by JERRY KELLAR
Wilkes-Barre (Pa.) Times-Leader
Wed, Jan. 31, 2007
It was April 2002, the last time Johnny Unitas, then part-owner of the fledgling Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Pioneers, visited this area. It was also five months before one of the greatest quarterbacks to play the game passed away.
The 20 minutes or so I got to spend that day with the NFL Hall of Famer in a small conference room in the basement of Wachovia Arena ranks among my most cherished memories in the business.
They also served as an eye-opener.
A couple decades in pro football took its toll on ol’ No. 19’s body. His most noticeable problem was a curved right arm, a result of all those passes he threw. He also suffered the lasting effects of a torn Achilles tendon, broken ribs, a punctured lung and knee injuries.
But it was the right hand that I’ll never forget.
Slightly deformed from nerve damage incurred from all that physical pounding, Unitas had only limited use of the appendage. When a local politician interrupted our interview to ask for an autograph, Johnny U gently laid the marker into his palm and slowly etched his name on a photograph.
The memory of the onetime gridiron hero struggling to carry out this simplest of tasks, one that most of us take for granted, is distressing.
That emotion turns to outrage when you come to realize that the work-related injuries that befell Unitas and so many other players from the golden age of the NFL is not covered by insurance because of the league’s unwillingness to rework the former employees’ pensions to include a health plan.
Think about that for a few moments.
As the NFL readies for its annual showcase event – Sunday’s Super Bowl – some of the biggest names in league history, athletes who have laid the groundwork for what is now a billion-dollar empire, have been forsaken by this greatest of all games and the greed-mongers who run it. That includes union president and Hall of Famer Gene Upshaw, along with a group of players who are reaping the rewards of the sacrifices made by their predecessors.
Guys like Earl Campbell, a bruising Hall of Fame running back who nowadays can barely walk. Or ex-Steelers’ center Mike Webster, another Canton inductee who died a virtual cripple at the age of 50 after several dozen operations to his hands, knees, ankles and hips.
Webster, who in 1999 was diagnosed with incurable brain damage, the result of repeated concussions during his career, passed away before learning that a lawsuit to acquire full disability benefits from the NFL was successful.
Stories such as these, a few of which were detailed in a recent segment of HBO’s Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel, left John Unitas a bitter man at the end.
“It’s hard not to be,” he told me during his final visit to Wilkes-Barre. “It’s the side of the game most people will never hear about.”
It should be noted that not all of today’s players have turned their backs on their gridiron brethren. But for every Peyton and Eli Manning – whose dad Archie still bears the scars of a 14-year NFL career while earning a fraction of what his sons make as high-profile quarterbacks -- there are far too many others whose only concern is their personal well-being.
Those players are representative of a generation which chooses to live only for the moment. But even the bright lights of Super Bowl Sunday eventually go out.
Then it’s every man for himself.
Wilkes-Barre (Pa.) Times-Leader
Wed, Jan. 31, 2007
It was April 2002, the last time Johnny Unitas, then part-owner of the fledgling Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Pioneers, visited this area. It was also five months before one of the greatest quarterbacks to play the game passed away.
The 20 minutes or so I got to spend that day with the NFL Hall of Famer in a small conference room in the basement of Wachovia Arena ranks among my most cherished memories in the business.
They also served as an eye-opener.
A couple decades in pro football took its toll on ol’ No. 19’s body. His most noticeable problem was a curved right arm, a result of all those passes he threw. He also suffered the lasting effects of a torn Achilles tendon, broken ribs, a punctured lung and knee injuries.
But it was the right hand that I’ll never forget.
Slightly deformed from nerve damage incurred from all that physical pounding, Unitas had only limited use of the appendage. When a local politician interrupted our interview to ask for an autograph, Johnny U gently laid the marker into his palm and slowly etched his name on a photograph.
The memory of the onetime gridiron hero struggling to carry out this simplest of tasks, one that most of us take for granted, is distressing.
That emotion turns to outrage when you come to realize that the work-related injuries that befell Unitas and so many other players from the golden age of the NFL is not covered by insurance because of the league’s unwillingness to rework the former employees’ pensions to include a health plan.
Think about that for a few moments.
As the NFL readies for its annual showcase event – Sunday’s Super Bowl – some of the biggest names in league history, athletes who have laid the groundwork for what is now a billion-dollar empire, have been forsaken by this greatest of all games and the greed-mongers who run it. That includes union president and Hall of Famer Gene Upshaw, along with a group of players who are reaping the rewards of the sacrifices made by their predecessors.
Guys like Earl Campbell, a bruising Hall of Fame running back who nowadays can barely walk. Or ex-Steelers’ center Mike Webster, another Canton inductee who died a virtual cripple at the age of 50 after several dozen operations to his hands, knees, ankles and hips.
Webster, who in 1999 was diagnosed with incurable brain damage, the result of repeated concussions during his career, passed away before learning that a lawsuit to acquire full disability benefits from the NFL was successful.
Stories such as these, a few of which were detailed in a recent segment of HBO’s Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel, left John Unitas a bitter man at the end.
“It’s hard not to be,” he told me during his final visit to Wilkes-Barre. “It’s the side of the game most people will never hear about.”
It should be noted that not all of today’s players have turned their backs on their gridiron brethren. But for every Peyton and Eli Manning – whose dad Archie still bears the scars of a 14-year NFL career while earning a fraction of what his sons make as high-profile quarterbacks -- there are far too many others whose only concern is their personal well-being.
Those players are representative of a generation which chooses to live only for the moment. But even the bright lights of Super Bowl Sunday eventually go out.
Then it’s every man for himself.
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