Politico’s Mike Allen, left, with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell. (Photo by @cara_ann_b)Roger Gooddell, the commissioner of the National Football League, said it was “healthy for our democracy” when professional athletes speak their minds on social and political issues, but declined to get specific when asked about a recent flap between a Baltimore Ravens linebacker and a Maryland state delegate over same-sex marriage.
At a lunch hosted by Politico, Goodell was asked to weigh in on the support for marriage equality espoused by Ravens linebacker Brendon Ayanbadejo and the sharp rebuke issued by Del. Emmett C. Burns Jr., who asked the Ravens to silence their player in a letter to the team last month. The commissioner, however, said it was good for players to express their personal opinions.
“I think in this day and age, people are going to speak up about what they think is important,” Goodell said. “They speak as individuals and that’s an important part of democracy.”
Burns, a Democrat from Baltimore County, walked back his original statement earlier this week after it yielded a wave of criticism, most notably from Minnesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe, who responded to Burns in a profanity-laced column on Deadspin. The Ravens also stood by Ayanbadejo, who today sent an email to supporters of Marylanders for Marriage Equality, an organization fighting a ballot referendum that would overturn Maryland’s recently enacted law permitting same-sex marriage.
“You’ve probably heard that recently a Maryland state delegate sent a letter to my team’s owner asking him to silence me in my support of marriage equality,” Ayanbadejo wrote. “Well guess what? I was not silenced.”
Ayanbadejo and Kluwe will continue to talk about their roles as professional athletes who support marriage equality today, when they appear together on NPR’s All Things Considered.
Goodell did not address Kluwe’s Deadspin column, nor did he really wade into the actual matter at hand. Much of the lunch-hour discussion, hosted by Politico’s Mike Allen, focused on the prospect of bringing an NFL franchise to Los Angeles, the league’s expanding global reach and the ongoing lockout of referees.
When asked by The Huffington Post’s Dave Jamieson for an update on negotiations with the referees’ union, Goodell mostly demurred, saying “you don’t negotiate in public.” But he did repeat the NFL’s position of converting referees’ pensions into an employee-contribution-based 401(k) plan.
The commissioner also had kind words for Redskins quarterback Robert Griffin III, who after his debut game was named the NFC’s offensive player of the week, calling the rookie “electrifying, exciting to watch” and a “fantastic young man.”
