An endorsement from ESPN podcast host and NFL analyst Domonique Foxworth goes a long way in the football world. The former president of the NFL Players Association was a candidate to become its executive director last year and often weighs in on big issues facing the league from his platform at the Worldwide Leader.
So it makes sense that new NFLPA executive director Lloyd Howell Jr. would connect with Foxworth, and it’s a big deal that Foxworth speaks highly of him, as he did in an interview on Nothing Personal with David Samson released Wednesday.
Foxworth even went so far as to open the door to future work alongside Howell with the union, despite not getting that job.
“I obviously am in complete support of Lloyd,” Foxworth told Samson. “If there was a reason or an opportunity to get involved and help, then absolutely I would walk away from my media career to do something like that.”
While discussing the challenges of wrangling so many players to unite them as one body of workers, Foxworth said he believed Howell was taking the right approach.
“Lloyd comes at it from the right place, and that’s the benefit of having an outsider like him is that he’s willing to look at these things differently, and he’s a calm, kind of even-tempered guy who is listening to both sides,” Foxworth said. “At least in my conversation with him, it sounds like that’s what he’s doing right now is listening and looking for ways to do things differently.”
Pressed on whether it was really so surprising that Howell would simply listen, Foxworth said that he personally may not have listened enough given his history in the union and as a player in the league.
“Everyone does that, they should at least. I think how genuine they are in doing that and the fact that new he is to this world is different,” Foxworth said. “So had I been selected, I would have come in with some level of baggage and some belief that I understand this business better than he does. And while I would have gone on this same listening tour, I don’t know that I would have been as receptive, because I have a track record.”
Foxworth emphasized that his meeting with Howell was not a job interview or to ask a favor, but he genuinely supports the direction the NFLPA is going and has no problem revealing his biases toward the players.
If Howell ever asked him for help, Foxworth said he would consider it.
“When it comes, it comes. I’ll figure it out then,” he said. “Until then, I’ll do what I can to support him and the players.”
It feels like Foxworth’s ultimate destiny is to return to the NFL player side in some capacity rather than working in media forever. His interest in leading the NFLPA speaks to that, as does his continued interactions with Howell and the union. Given that Foxworth can have considerably more impact from the inside than on TV, who could blame him?