A day after former Bears General Manager Jerry Angelo was quoted as saying that “hundreds and hundreds” of domestic violence cases have been covered up in the NFL, Angelo has stepped back from those comments. Way back.
Now Angelo says his words were twisted and he wasn’t saying what Thursday’s USA Today story said he said.
“That ‘hundreds and hundreds’ was taken totally out of context,” Angelo said, via CSNChicago.com. “When I was making a point to this person, I was making a point that over my 31 years in the National Football League I’ve seen a lot of changes. There were hundreds and hundreds of things over those years that I’ve seen that have gotten better. Domestic violence is one of those. There were no hundreds and hundreds [of cases] of domestic violence. I would have no knowledge of that or have any idea how I would authenticate that. . . . That was never the intent of [the writer’s] conversation with me.”
Angelo says that when he talked about past problems in the league, he was attempting to illustrate that NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has improved the situation.
“It’s very disappointing,” Angelo said. “That story was originally was supposed to be about the commissioner and how I saw him when I was in the league. I’m very pro-commissioner.”
Angelo says the USA Today story he saw looked a lot different from the conversation he thought he had with the USA Today reporter.
“It went in a whole other direction and I was blindsided with it,” he said. “Unfortunately you can’t rewrite what’s already been written but I do want to go on record to tell you what my intentions were and what my motives were.”
Angelo has already received plenty of blowback in the time since his quotes were published, and he now appears to be trying to put the toothpaste back in the tube. That’s not going to be easy.
