{"id":38063,"date":"2025-08-01T18:19:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-01T18:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/38063\/"},"modified":"2025-08-01T18:19:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-01T18:19:08","slug":"roger-goodell-addresses-shooting-in-emotional-interview-ahead-of-nfl-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/38063\/","title":{"rendered":"Roger Goodell Addresses Shooting In Emotional Interview Ahead Of NFL Game"},"content":{"rendered":"

In an emotional interview ahead of Thursday night\u2019s NFL preseason opener between the Los Angeles Chargers and the Detroit Lions, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell addressed the shooting earlier this week<\/a> that targeted NFL headquarters, killing four.<\/p>\n

Goodell wasn\u2019t at the game, instead staying in New York City to attend the funeral of NYPD officer Didarul Islam, who died in the attack along with a security guard, a real estate firm employee and an investment firm executive.<\/p>\n

\u201cTremendous loss,\u201d Goodell said<\/a>, reflecting on the death of Islam, a father of two with a third on the way.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou see the officer\u2019s family, his young children. It\u2019s something that happens in the line of work for police officers, but that never makes it easy. He was made a detective first grade today. It\u2019s an honor and a promotion, which is well deserved for his bravery. …<\/p>\n

\u201cIt hits home \u2014 the loss, the unnecessary and unexplainable loss. … So, it was a difficult, emotional afternoon but also a tremendous, heartwarming service for him.\u201d<\/p>\n

An NFL employee was also seriously injured in the attack. Goodell said he spent about an hour with his co-worker Wednesday at a hospital in New York, describing his condition as \u201cstable and improving.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe has a young family. I had a chance to meet his brother and parents, and I think it\u2019s something that is really hard for all of us to understand and to deal with,\u201d said Goodell, his voice quivering.<\/p>\n

The 27-year-old shooter intended to target NFL headquarters but took the wrong elevator, officials said Tuesday. A note found on the gunman\u2019s body claimed he suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a brain disease linked to repetitive head injuries like those suffered by NFL players.<\/p>\n

The shooter played high school football several decades ago but never in the NFL.<\/p>\n

Goodell didn\u2019t address the CTE claim directly when asked by NBC\u2019s Mike Tirico, instead lamenting the violence.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are no excuses for those senseless acts,\u201d\u00a0Goodell said. \u201cThey\u2019re hard for all of us to understand when it inflicts pain on people you know and people you care about and people that we deal with on a daily basis. That\u2019s particularly hard.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut as you know, these acts of senseless violence and hatred are happening around our country, and our world, far too often \u2014 in schools, in churches and in synagogues, and other places,\u201d Goodell continued. \u201cThis should just not be happening, but we all have to continue to be vigilant and do what we can to protect ourselves, and the NFL\u2019s going to do that with our employees and with our people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Related…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In an emotional interview ahead of Thursday night\u2019s NFL preseason opener between the Los Angeles Chargers and the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":38064,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[64,63,3055,3052,593,6499,28598,85],"class_list":["post-38063","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-detroit-lions","tag-los-angeles-chargers","tag-nfl","tag-nfl-preseason","tag-roger-goodell","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38063"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38063\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38064"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}