AP

The NFL has put a process in place for removing players from action if/when they suffer a concussion. The NFL knows (along with everyone else) that the process failed last month, when Rams quarterback Case Keenum clearly was in distress, but Keenum was not removed from the game for a concussion evaluation after he suffered what turned out to be a concussion.

Appearing Friday on SiriusXM NFL Radio with Bob Papa and Shannon Sharpe, Commissioner Roger Goodell admitted that the Keenum situation wasn’t handled properly.

“In the Case Keenum case, it was clear that there was somebody [from the Rams] giving him medical attention, and that that was already done,” Goodell said. “The problem we had is that the appropriate medical attention wasn’t given. And there were several gates that frankly failed and didn’t do the right things to our protocol, and so we’re trying to make changes to that. We’re going to continue to tweak that until we get that right, and make sure the game is stopped so the player has the right medical attention, and that’s always the issue.”

Goodell specifically absolved the ATC spotter, who merely must flag the need for a player to receive medical attention. By process of elimination, however, exonerating the ATC spotter means implicating the Rams, who sent a trainer out to assess Keenum, took Keenum’s “I’m fine” explanation at face value, and didn’t remove Keenum for a closer look.

If, as Goodell admits, appropriate medical attention wasn’t given to Keenum and if, as Goodell has made clear, the ATC spotter isn’t to blame, the team is to blame.

So why wasn’t the team fined? Players are fined all the time for conduct that jeopardizes the safety of other players (more on that in a later post). Why should the Rams or any team get a pass under the premise that it was a “confluence of events” that allowed Keenum to fall through the cracks when, in reality, the Rams knew that they should tend to Keenum but didn’t know that they should remove him for a concussion evaluation?

Maybe the league didn’t want to punish the Rams in order to avoid making the situation into a bigger deal than it was, especially with the release of Concussion looming. Maybe coach Jeff Fisher’s membership on the Competition Committee gets the Rams extra consideration when it comes to matters of discipline. Whatever the reason, Goodell’s explanation demonstrates that the “stuff happens” defense doesn’t really apply here, that a clear failure of the protocol occurred, and that the entity responsible for it should be fined, in order to prevent a situation like this from happening again.