Junior Seau's family barred from speaking at his Hall of Fame induction
When former NFL linebacker Junior Seau is posthumously enshrined into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, his family won't be permitted to speak on his behalf.
Though Seau told his family he wanted his daughter to speak for him, the Hall of Fame will only play a video in Seau's honor at the Aug. 8 ceremony, and will not allow anyone to share a few words, Ken Belson of the New York Times reports.
Seau's suicide in 2012 and his posthumous diagnosis of traumatic brain injury is an area the NFL and Hall of Fame likely want to minimize.
The video set to be played will reportedly not include details of Seau's death and will focus wholly on his playing career, though it will include clips of an interview with his daughter.
"It's frustrating because the induction is for my father and for the other players, but then to not be able to speak, it's painful," Seau's daughter Sydney said. "I just want to give the speech he would have given. It wasn't going to be about this mess. My speech was solely about him."
The Hall of Fame released a statement saying that the policy is not without precedent.
NFL Hall of Fame's statement on the Seau decision, from the "Can we make this worse? Let's try!" department: pic.twitter.com/tHZe8YNUEf
— Chris Burke (@ChrisBurke_SI) July 24, 2015
Seau's family filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the NFL in 2013. The suit may not be permitted to proceed independent of a class-action suit brought by 5,000 retired players.