The National Football League is facing a proposed class action lawsuit three days before the Super Bowl from former players who claim the league’s disability plan prevents them from receiving necessary treatment.
The suit, filed Thursday in federal court in Maryland, alleges that ten former pros must navigate a maze of arbitrary challenges to their claims, including for severe neurological damage they claim they sustained in a career of brutal collisions. The suit comes amid a national debate about the dangers of the game.
The plaintiffs, who seek to represent a class of similarly affected NFL veterans, allege that the league has a history of wrongfully denying them benefits. The players, who include former cornerback Michael McKenzie and former safety Eric Smith, claim that neuropsychologists hired as part of the NFL Player Disability & Neurocognitive Benefit
Plan arbitrarily denied benefits to a number of players who complained about pain.
The players accuse each other of “repeated lies,” “active concealment,” and “flagrant violations of the Erisa statute, regulations, and case law,” referring to the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act. They also claim that “constantly shifting inconsistent and illogical interpretations of the plan’s terms” have resulted in “a pattern of systematic bias against disabled NFL players.”
“Unfortunately, this is yet another example of the NFL’s betrayal of its players once we are no longer on the field and earning money for them,” Smith said in a statement.
“Through this lawsuit, we are bringing these injustices to light and demanding that the NFL fulfill its obligations to players rather than continuing to try to avoid accountability at every turn.”
According to NFL spokesperson Brian McCarthy, the NFL-NFLPA disability plan is “fair and administered by a professional staff overseen by a board comprised of an equal number of NFL Players Association and league appointees, which includes retired players.”
This board “reviews the activities of the office and the operation of the benefit program, including every contested application for benefits, to ensure that retired players who are entitled to disability benefits receive them as intended,” McCarthy explained.