To: Chief Executives/ Club Presidents
From: Commissioner Goodell
Date: October 10, 2017
Re: Fall Meeting/National Anthem
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We live in a country that can feel very divided. Sports, and especially the NFL, brings people together and lets them set aside those divisions, at least for a few hours. The current dispute over the National Anthem is threatening to erode the unifying power of our game, and is now dividing us, and our players, from many fans across the country.
I’m very proud of our players and owners who have done the hard work over the past year to listen, understand and attempt to address the underlying issues within their communities. At our September committee meetings, we heard directly from several players about why these issues are so important to them and how we can support their work. And last week, we met with the leadership of the NFLPA and more players to advance the dialogue.
Like many of our fans, we believe that everyone should stand for the National Anthem. It is an important moment in our game. We want to honor our flag and our country, and our fans expect that of us. We also care deeply about our players and respect their opinions and concerns about critical social issues. The controversy over the Anthem is a barrier to having honest conversations and making real progress on the underlying issues. We need to move past this controversy, and we want to do that together with our players.
Building on many discussions with clubs and players, we have worked to develop a plan that we will review with you at next week’s League meeting. This would include such elements as an in-season platform to promote the work of our players on these core issues, and that will help to promote positive change in our country. We want to ensure that any work at the League level is consistent with the work that each club is doing in its own community, and that we dedicate a platform that can enable these initiatives to succeed. Additionally, we will continue the unprecedented dialogue with our players.
I expect and look forward to a full and open discussion of these issues when we meet next week in New York. Everyone involved in the game needs to come together on a path forward to continue to be a force for good within our communities, protect the game, and preserve our relationship with fans throughout the country. The NFL is at its best when we ourselves are unified. In that spirit, let’s resolve that next week we will meet this challenge in a unified and positive way.

​According to sources the NFL and Roger Goodell are close to agreeing to a contract extension through 2024. Goodell is currently signed through 2019 so this would be a five-year extension.
 
Labor unrest is likely when the current CBA agreement expires after the 2020 season and negotiations start between the player’s union and the league owners. This means Goodell will be presiding over the negotiations again for the owners.
 
Not sure of the salary parameters but there are some owners that would like to see him make less money. Tax records show Goodell made more than $150 million in salary and bonuses in his first eight years as NFL commissioner. In 2014-2015 records show he made $34 million. Not sure what this new deal will be.

Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Doug Baldwin is looking to help VICIS, the Seattle-based technology company poised to have its helmet make an impact in the NFL, change and perhaps save the game of football.
 
Baldwin invested in the company and is promoting it as well, telling CBS Sports Radio that he has an 11-year-old cousin that wants to play football and that the child’s mother is among those who has inquired about VICIS’ helmet at a time when she is concerned about injury risk.

Other NFL players are also very much interested in the VICIS ZERO1 helmet after it ranked first out of 33 helmet models in laboratory testing conducted by biomechanical experts from the league and NFLPA that determined which of them best reduced head impact severity under conditions simulating concussion-causing impacts in NFL games.
The ZERO1 has yet to be used in NFL games, but Cincinnati Bengals offensive lineman Eric Winston, who is the NFLPA executive committee president, is among those who tried the VICIS helmet in offseason workouts.
 
VICIS has images of players from 19 NFL teams wearing the helmet this offseason. Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver Chris Conley told the Kansas City Star that he along with an estimated 10 to 15 players including quarterback Alex Smith are expected to test the helmet during training camp.
 
For Baldwin, he is committed to using the ZERO1. “I’ve been wearing it in OTAs, and I will be wearing it this season during the football season,” Baldwin said.

​The ZERO1 is unlike the typical football helmet that has a hard exterior shell and instead has an outer LODE Shell that deforms to absorb impact like a car bumper and then can return to form before the next impact. The helmet has a columnar layer designed to absorb impacts from any direction and buckle.

​“Football is a violent, collision sport, and we need the protection that can mitigate that,” Baldwin told SiriusXM NFL Radio. “And so this helmet is definitely taking that approach. It’s not just another piece of football equipment. The team there at VICIS, they’ve looked at it as a medical device. They’ve approached it from a medical standpoint, a medical point of view. And that’s been vitally important to the reason why I’ve been so excited it is because I know it’s going to be safer for not only myself, but for future players and for the game.”
 
Conley told the Kansas City Star that the look of the helmet was “pretty good” even as it is noticeably larger than the average helmet.
 
A Stanford graduate, Baldwin told Fox 5 NY that the main thing he wanted to relay to VICIS was that it didn’t make a helmet so “drastically different” that players would not be willing to test it. “I saw this as an opportunity, as an opportunity not only to get in with a company that’s doing something drastically different in our arena, but also to be able to get myself in a safer piece of equipment,” Baldwin told the station.
“I have that confidence with a piece of technology that I know is safer for me. To me, it’s going to save the game.”

​Top 2017 Helmet Laboratory Testing Performance Results from the NFL

Article written by and credited to
NFL, Trending July 11, 2017
July 12, 2017
Diamond Leung
Diamond is responsible for SportTechie’s editorial vision and execution. Before joining SportTechie in August 2016, he worked as the Golden State Warriors beat writer for the Bay Area News Group and covered both their NBA championship and 73-win seasons. He previously covered Michigan State for MLive.com, college basketball for ESPN.com and the Los Angeles Dodgers for The Press-Enterprise. He lives in New York City and is a native of San Francisco
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