Front Burner - Will the NHL concussion settlement change anything?

Episode Date: November 14, 2018

In 2013 a group of hockey players launched a lawsuit against the NHL alleging that the league failed to protect players from head injuries or warn them of the risk of playing. A tentative settlement between the NHL and more than 300 players has now been reached. Will this make players safer? And will it help the future of the league? TSN senior correspondent Rick Westhead explains.

Hey there, I'm Kathleen Goltar and I have a confession to make. I am a true crime fanatic. I devour books and films and most of all true crime podcasts. But sometimes I just want to know more. I want to go deeper. And that's where my podcast Crime Story comes in. Every week I go behind the scenes with the creators of the best in true crime. I chat with the host of Scamanda, Teacher's Pet, Bone Valley, the list goes on. For the insider scoop, find Crime Story in your podcast app. This is a CBC Podcast. Hi, I'm Jamie Poisson. I'm Jamie Poisson.

For years, we've been hearing from players who say that the concussions they got while playing hockey ruined their careers and made them afraid for their futures. This week, a tentative deal has been reached between the National Hockey League and more than 300 of those players. It comes from a lawsuit alleging that the NHL failed to protect them, or to warn them of the risk of playing in the first place. The league is offering to pay close to $19 million U.S. But, and this is an important note, it accepts no liability. So, after a decades-long fight for concussions to be taken seriously,

today we're asking if this proposed settlement closes the book, or if it's just the latest chapter. Hockey is part of the national fabric. We've learned about the power of sports and coming back and overcoming hurdles and bringing people together. But there's also some uncomfortable truths that people just don't want to face. This is FrontBurner. Amy. Thanks so much for being here. Sure. I want to start this conversation by taking a step back. When did we first hear about concussions in the NHL? We know the NHL has been around since almost

the turn of the 20th century. And it wasn't long after the league began running games that we heard the phrase concussion and brain injury. And it wasn't limited to hockey. You know, we saw head trauma and concussions reported in football. We saw it in boxing. And we saw it in ice hockey. So it's sort of been around forever. In terms of more recent history, you know, in the 80s, there was a study in the Canadian Medical Association Journal about the dangers of returning to contact sports after head trauma. about the dangers of returning to contact sports after head trauma. In terms of when did this kind of become a real watershed moment for the NHL,

in the late 1990s, you had players like Eric Lindros. Here's 88. Lindros makes the move. And Lindros is hammered down on the ice by Scott Stevens. And Lindros remains down on the ice. Pat LaFontaine. The training staff were on the ice in a matter of seconds to try and help LaFontaine, who was motionless.

Now Dr. Minkoff. Eric Lindros' brother, Brett. Paul Correa. You know, star players whose careers either were being ended or were being affected by brain injuries. And people were asking why. And what do we know about where these concussions were coming from?

Are they coming from fighting on the ice or are they coming from just playing the game, being slammed up against the boards? Well, you'd think that because fighting is so vicious and so visible that that would be how most of these players were being injured. The NHL statistics say that's not true. They argue that most players who receive diagnosed concussions are injured through, like you just said, hitting their head on the stanchions or the boards or on the ice. It does raise another question, though, and that's how reliable are the NHL's own stats?

One of the things that we've seen through the last five years as the NHL has been fighting a lawsuit, we've learned through discovery that NHL teams have underreported concussions. Can you talk a little bit more about how the NHL has responded to concerns about concussions over the years? In the late 90s, the NHL started a committee called the NHL Subcommittee on Concussions. And this was a group that pledged to look into this issue. You know, it came in the aftermath of the Lindros and LaFontaine injuries like we talked about. And the NHL wanted to be seen to be doing something about this, to be trying to solve the problem.

So they start this committee and they hire or they have some – they don't hire. They have some neuropsychologists on this committee. And several years go by and nothing happens. Several more years goes by and we know through NHL emails that have been released that people even at the NHL start to ask questions. And at one point, Gary Bettman is asking, you know, what's going on? This is now in 2007.

You know, what's going on with this? And the NHL's top lawyer informs him that they've decided to totally scrap this committee and reform it with new doctors because the doctors who were on it hadn't done any analysis of the data that they'd been collecting. And the reason for that is because they weren't paying these doctors anything. And this is all new information that's come out in this lawsuit that's been progressing over the last five years. Yeah, absolutely. And the NHL has fought. One of the things that's been interesting is that we have this idea. I mean, hockey is part of the national fabric, and it has been for a century. It's a great game. It's brought the country together.

We've learned about the power of sports and coming back and overcoming hurdles and bringing people together. But there's also some uncomfortable truths that people just don't want to face. And one of those truths is that the game could have been made safer. No one's saying, no one has said that you can make hockey safe, but you can make it safer. You know, we saw in the NHL playoffs a couple of years ago, Sidney Crosby smashed his head onto the ice. And the question was, well, why isn't he being removed to be looked at for a concussion? And the answer was because the ice or the boards weren't a mechanism of injury. I'm not sure exactly what that is, but it sounds to me like it's lawyer's language

that just avoids taking one of your top stars out of a game in the playoffs, you know, when they should be checked by a neurologist. Can we talk about some of those players, some of the players that you think might be emblematic of this issue? Who are they? Is there one or two whose stories stick with you? Well, Mike Peluso is definitely one. During our interview, I remember him looking at me and he started crying. And he was as far away from me as you are right now, just a couple feet. And he started crying and telling me how he tried to kill himself. I was so tired of seizures and the medication. I took all my seizure medication,

poured it into a bowl. He was going to take all of these medications and overdose. And the only thing that stopped him was his dog coming down the stairs and the realization, he said, that if he killed himself, there'd be no one to look after his dog Coors. And I looked at him and I said, I'm sorry, man. And I took out the pills and I put them back in the bottle. He did save my life. There's no question about it.

And Mike's story sticks out for a couple of reasons. One, just because of how sad and alone he is. You know, midway through the interview again, he looked at me and said, I'm sorry, I can't remember what your name is. I don't remember you guys' names as you introduced me to yourself today. I'm sorry. Yeah, I have no short-term memory.

Since he left the NHL, his story has just been such a tragic one. He was in a fight in one season in December in Quebec City against a Quebec Nordique player named Tony Twist. And he hit his head on the ice and he was unconscious. He came to and was taken to the locker room. And he dressed and he got in the shower. And then he got dressed and then he undressed and got in the shower. And that went on for three or four times. And one of the massage therapists for the team noticed this and said to the trainer, what are we going to do about this? You've got to take him to the hospital.

He wasn't talking coherently, and his eyes were, looked like no one was home. Mike went to the hospital in Quebec. A team doctor in New Jersey cleared him to play again. And so Mike left, went back to New Jersey, and was basically told, make your own way to the rink. Mike filed a workers' compensation lawsuit against the Devils and some of his other teams. And one of the things he found out later

was there was a neurologist report that was sent by this independent neurologist because he wound up having seizures even after this episode. A neurologist sent a report to the team and said, listen, Mike can play hockey again, but he can't keep having repeated head trauma. It could cause more neurocognitive problems. Well, Mike never saw that report. And he went on to have more than 100 fights in the NHL after that report was sent. And in testimony, the general manager for the New Jersey Devils was asked about Mike. Why would you let him keep going back on the ice?

And his answer was one that we hear throughout hockey. Lou Lamorello said, well, I asked him if he was okay to go, and he said he was okay. Wow, that's a stunning detail. You know, obviously the science on the impact of concussions has evolved over the years. So through the lens of what we know today, what do we know about what concussions do to a person? Well, they do. And you know, it's funny, I've looked at this so closely over the last five years, and I still can't exactly define what a concussion is. But some of the symptoms that people have when they're suffering a concussion include dizziness and nausea, you know, they can't balance themselves very well. I've talked to NHL players who talk about their change in personality, how they've become quick

to temper, how they've had sensitivity to light, how sometimes they lose the taste, their ability to taste things, and about how they have, you know, tried to self-medicate with the headaches that come on, you know, they will drink more. Do you think from the NHL's perspective that these concerns around concussions, that it's threatened the future of the league or that it's threatened the way that the game is played? Well, I think the NHL has – I think they have done some moves that have been positive. We've seen concussion protocols now introduced.

Now, again, the league's critics will say those protocols are only good if you actually follow through with them. But they can't help but improve because like you said, the knowledge of what brain trauma is now is evolved. And even if the knowledge hasn't evolved, the education about it certainly has. So, you know, the NHL has a vested interest in trying to make sure that the next generation of kids still plays hockey. And, you know, so there are some things that the league is doing that are positive and truthfully that are in the league's own self-interest. I want to get back to this lawsuit. What exactly are these players that started this lawsuit five years ago? What are they accusing the NHL of doing here? The accusation is several fold. One, they're saying that the NHL didn't do enough to educate them about the dangers of repeated head trauma.

So these guys who played in the 90s would say that at that time that the NHL knew or should have known that it wasn't safe to have five, six, seven, eight, nine concussions and keep playing. They're also saying that when they were hurt with brain injuries, that too often an NHL trainer would say, are you hurt or are you injured? If you're hurt, this is hockey, you can fight through it, get back on the ice. One player alleges that he was unconscious on the ice and a trainer used smelling salts to bring him to and he played the rest of the game. There is a tentative deal on the table now.

What are the players being offered? Well, each player and only the players who have sued the NHL or hired a lawyer to do so, they're the only players eligible for this settlement. They're the only players eligible for this settlement. Each of them can get $22,000 American in cash and the right to go and have neurocognitive testing over the next three years. They can go in for one battery of tests. And if those tests show that the players have a neurological disease, whether it's Alzheimer's or Parkinson's or Huntington's or dementia, whatever, they're eligible for treatment that the NHL will pay for up to $75,000.

I'm interested in where this leaves the league now. You mentioned before that the NHL is taking some steps to address concussions or address player health in a more fulsome way than they have in the past. But does this change, in your opinion, any of the core issues that got us here? I don't know that the settlement does that. You know, what's interesting is in the NFL case. You mean the concussion lawsuit against the National Football League? The league and some 4,500 retired players, including several Hall of Famers, have reached a settlement regarding the concussion. The NFL said, listen, we want to wrap this up.

We don't want to deal with this ever again. So every player in the NFL, unless you opt out, everyone is going to be part of this settlement. So if you have an NFL player 10 years from now who says, I have Alzheimer's at 50, I want to sue. Well, he can't. That won't happen in the NHL. The NHL didn't choose that route to settle. There is no collective class of players. So again, only the 300 players who are involved in this litigation, this settlement is only for them. So when we use phrases like this brings an end to an upsetting or disappointing chapter for the NHL, well, sure, it does on one level. But what about the guys who retire next year and the year after that and the year after that?

They're still eligible to pursue and chase down their day in court. At the end of the day, do you think that this tentative deal is a positive thing for the players? Yeah, for those who want to take it, for sure. I think ultimately, you know, who are we to judge anybody for taking it or not taking it? You know, for the players who take it, maybe they don't relish the idea of, you know, going through a long trial and waiting. Some of the players in the NFL case who opted out, they still haven't had their day in court years later. So maybe the chance to grab $22,000 and get yourself tested right now, knowing that there will be treatment for you, that sounds like a good deal.

But there will be others who say no. They want and deserve more, and they're willing to wait and go to court. Maybe because they want to face down somebody that they think didn't give them proper treatment when they were in the NHL or maybe because they look at it as having some broader responsibility to their hockey brothers. At this point right now I won't accept it just because it's not enough. There should be a lot more money given out to these people, these players that are really

suffering. They can't live their lives. Rick, thanks so much for taking me through this today. I really appreciate it. Thanks, Jamie. On Monday, an NHL spokesman said the league isn't going to comment further on the case at this time. As of the day that we recorded this podcast, the 318 retired players now have 75 days to decide whether they'll opt in or out of the settlement. I'm Jamie Poisson. Thanks for listening to FrontBurner.

podcasts. It's 2011 and the Arab Spring is raging. A lesbian activist in Syria starts a blog. She names it Gay Girl in Damascus. Am I crazy? Maybe. As her profile grows, so does the danger. The object of the email was please read this while sitting down. It's like a genie came out of the bottle and you can't put it back. Gay Girl Gone. Available now.