Professional Football Researchers Association Forum

From the article:

"Frank Gifford, the Hall of Fame N.F.L. running back who was involved in one of the most brutal collisions in league history, was found to have chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a degenerative brain disease.

The finding, which can only be confirmed posthumously, was announced by Gifford’s family on Wednesday, more than three months after Gifford died. His family hoped that in publicizing the diagnosis, more attention would be paid to medical research linking football and traumatic brain injury."

entire read at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/26/sport ... &smtyp=cur

Gifford was a week short of his 85th birthday and, as far as I know, in reasonably good health almost to the end. That's not a bad run.

No doubt that playing football, especially at the professional level, is a dangerous undertaking. However, until everyone has these studies posthumously done on them, we won't know how much more prevalent CTE is on football players than it is on the average Joe or Joanne.

Did he suffer a concussion when Bednarik laid him out in 1960? He must have suffered a bad one in addition to all his other injuries.

JohnH19 wrote:No doubt that playing football, especially at the professional level, is a dangerous undertaking. However, until everyone has these studies posthumously done on them, we won't know how much more prevalent CTE is on football players than it is on the average Joe or Joanne.

So true. He has CTE. He played football. They must be related.

The press is crucial to a free society but sometimes I hate it. Everyone is trying to be Woodward and Bernstein.

Rupert Patrick wrote:Did he suffer a concussion when Bednarik laid him out in 1960? He must have suffered a bad one in addition to all his other injuries.

An article two days after the game specifically mentions a "head concussion," with the team physician saying that "a rest of three to four weeks was required before a player could risk contact in game again."

BD Sullivan wrote:

Rupert Patrick wrote:Did he suffer a concussion when Bednarik laid him out in 1960? He must have suffered a bad one in addition to all his other injuries.

An article two days after the game specifically mentions a "head concussion," with the team physician saying that "a rest of three to four weeks was required before a player could risk contact in game again."

What exactly were the extent of Gifford's injuries from that play that forced him to miss two seasons? I've seen the hit a million times, but never heard of him breaking any bones on the play, or tearing any MCL's or rotator cuffs or anything requiring surgeries that would keep him laid up and healing/rehabing. Are there any details on this? How long was he hospitalized after the play?

If it was the mother of all concussions that he suffered, which is what it sounds like to me if there were no other real physical issues related to the hit, there were no real after-affects that the public saw for the remainder of his public career where it was apparent he had suffered any problems as he was on TV constantly until he was about 70. He never made mistakes while broadcasting, got numbers wrong as others did a lot, etc, and he not only did football but other things for ABC including the Olympics, Wide World of Sports, and was a fill in host on Good Morning America to name a few. One of Gifford's contemporaries, Pat Summerall, you couldn't get thru one of his broadcasts without Summerall saying "beg your pardon" at least a dozen times when he messed up a player's name or some other detail, and this was even after he stopped drinking, and Summerall was one of the all-time great broadcasters. You never saw Frank Gifford make those kinds of mistakes, never.

Having seen cases like Junior Seau and Mike Webster who were surely suffering from CTE issues while still playing in the NFL, it doesn't seem to make sense to me that Gifford seemed to do just fine until with no affects from CTE and then when he got into his mid-70's and later, it started to kick in because it had not manifest itself much earlier in his life. I am happy to see that his family donated his brain to the CTE project for research.

Rupert Patrick wrote:

BD Sullivan wrote:

Rupert Patrick wrote:Did he suffer a concussion when Bednarik laid him out in 1960? He must have suffered a bad one in addition to all his other injuries.

An article two days after the game specifically mentions a "head concussion," with the team physician saying that "a rest of three to four weeks was required before a player could risk contact in game again."

What exactly were the extent of Gifford's injuries from that play that forced him to miss two seasons? I've seen the hit a million times, but never heard of him breaking any bones on the play, or tearing any MCL's or rotator cuffs or anything requiring surgeries that would keep him laid up and healing/rehabing. Are there any details on this? How long was he hospitalized after the play?

If it was the mother of all concussions that he suffered, which is what it sounds like to me if there were no other real physical issues related to the hit, there were no real after-affects that the public saw for the remainder of his public career where it was apparent he had suffered any problems as he was on TV constantly until he was about 70. He never made mistakes while broadcasting, got numbers wrong as others did a lot, etc, and he not only did football but other things for ABC including the Olympics, Wide World of Sports, and was a fill in host on Good Morning America to name a few. One of Gifford's contemporaries, Pat Summerall, you couldn't get thru one of his broadcasts without Summerall saying "beg your pardon" at least a dozen times when he messed up a player's name or some other detail, and this was even after he stopped drinking, and Summerall was one of the all-time great broadcasters. You never saw Frank Gifford make those kinds of mistakes, never.

Having seen cases like Junior Seau and Mike Webster who were surely suffering from CTE issues while still playing in the NFL, it doesn't seem to make sense to me that Gifford seemed to do just fine until with no affects from CTE and then when he got into his mid-70's and later, it started to kick in because it had not manifest itself much earlier in his life. I am happy to see that his family donated his brain to the CTE project for research.

While it's fair to say that there were no obvious signs that he had been materially affected by the concussion, to say that he didn't make some embarrassing mistakes along the way would be incorrect. Probably his most notorious was when he referred to Cowboy DB Dennis Thurman as "Thurman Munson"--about six weeks after Munson had been killed in a plane crash. There was also the story about him reading cue cards for some live PSA and actually pausing when he got to "and I'm ..." because his name was at the start of the next cue card.

I imagine whatever mental issues that came about were the result of simply being retired, since the philosophy of "use it or lose it" relates to staying active. I don't think it was as serious as many other cases, simply because he was still seemed to be a part of talking head reminiscing on NFL Films projects, but then none of us saw what he was like on a day-to-day basis over the last few years.

Rupert Patrick wrote: What exactly were the extent of Gifford's injuries from that play that forced him to miss two seasons? I've seen the hit a million times, but never heard of him breaking any bones on the play, or tearing any MCL's or rotator cuffs or anything requiring surgeries that would keep him laid up and healing/rehabing. Are there any details on this? How long was he hospitalized after the play?

His only reported injury from the hit was a "deep concussion". He was in the hospital for 12 days.
https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid= ... 4508&hl=en
https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid= ... 8177&hl=en

On a somewhat related note Gifford was once the narrator for a 20-minute video on the prevention of traumatic brain injuries in children.
https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid= ... 5655&hl=en

Rupert Patrick wrote:

BD Sullivan wrote:

Rupert Patrick wrote:Did he suffer a concussion when Bednarik laid him out in 1960? He must have suffered a bad one in addition to all his other injuries.

An article two days after the game specifically mentions a "head concussion," with the team physician saying that "a rest of three to four weeks was required before a player could risk contact in game again."

What exactly were the extent of Gifford's injuries from that play that forced him to miss two seasons? I've seen the hit a million times, but never heard of him breaking any bones on the play, or tearing any MCL's or rotator cuffs or anything requiring surgeries that would keep him laid up and healing/rehabing. Are there any details on this? How long was he hospitalized after the play?

I

He missed only one season not two (1961) - retiring on 2/9/1961, un-retiring on 4/2/1962.

He was in the hospital for 12 days.

There was also the story about him reading cue cards for some live PSA and actually pausing when he got to "and I'm ..." because his name was at the start of the next cue card.
.

and I'm..."happy to support this cause."
and I'm..."hoping you will join me in supporting this cause."

In fact, "and I'm Frank Gifford" makes no sense. Starting off the PSA and not ending it with "I'm Frank Gifford" is much better. If that "story" is true, then I blame it on bad writing.