Sports Radio Interviews

Roger Goodell: “Our focus is that people enjoy more football and keep their focus on the field.”

From performance enhancing drugs to Mike Vick to the potential lockout or uncapped year coming up in the NFL, it just seems like we never hear any positives coming from the office of Roger Goodell.  He has taken the ranks from Paul Tagliabue in August 2006 as the big boss of the NFL and seems like an easy guy to like. Covering the NFL, Tagliabue’s conferences were like sitting in the back of my Poly-Sci class in college and trying to stay awake.  Goodell’s are more like the cool teacher who is telling a story. 

Just like in any sport, we almost only hear from the commissioner’s office when something bad happens or is about to, so I guess I am used to it.  But unlike the other sports in the U.S, football is king so I guess that makes Goodell the main man in sports today.  He makes $11 million a year and might be on the verge of losing control of his league for a year or so when the CBA runs out. Somehow, someway I think the NFL won’t turn out to be like the NHL under Goodell or take as long as the MLB did to make it back to the big-time. Football is King; just ask the networks that fight over them every couple years.

Roger Goodell joined104.3 the Fan in Denver and talked about the NFL in general, some of the good things going on around the NFL and the possibility of expansion.

Asked about some of the positives that have happened for him lately:

“One of the great things about this game is that that you get to work with terrific people, then you mention some of the players’ discipline matters; the reason I feel so strongly about that is because I feel so strongly about our players.  I am proud of them, I am proud of what they do; these guys are so terrific on and off the field.  Our focus is that people enjoy more football and keep their focus on the field.”

Asked about the possibility of expansion in Los Angeles:

“Its not something that we are spending an extraordinary amount of time on right now because we have a lot of priorities and we got a lot of things we got to deal with, particularly a labor agreement that will allow us to invest in things like getting back to Los Angeles.  It is important, we have millions of fans in Southern California, and we would love to have a team back in Los Angeles. We do have people that are working on it and we are making some progress.  We have seen the Governor of California sign some legislation which is making it more reasonable that we can get a stadium up and that’s good news.”

Asked if he has talked to Paul Tagliabue about past CBA agreements and what has helped them:

“One of the great things about this job is that I get to work very closely to Paul Tagliabue.  He has a pretty good insight of the history of labor negotiations and some of the issues that are important and Paul is still only a phone call away.  Hopefully we will be able to come up with something that makes sense for the players and the owners so we can continue this great game.”

Listen to Roger Goodell on 104.3 the Fan in Denver with Alfred and D-Mac

Tags: CBA, expansion, Michael Vick, MLB, NFL, NFL Commissioner, NHL, Paul Tagliabue, Roger Goodell