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Gale Sayers and Dwight Clark, NFL legends with bad diagnoses, ‘suspect’ football is to blame

By Cindy Boren March 20 at 9:53 AM, Washington Post

Amid a weekend dominated by headlines about March Madness, there was a double whammy of awful news about two great, beloved former NFL players.

A story from Kansas City detailed the dementia that is claiming the memories of Gale Sayers, the Chicago Bears’ legendary running back, while Dwight Clark, the San Francisco 49ers’ wide receiver who was one half of “The Catch,” announced that he has amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

For both men, there is an awareness that playing football may be a contributing factor to what they are experiencing now. Clark is at least the fifth former NFL player in the last 10 years to be diagnosed with what is also called Lou Gehrig’s disease. While he said in a statement that he doesn’t know for sure whether football “caused this,” he adds that “I certainly suspect it did. And I encourage the NFLPA and the NFL to continue working together in their efforts to make the game of football safer, especially as it relates to head trauma.”

The game we love, every day it seems, is claiming the players we’ve loved.

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Burgundy&GoldForever wrote:The NFL as we know it has a limited shelf life. The CTE lawsuit alone is going to fundamentally change the game. At the same time, there is no way these players didn't know the risks long before they played at the professional level. It's hard to muster sympathy for someone who made a conscious choice to get the snot knocked out of them for money.