Brennan: Frank Gifford's family gives hope for national discussion on concussions
Frank Gifford last played in a football game 51 years ago and died more than three months ago at the age of 84, yet he has become the most compelling and important story of our long football weekend.
Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy now has a face, and a name, and it is Gifford's. Junior Seau, Dave Duerson and the entire tragic lot are football names, famous to those of us who love sports, unfamiliar to much of the rest of the nation.
Gifford, though, was a cultural icon. His was, and is, a name almost everyone knows. You don't have to love football to know Gifford. He left the NFL and became a sports TV star, living a glittery life for decades.
So to hear the news announced by the Gifford family the day before Thanksgiving that researchers discovered Gifford had CTE, a degenerative brain disease that is believed to be linked to concussions, was to realize immediately there has been a sudden turn in the discussion about head trauma in the NFL, and throughout sports. A national conversation we all should be having about concussions will come easier now because of Gifford.
Frank Gifford's family reveals former NFL star suffered from CTE
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We've seen it before, with HIV and AIDS with Rock Hudson, then Magic Johnson; Parkinson's disease with Michael J. Fox; addiction with Betty Ford. Different issues all, but the common thread is a famous and unexpected name suddenly attached to them, drawing us closer.
When Gifford's family decided to have his brain studied, it offered a simple gift: the potential for new information. To be able to add Gifford's name to the list of football players who had CTE should help researchers and advocates obtain more money and push for more answers. Anything and everything helps.
Gifford’s family said it suspected that he was suffering from “the debilitating effects of head trauma,” and now it knows for sure. Gifford played 12 seasons in the NFL as a running back and flanker for the New York Giants. Almost exactly 55 years ago, on Nov. 20, 1960, Chuck Bednarik of the Philadelphia Eagles hit Gifford so hard that he not only knocked him out on the Yankee Stadium turf that day but also knocked him out of the NFL for a year.
"During the last years of his life, Frank dedicated himself to understanding the recent revelations concerning the connection between repetitive head trauma and its associated cognitive and behavioral symptoms—which he experienced firsthand," Gifford's family said in a statement.
"We miss him every day, now more than ever, but find comfort in knowing that by disclosing his condition we might contribute positively to the ongoing conversation that needs to be had; that he might be an inspiration for others suffering with this disease that needs to be addressed in the present; and that we might be a small part of the solution to an urgent problem concerning anyone involved with football, at any level.
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"The Gifford family will continue to support the National Football League and its recent on-field rule changes and procedures to make the game Frank loved so dearly — and the players he advocated so tirelessly for — as safe as possible."
While much of the discussion about concussions in the NFL has been framed as an us-against-them battle, the Gifford family statement struck a conciliatory and even hopeful tone, and NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell followed suit, thanking the Giffords for helping “the medical community understand more about CTE,” and saying the NFL is “grateful for their support of the league’s efforts to improve safety in our game.”
This is good. The Gifford news came a day after the NFL held a conference call with the head trainers of all 32 teams and top league and union medical officials to discuss why St. Louis Rams quarterback Case Keenum was allowed to remain in a game after receiving a hit to the head that resulted in a concussion.
Earlier this year, a judge approved a potential $1 billion settlement between the NFL and thousands of retired players who say the league hid the known risks of repeated head injuries.
And in a few weeks, the movie “Concussion,” which is based on the story of the discovery of CTE, opens in theaters around the country.
This is the backdrop against which the Gifford news hit this week. The timing could not have been better.
Follow Christine Brennan on Twitter@cbrennansports