Armour: NFL looking for answers? USOC has some

Roger Goodell and his people have spent the past month talking to anyone who might help the NFL figure out the best way to handle domestic violence and sexual abuse. Advocates. Law-enforcement officials. Prosecutors. Former players.

One phone call to the U.S. Olympic Committee could have saved a whole lot of time.

Facing its own crisis after USA Swimming was hit with a series of lawsuits over child sex abuse in 2010, the USOC began looking at what it could do to prevent future incidents. Several of the federations already had Safe Sport programs to establish licensing procedures, outline unacceptable behavior and provide a structure for how complaints were to be handled.

But USOC CEO Scott Blackmun soon recognized that wasn't enough.

"What we found is a lot of our NGBs (national governing bodies) just didn't have the expertise to do the investigation piece and the adjudication piece," Blackmun told USA TODAY Sports. "We just concluded that this required enough expertise that we needed an organization dedicated exclusively to this."

Early next year, the USOC plans to establish a national agency for Safe Sport. The bulk of its focus will be on education: running seminars for coaches, and briefing parents and athletes on behavior that could be a warning sign for abuse. It will help federations establish prevention procedures, and do background checks.

But its most important role will be as an independent investigative agency, operating much like the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency.

No longer will cases against coaches be handled by folks who have known and worked with them for years. No longer will parents wonder if their complaints will be taken seriously by a body that was supposed to be keeping an eye on the alleged abusers in the first place.

No longer will victims wonder if anyone is on their side.

"One of the most important things for us is to keep kids safe. In order to do that, we need to get the disclosures, whether that comes from the individual itself or someone else," said Malia Arrington, the USOC's director of ethics and Safe Sport.

"There's a perception they won't really get a fair shake," she said. "Creating that independence and that sense they will be believed and that something will come of their disclosure … was really important in structuring this conversation."

And it's worth considering for the NFL.

The league has talked about establishing "support teams" for abuse victims. It also has said it wants a point person on each team to work with families, someone who can identify both potential abusers and victims.

But if you're married to the star running back – or the third-string defensive back, for that matter – are you really going to seek help from the team that employs him? The team that counts on him? The team that holds your family's fate in its hands?

The USOC's new agency is focused on sexual abuse rather than domestic violence, because that's the issue the Olympic sport federations are confronted with most. But there's no reason it can't be a model for the NFL.

No reason the NFL can't help fund it, either.

A five-year pilot program will cost about $25 million, and Blackmun said the USOC and its federations have contributed $10 million. He's approached the professional sports leagues as well as philanthropic organizations to raise the rest of the funding but, so far, all he's heard are crickets -- though he puts it a little more diplomatically.

"We really just hit the streets in the last couple of weeks," Blackmun said. "There is a recognition these programs are important, but we're not at a point where this program fits into their priorities."

So make it fit. Have the league pony up the $15 million to cover the remaining costs of the pilot program, and then have each of the 32 NFL owners kick in $1 million more to keep it going for an additional five years. Consider it consulting fees.

"This is not something that I would prefer the USOC to do," Blackmun said. "Our core mission is to sustain competitive excellence, and that means we want to see as many Americans standing on the (medals) podium.

"The challenge was, nobody else was stepping up to do this."

The USOC is stepping up now. The NFL would do well to follow along.