Advocacy group's high-flying message to Roger Goodell hard to miss

The message was impossible for fans outside three NFL stadiums on Sunday to miss.

A banner reading "#GoodellMustGo" was towed above MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J., as well as in Cleveland and Santa Clara, Calif., all orchestrated by the women's advocacy group UltraViolet as a response to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and the league's handling of recent domestic violence cases. The group started the hashtag, along with an online petition seeking Goodell's resignation, last week after the release of a second video in the Ray Rice domestic abuse case brought into question just how much the NFL knew about the incident.

"It seems like every other day a new egregious report is coming out in the media," UltraViolet co-founder Nita Chaudhary told USA TODAY Sports. "Obviously a lot of news came out last week, and we were thinking that we've got to send a message that the NFL can't ignore. On game day, when folks are out tailgating and out to support their team, that's the time to show the NFL exactly how people are feeling. That seems to be the best way to get at the NFL on their own field."

It's a sentiment UltraViolet and groups such as the National Organization for Women, who last week also called for Goodell's ouster, are likely to continue voicing as the season continues. While Goodell sent a letter to teams and league staff members Monday morning announcing the names of four women (one current NFL staffer and three outside senior advisors) who will help shape the league's domestic violence policies moving forward, representatives from both groups feel like the commissioner's actions have still been woefully inadequate.

"This measure is another step in the right direction. It is way not enough," NOW president Terry O'Neill told USA TODAY Sports Monday afternoon. "The statement raises more questions than it answers. How can we believe that there is a real willingness to change at the top level of the NFL when they are going to their current employees who have not been empowered to succeed or for some reasons, have failed?

"I'm just trying to wrap my brain around how we're supposed to believe that Roger Goodell is committed to real change when what he's doing is simply using more window dressing. He's utilizing people that are already in his organization that have had 50 opportunities to have a proper response to domestic violence, and they've blown every single opportunity.

"How can Roger Goodell say at this late date in his tenure as the CEO of the National Football League that he doesn't know anything about domestic violence, he just doesn't understand it and now he wants to be educated? Has he learned nothing from the 50 cases that have come before him during his tenure and has he not been curious? If his curiosity is only driven by the public spotlight that has been put on his failure to act, frankly, I'm glad that he's finally getting there awfully late to the party. But he's not the person that should be the CEO of this organization."

Chaudhary agrees, calling Goodell's letter a "fine first step" but noting that "right now what this looks like is crisis communications 101."

She says UltraViolet has not heard from the NFL regarding the protest banners or to solicit the organization's assistance in creating a dialogue regarding domestic violence issues.

UltraViolet and NOW plan to continue shining a spotlight on the NFL's domestic violence policies and are assessing numerous options to raise awareness. O'Neill says NOW is supportive of potential Congressional hearings into the NFL's handling of the subject and is also considering reaching out to league sponsors "who mostly sell products to women for women."

Chaudhary remains skeptical the league can make significant progress in this area if Goodell remains at the helm.

"Unless the NFL removes him, because of the way he's engaged on this issue throughout, he's exposed himself as somebody that doesn't take this issue seriously," she said. "Until they send a message that that isn't tolerated in their league, either, we don't feel like they will have adequately addressed it.

"But there is certainly a lot more they could be doing. One big thing is having a zero-tolerance policy for domestic abuse."

Follow Chris Strauss on Twitter @chris_strauss.