

When asked if Junior ever played through concussions his ex-wife Gina said, “of course he had.”

“He always bounced back and kept on playing.  He’s a warrior.  That didn’t stop him.”

“I don’t know what football player hasn’t.  It’s not ballet.”

We will never know for sure what was going through the head of Junior Seau when he fired the gun on Wednesday.

But we do know it wasn’t a bullet.

That's because Seau shot himself in the chest.

Just like Dave Duerson.

Adding to a problem that may change the NFL forever.

A much bigger problem than anything Sean Pamphilon ever did.