More than 16 years had passed since Rich Miano hung up his professional football jersey when an attorney-friend from New Jersey asked him to be a plaintiff in a class-action lawsuit blaming the National Football League for serious head injuries to players.

After talking with his wife and parents, Miano agreed to take the role in the fraud and negligence lawsuit filed in January at Philadelphia, accusing the NFL of publishing nonscientific papers written by biased members of the league’s medical committee.

“Whether we win or lose,” Miano said, “this lawsuit I think is an important lawsuit because of the opportunity to educate not only the NFL but all the way down to youth leagues, including soccer, and all the other studies that have come out of concussions, whether it’s skateboarding or any recreational activities. This will probably give more education about head trauma than anything that’s previously been done.”

Miano, 49, had been an aggressive player at Kaiser High School, as a walk-on at the University of Hawaii and for 11 years as a defense back from 1985 through 1995 with the New York Jets, Philadelphia Eagles and Altanta Falcons. He returned to UH as an assistant football coach for 13 years, the last four as associate head coach, but new Warrior Coach Norm Chow this year chose not to include him in his staff.

In June, Miano accepted the job of head coach at his alma mater at Kaiser, agreeing to donate his coaching paycheck to his staff.

His concern about head injuries on the gridiron has carried over to his first games this season, objecting to inconsistent calls by referees and urging that “FieldTurf,” the relatively soft synthetic ground surface at Aloha Stadium, be installed at high school fields across the state.

QUESTION: It’s been reported that you sustained a least one concussion playing football. Is that right?

ANSWER: I honestly think that I’ve had many, many, many, many concussions. I say that because in the ’80s I was known to be a vicious hitter in high school, college and then the National Football League, but we weren’t even aware of, we didn’t speak of concussions, we spoke in terms of bell ringers, zingers, dingers, stingers, all those terms that just basically meant that you were a football player, and that’s part of the game, and you would only take yourself out of the game if you had to be carried out of the game. You wouldn’t take yourself out of the game if you could physically walk off or continue to play. We didn’t think of the way that young people and the way coaches and the way trainers and the way doctors look at concussions today. This was part of playing football, part of our job, part of the game.

Q: How has the NFL reacted to the lawsuit and congressional hearings?

A: I was pretty much told by our lawyers that by becoming part of this lawsuit, I would never work for the NFL again. I think the NFL has taken a very proactive approach: In the last year or two, their No. 1 focus has been player safety, as it should be. Another reason why I thought this lawsuit was something I should be a part of is that the NFL has the wherewithal. The NFL is a $10-billion business that to me doesn’t do a good enough job of taking care of its past. As a former (NFL) union member, and somebody who was very active in the union, our whole logo was of the past, present and future, and so should the National Football League’s. I think they have a moral responsibility to make sure that guys in their 70s, of which there are very few, guys in their 60s and 50s and 40s, that have no medical plans, they should do a better job of taking care of these men as they get into their latter years — dementia, Alzheimer’s and chronic trauma, and all the other things  that are associated with this game. So I think the NFL is really starting to be proactive. They understand player safety should be first and foremost, and what they do and who they are. The game is a better game now in terms of safety, but there still is obviously things that they can continue to do …

Q: Is the main problem equipment or decisions to put people back in the game?

A: I spent a week in Miami Beach with most of the lead attorneys in this lawsuit. … Their feelings were that the helmet manufacturers are doing the best job they can. There was probably just as much concern for helmet-to-helmet hits as there is with whiplash of your head hitting the ground. So I think that it wasn’t a matter of so much of the helmet manufacturers being negligent. I think it was the position of the National Football League to not do prior base-line testing, to put people back in the game that were concussed.

One thing that stood out last year was Colt McCoy, who was a star quarterback for the Cleveland Browns. His dad was at a game where his son got (head-to-head) concussed. Here you have a star football player, a quarterback, one of the big names in the National Football League, sent back into a football game. That shouldn’t happen in Pop Warner. I don’t think it would in Pop Warner today. I don’t think it would happen in high school today. I never thought it  would happen in the National Football League last year, but it’s another case of another pretty big-name player being put back into a game. That to me goes beyond comprehension as a former player, a coach, a dad, just a fan of the game, knowing what we know now. That’s the National Football League. That’s the highest level that you can actually put somebody back in the game knowing that he’s been concussed. … The dad was at the game, and I think what happened was the dad’s reaction after the game to the press was what really got the NFL in, not a pent-up mode, but an understanding of how did we allow this to happen, really a public relations nightmare that that could happen. So I think again, as a coach now in high school, and as a former college coach and a player, that shouldn’t happen last year in the big leagues and it shouldn’t happen this year in Pop Warner.

Q: Is there a problem with helmets that are deficient or are they knocked around and used again?

A: I think some of it is that equipment managers have to make sure they are properly inflated, for those helmets that are inflatable, so that’s on them as well as probably the player to make sure that the helmet fits properly. There’s been a new helmet design in the past 20 or 30 years in terms it’s supposed to be safer. They have helmet ratings, and obviously you try to use the safe helmet. The problem with it, my feeling is, guys have gotten bigger, stronger, faster. There’s no question now. I just saw a study in the paper recently that in 1980 there were 12 guys over 300 pounds. Now there are 356 out of 2,000. At every single position, they have gotten faster. … Now across the board at every single position, speed is such a requirement, combined with nutrition, the possible performance-enhancing drugs that athletes are taking nowadays, the strength, the training of these young people, the collisions have a much higher impact. You can only do so much with equipment.

Q: Was there a problem that you saw when you were in high school and UH?

A: I led with my head way too many times. If I played in today’s game, I would probably be penalized or thrown out of a high school football game or college football game or probably even an NFL game. I think that the game has become faster and stronger and more violent, but now that’s starting to dissipate, I think, with the rule changes to protect the players, so now you can’t launch, you can’t leave your feet, in high school you can’t hurdle somebody, jump over somebody. There’s so many different rules now that protect not only the quarterback, which probably began about 10 years ago in the National Football League, but to protect defenseless players.

There’s still some hypocritical kind of rules that it would be worth to study the actual benefits of safety versus the benefits of what they perceive as being safe. Their goal is to try to make the game safer. There’s no question in my mind, they’re doing the right thing. They understand that when you had 10.1 million football players last year, and you (now) have 9.1 million football players playing organized football, and you lose one-tenth of organized football players. Those from the commissioner on down understand the loss of participation in this great sport will result eventually in loss of television revenue. The whole thing is driven by money. …

Q: Do you think NFL Commissioner (Roger) Goodell is still resistant to changes made to reduce head injuries by players?

A: People ask me all the time, ‘Do you think this has a possibility of bankrupting the National Football League?’ I say I hope not. It’s the greatest sport there is, it’s the greatest game there is. I’m proud to have played 11 years. … (Goodell) represents the owners. There’s a huge liability concern in terms of if there will be monetary damages, how the game will change.

But I think his whole understanding of this is the public wants a safe game, and the public wants to make sure that player safety is the No. 1 issue. There’s been so much press about this, which will help every sport and every athlete, for player safety… I think he understands the moral responsibility to the player…

Q: It was reported this week that NFL star Junior Seau, who killed himself in May, had no evidence of brain trauma, according to an autopsy report by the San Diego County (Calif.) medical examiner. Is that the end of suspicion that his suicide was connected with brain trauma incurred during his football career?

A: There’s still a lot of studies to be done on the actual brain matter, the tissue and all that kind of stuff.

I think that closes the door on recreational drug use, and it closes the door to a lot of other things, in terms of how he died. I don’t think that closes the door on just any more insight into the trauma of his brain. I think that’s going to be a whole separate issue. …

I think there’s so much propaganda coming from both sides. I really believe that until an independent study, where the brain was donated (to Boston University Medical School), comes back, I don’t think it’s a closed case.