CNN "American Morning" - Transcript

Statement

CNN "American Morning" - Transcript

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

ROBERT: Fifty-three and a half minutes after the hour.

Football and brain injuries. That's the focus of a House judiciary hearing today, and sitting front and center, California Congresswoman Linda Sanchez. She's been blowing the whistle on the health risks of concussions and trying to get the rules changed. She's with us this morning.

And also joining us, former NFL player, Nolan Harrison. He's testifying as well today after playing for ten seasons suffering several concussions.

Good to see both of you.

This is an important issue, obviously, that we've been following a lot, you know, each and every little development, and we talked to you about it last fall when the House hearings were taking place.

Nolan, let me start with you, though. Your playing career, how many times did you suffer a concussion and - and each and every time that that happened, were you under pressure to get back out there on the field?

NOLAN HARRISON, RETIRED NFL PLAYER: There's always pressure to get back out on the field. I suffered a couple of major concussions, the last one being against the Eagles. Herschel Walker kneed me in the side of the head as I was trying to tackle him. If you know about Herschel, you go low on him, but sometimes you do get the worst end of the stick and I don't remember anything after the game.

But there was no push to keep me out afterwards. I practiced the rest of the week, the next week, and played.

But I still, to this day, don't have any recollection of what happened after that hit.

ROBERTS: You know, sort of the ethos in - in any professional sport is you play hurt but you're not supposed to play injured. But where is that line, and who determines that?

HARRISON: Well, I think the pressure, whether it's from the locker room, from peers. You know, from '91 to 2001, when I played, you know, you're supposed to be the human juggernaut. You're supposed to play and you have to do that to keep your job and - and to keep things going. It's - it was the culture.

ROBERTS: Congresswoman Sanchez, as the result of the hearing last year, the NFL has made some changes, such as to have a doctor on the sidelines of every game to examine one of the players if they have a concussion.

Roger Goodell said, quote, "The NFL is taking a much more aggressive approach in recent years in identifying and treating concussions among our own players. We've implemented an awareness campaign to make certain that everyone in the league, including payers and coaches, is better equipped to identify concussion symptoms." He's the commissioner of the NFL.

Are you satisfied with everything they've done?

REP. LINDA SANCHEZ (D), CALIFORNIA: Well, they kind of came to this stance a little bit late. For years, they've denied any kind of link between repeated trauma to the head and brain damage. And, finally, as a result, I think, of the Congressional hearings, they had to step up and admit the link, although that's - they still want to fund studies to be absolutely sure. But the majority of independent research shows that that's the case. They have made in the last seven months, since - since the first real hearing to - to spotlight the issue - have made some tremendous strides, but there's still a lot more that needs to be done. And as far as I'm concerned, that's why we continue to have these hearings to check the progress on the NFL.

ROBERTS: Are you satisfied, Nolan? Is there more, as the congresswoman says, to be done?

HARRISON: There is a lot more to be done. We still don't have, in my opinion, or I haven't seen in writing any team that has a specific arbitrary or independent neurologist that's there to judge these guys. There's still no parameters in place on the sidelines that you can say, OK, this guy has had this type of a hit. We're going to keep him out for a certain amount of time.

If you don't take that out of the coach's hands, the trainer's hands, the doctor's hands, who are paid by the teams -

ROBERTS: So even though they have doctors, you say they're still not independent?

HARRISON: No, they're not. They're not. And there needs to be an independent person to look out for these players because the culture still exists to where we have to go back out and finish the game.

ROBERTS: So - so how do you achieve independence? Obviously somebody has got to pay the doctor's salary.

SANCHEZ: Right. Well, they announced that they were going to have independent doctors evaluate, but - but that's the question is how independent are these doctors, really? And, you know, are players -

ROBERTS: You know, unless the government were to pay for them, who - who else might -

SANCHEZ: I don't think taxpayers would really be crazy about that idea.

ROBERTS: So can you ever really have an independent neurologist on the sidelines of a football game?

SANCHEZ: Well, possibly you could if the player's association and the - and the NFL were to negotiate something like that. Or maybe it's jointly paid by -- by the two. That could be one potential scenario.

But the question of independence has been a problem that's plagued the NFL for quite some time.

ROBERTS: And something we're going to hear about today at the hearing, again, Roger Goodell sent a letter to 44 governors, urging them to - to adopt Lystedt's Law, which is named after Zackery Lystedt. He was a middle school student in Washington State who had a really bad concussion in a middle school football game, played after that.

So he's saying, you know, please adopt this law. Its' a great thing for young players to be looked after.

It's one thing to say, OK, fine let's do it when kids are young, but what about the pros? Isn't this all about the pros and this adds a little bit of a - of a deflection to have them say, oh, look. We're - we're all for making sure that these young players, very important as well, get appropriate medical treatment, but if you're not doing it yourself, are you really following through to the end of the chain?

SANCHEZ: Well, the important thing to remember here is the NFL is a moneymaker and people profit at the expense, unfortunately, of players, and what we've seen with the NFL is young kids in sports at all levels emulate their favorite players. And if the NFL isn't doing things correctly, it's - you have very little chance that it will trickle down, you know, to youth sports like it should.

So the NFL really needs to - to take the lead and really highlight safety.

ROBERTS: And one last quick point, if we could, Nolan. There's been an undefined link between concussion and dementia. We've seen what's happened to some NFL players over the years.

What do you think about that? Have you noticed that your - your cognitive functioning has decreased at all as a result of the concussions you suffered?

HARRISON: I'm OK with mine, but I have, you know, teammates and - and old friends that have gone through the situations and they are suffering. They're not the same men that they were when we played. And I think that's a problem and I think as time goes on, it's going to be a more significant problem.

That's why things like the legacy fund that we've talked about are really, really important, because the cost to take care of these guys to make sure that they're going to have the kind of lifestyle they need and the treatment that they have is going to go up and that needs to be addressed. The NFL hasn't done it.

ROBERTS: No, again, this is a very important issue for us. We'll keep on following it closely. Great to see you this morning. Thanks for coming in.

SANCHEZ: Thanks, John.

ROBERTS: We'll be watching the hearing today.

HARRISON: Thank you.

ROBERTS: Top stories coming your way right after the break. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source