re: “F--- Drew Brees,” Pastorini said.

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So you're upset they're asking a multibillion dollar business made up an exclusive number of owners for health benefits and disability benefits. Yeah, so stop acting like they're stealing food from some Baby Breesus' mouth.

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It might have something to do with people getting upset at the audacity of a guy who squandered his money calling out Brees for not wanting to support guys who squandered their money.

From the article linked in the first post:

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And though Brees’ statement continues to backfire on him and the union, those close to Brees says he was one of the retired players’ biggest advocates in trying to give back to the players who came before him -- and to get everybody to understand the importance of doing so. Witness a radio interview he gave last April to XX 1090 in San Diego.

“I know that I’m fighting for so many people here, for former players in the form of improving their pensions and disability benefits to take care of those guys that built this game for us and future players too,” he said. “To be honest with you, this is one of those things that when a settlement is reached, that settlement is something that I’m probably never going to benefit from. It’s guys before me, it’s guys that are going to come after me. So for me, there’s so many guys that made sacrifices before us to make this game better.”

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Perhaps that is something you should be looking at, instead of posting some half-assed opinion that does nothing more than make you look like a jackass. Pastorini comes across as a petulant child complaining that daddy doesn't give him a big enough allowance, never mind that he spends his entire allowance on candy and comic books.

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So you're upset they're asking a multibillion dollar business made up an exclusive number of owners for health benefits and disability benefits

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Typical liberal mindset.

"You have enough, so you can afford to give me some of what you have"

It's envy, plain and simple, but these cockroaches try to disguise it as humanitarianism. Get fricked you ignorant piece of shite.

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Its a liberal mindset for retired players to get subsidized health insurance and disability benefits?

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Yup. show me in their contracts where they were guaranteed benefits for "x" amount of dollars. You play football at your own risk, at the expense of your body. They don't deserve it, period, if their profession doesn't guarantee them the benefits to which they signed on for. I'll go ahead and tell you there is no such thing for them, but you can go ahead and look.

And yes, that's textbook socialist thinking. You take from the haves and give it to fricking stupid have nots. They knew the rules, knew they weren't going to be medically covered, and played anyway. That's on them.

these guys are grossly compensated for putting their bodies and sometimes life through the violence that is the NFL. The owners back then didn't make nowhere near the money the owners of today enjoy, but they still made good profits off those players from that era.

playing in the NFL of yesterday or today cannot be compared to regular jobs people retire from, and the retirement plans that they live off because the NFL is not a regular job.

and yet they are paid(NFL players of yesterday)like regular Joes from a company, totally ridiculous.

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I could work almost any Fortune 500 company for 5-10 years, retire and walk away with some pension (the ones that offer a pension and haven't gone to strictly 401K contributions) and health benefits for the rest of my life.

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The insurance part of this is 100% BS. There are companies that if you work them for 25 -30 years you get access to their health plans. But I know of NONE that offer that access if you work for them for 5 years. Find one that offer this after 5 years of service. Yeah you're vested, great. But find me one where they offer you guaranteed insurance after 5 or 10 years.

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Find one that offer this after 5 years of service. Yeah you're vested, great. But find me one where they offer you guaranteed insurance after 5 or 10 years.

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You work for a fortune 500 company and retire from them with between 5-10 years of service at 59 1/2, you will be given access to health insurance with increased premiums. What they don't offer anymore is Pensions, that's been reduced to mostly 401K contributions because pensions puts the company on the hook longer than giving a match. The Pension portion is outdated.

Its funny how all you do is pass judgement with anybody who has a different opinion. You've brought the least amount of substance to this discussion. Let me guess, you ride around with bumper stickers saying Obama is Muslim and is Socialist set about to steal all your money and redistrubute the wealth to everyone....am I right?

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You work for a fortune 500 company and retire from them with between 5-10 years of service at 59 1/2, you will be given access to health insurance with increased premiums.

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I don't think so, it's years of service + retirement, not just retirement.

Anyway, you have to take emotion out of the arugment. This is really no different than working for any other company in the 60s and 70s.

Benefits and compensation are much greater now at say, GE than in the 60s and 70s. You have companies now offering access to health plans after retirement, increased salary during employment, bonuses, stock options, disability insurance, life insurance, etc., none of which were available for workers during the 50s, 60s and 70s. Are the past GE workers due those same benefits now? No because no company could make money if they were constantly on the hook for ever-increasing benefit packages to past workers.

IMO, Brees and the current players are doing more than duty calls for to secure extra benefits for those past players. You have to take emotion and the injuries they sustained out of it and look at it objectively.

Would I want more money being an old player seeing these gigantic contracts now? Sure everyone would. Would I get on TV and bad-mouth current players and say I'm owed more money, no.

It would be right place, wrong time for me.

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I just think considering the struggles many of them deal with as a result of their injuries, the least they could do is provide quality health benefits and disability insurance.

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Right. Here we actually do agree, but there's a big difference between saying it that way, and saying that they "deserve" it. It's the presumtion of entitlement which is what makes people angry.

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I don't think those players deserved $1,000.00 in increased pension checks. They had 30+ years to find new avenues to make money.

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Is it just me or are you doing a 180 here? Again we agree...

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the part that riled you up was the adjustment of the inflation.

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Well first, I'm not riled up at all. I'm enjoying myself quite a bit.

Second, no the adjustment of pensions for inflation I would say is a legitimately debatable topic. Could go either way.

The thing which is outraging people so badly in this thread is, again, the presumption of entitlement which is so predominant in Dan Pastorini's comments, which are also echoed by other retired players and the underlying mindset to said comments which perverts our society, even outside of football.


ETA: The whole "frick Drew Brees" comment, both by yourself and Pastorini, doomed this discussion from the beginning. If it was a rational discussion you were looking for, on a Saints board no less, that's one sure fire way to ensure you don't get it.