It's unusual to hear a current NFL player criticize the league, let alone talk frankly about its handling of concussions or its response to domestic violence scandals
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But a new book does just that. It's called NFL Confidential, a memoir of the 2014 football season written by a player who goes only by Johnny Anonymous.
The player spoke with All Things Considered host Audie Cornish this week, after NPR confirmed his identity before the interview.
He says he loves playing the game but thinks the NFL is manipulative and exploitative.
"You get to the NFL and you realize that the only reason you're there — and the only reason they want you there — is to make money for the NFL, and they'll compensate you for that," he says.
The player describes feeling that concussions, painkillers and off-the-field scandals all take a back seat to on-field performance.
"It's either come clean and tell all as it stands from my mouth and my voice with my picture and my name on it, and football cease to exist in my life," he says. "Or I maintain my anonymous stature, and I can really give the world a piece of what this game really is for the guys that don't mean anything to the game — and continue to make money."I think it's just a general acceptance of, I don't know, what seems normal, which is kind of sad to say. Obviously, when that came out, we were all sitting in the training room and it comes up, and it's disgusting. We all know it's disgusting. A handful of guys made remarks of, "This guy shouldn't be in the league; this guy is disrespectful to women." And then 10 minutes later you've got a guy making a joke about it. So, there's different levels of respect that players will have, but I think in general they have a pretty short attention span
