News: Namoff sues D.C. United

Yes, and the "blood in the water" is the blood on the brains of the players who have had their careers, their cognitive abilities and their very lives cut short due to concussions.

I rarely defend "the lawyers" (I am a lawyer, by the way, but I am a legal aid attorney), but your comment about lawyers is immaterial to the discussions.

 

Define "frivolous". And define it in real terms that non-lawyers view it, not some narrowly constructed definition that allows a strained plea for relief under the law. How many lawyers get sanctioned or fined compared to lawsuits filed?

I have a buddy who is a personal injury attorney. Many of his filings appear to be the equivalent of buying a scratch-off lottery ticket for his clients. I never knew how dangerous any retail store or parking lot is - Walmart probably has more devastating injuries that occur on their premises than the entire Vietnam War. The initial thought upon any injury is to find a cause and blame and sue. Many get dismissed or dropped, but they still were filed initially. The decision to file a lawsuit demonstrates relatively little legal judgment on the merits of the case.

In this case, I'm sure the league and team will raise defenses related to the union CBA, venue, etc.

 

I think you're confusing Namoff with Soehn.

 

Huh? According to the article, Namoff hasn't worked in 2 years... Where are you getting that he's an exec with the Whitecaps?

 

Quota litis agreements are a pox on our legal system. However that is neither here nor there concerning the present case. We will just have to wait for the particulars before passing judgment.

 

i've been thinking that every year for the last 3 years. Why they let him keep playing is a mystery; he will end up like Taylor Twellman, Pablo Mastroeni, and the rest. Next will be Jay DeMerit, who went back on the field this week just 2 weeks after a concussion. You're supposed to wait at least 4-6 weeks for a brain injury to recover.

 

What you mean MLS medical staff is allowing a player to return from injury prior to what would be a standard medically required recovery time? The hell you say. All these frivolous lawsuits about concussions both at the NFL and MLS level have no basis in merit and are brought by scumbag lawyers.

 

You got that right. Scumbag lawyers bringing cases without merit. They love those settlements.

 

We should wait for the case to take it's course before making judgement. But tit does have pretty big implications to league regardless which way it goes.

 

In any settlement Namoff's attorney is going to get paid - whether directly covered by MLS/DCU/Soehn/Insurance companies or thru the settlement paid to Namoff. Only if he gets absolutely zero will he not get paid. And all it takes is one of the doctor's insurance companies to be willing to make it go away to get some money out of this. Depending on the carrier, that may not be a high barrier.

Having been involved in many settlement discussions over the years (as a non-attorney), I'm never surprised that throwing in covering the attorney's fees usually gets a settlement done quicker because once the lawyer realizes he's going to get paid for the time invested, he usually wants to wind it down and get his cash as soon as possible. Or when you spend as much time on the attorney's fees section and timing of payment and billable hour rate as you do on the underlying settlement.

 

I have a feeling something distracted you when you typed your post. Was it a picture of Nadine?

 

If I remember right didn't DC United and the team Dr get sued before because the DR messed up a surgery on a goalie and he was forced to retire because of the DR's mistake?
I know I read how Payton Manning would purposesly screw with the base line on the Concussion test, so that if he ever got one he could continue to play, players lie so they can stay in the game. This case will be about what Namoff said to the Dr and I hope he kept detailed notes.

 

If he's smart he kept very detailed notes. I'm a respiratory therapist and I always make sure everything is documented extremely well. Mostly in case I need to refer back to the plan care for a patient I haven't seen in months so I remember what he/she needs. The other reason is to cover my ass in the event of a lawsuit because too many people don't follow proper instructions and then want to blame someone else when they get sick again. A few weeks ago I had an idiot catch pneumonia because he was too lazy to clean his cpap equipment and the water chamber grew mold. He called a lawyer and made a big stink about he was going to sue us. Thankfully I documented the instruction I gave him and had his signed statement attesting to the instruction he'd received. His lawyer shut up really quickly. I am not saying that Namoff is at fault here. I haven't seen the medical evidence so I don't know who is to blame.

 

This has educated me: I didn't know there was a "DC United" legal entity that could be sued. I thought all such lawsuits would have to be directed at MLS, because of the single-entity organization.

------RM

 

I know athletes are competitive and always want to play. But to blame them is not fair, because most are too young or immature to understand the consequences. It's like the saying, friends don't let friends drive drunk. Team officials cannot let players play hurt. It's so short-sighted.

Obviously, DCU would not put me on that jury!

 

I see a major causation problem for Namoff. I don't know how he's going to prove that it was the failure to treat the concussion properly -- and not the concussion itself -- that's caused his current problems.

DCU and MLS are not at fault for his original concussion, and Namoff isn't saying that they are. He's saying that he wouldn't have his current problems if his concussion had been properly treated. That's a really hard argument to make, especially because there's no indication that he got hit in the head in the second game. I'm sure it wasn't good for him to run around three days after getting a concussion, but is that what's messed him up? How can we know? How can we know that it was the running around in the second game, and not the concussion he actually suffered in the first game? That's the question his attorneys have to answer.

I'm sure his attorney has an answer, and has some expert who will testify that he'd be perfectly normal if he hadn't played in a game three days later. Maybe that's true, but there's obviously no way anyone can know for sure. They're betting DCU and MLS won't want a jury to decide the issue, and they're probably right. He'll get something.

 

Maybe you should read up on concussion treatment. You are not supposed to run at all after a concussion, no jarring activity. Running is jarring. Makes your head go up and down.

My daughter had a concussion 8 years ago, and that's what the doctor told us then. No soccer or running for 6 weeks.

 

That goes to the standard of care. Assuming what you are saying is true, the advice to let him play so shortly after the injury fell below the standard of care. In other words, its was negligent and the Dr. shouldn't have given that advice. But if it Namoff wasn't actually hurt by that negligent advice, there's no causal connection between his present injuries and the Dr.'s actions, and therefore, no damages.

That's the law school analysis. But the real world, defense lawyer analysis says "we violated the standard of care and this dude is totally messed up and we should not let the jury decide causation so we're going to buy the risk and settle."

 

I had my 9th concussion this summer playing rec league (4th from soccer). It had been 23 years since my last one (playing in college). The change in standard of care is remarkable. I was told no vigorous exercise for a month and no contact sports for 8 weeks.

I had two concussion playing HS soccer and two playing in college. After my last one in college they wouldn't let me back on the field without padded headgear... but they let me play as soon as I wasn't experiencing dizziness and headaches.

Now my kids got baseline cognitive tests before the season started with teh HS. I've made my kids wear padded headgear. The standards are changing, but too often coaches and trainers from an earlier era don't want to go along with it... and players want to get back on the field and don't really understand the risk they're taking.

If the threat of a lawsuit is what it takes to address this issue, I'm OK with that.

 

And this is one rationale for respondeat superior. The club is also liable for anything its employee, the doctor, does within the scope of his employment. That possibility should, in theory, encourage the club to carefully evaluate any doctor it considers hiring and deter the club from pressuring its doctor to take risks. (In practice, I'm not sure people are that good at judging risks.)

 

I think MLS should lobby for having players wear headgear. Make it mandatory. The USMNT should wear headgear also in all their games.

 

Lol, people bashing high-speed soccer balls into their skulls a few thousand times has a brain injury.

I wonder how FIFA weighs in on this... Lawsuits are contagious.

 

Don't be ignorant... this isn't about heading the ball. That's a different issue altogether.