Just sayin': Needless to say, it can happen in other sports too:
Former Detroit Tigers catcher Bill Freehan one of many ex-athletes feeling the long-term effects of concussions
Sept. 4, 2019
At a recent birthday celebration in their Vinegar Flats neighborhood, Rick Freehan sat on a sofa next to his wife, Carole, and chatted about typical neighborhood topics. A sighting of young beavers playing in Latah Creek. A neighbor’s adventures mixing sheep and goats.
Usual neighborhood stuff.
But when a friend arrived wearing a souvenir T-shirt from the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, he changed topics.
“You know, my brother should have been inducted into the Hall of Fame,” he said. “He was an 11-time All-Star and he won three Gold Gloves as a catcher.”
Freehan’s brother, Bill, was a catcher with the Detroit Tigers from 1961, when he was called up as a 19-year-old, until he was released in 1976. He was a major cog in the Tigers’ run to a 1968 World Series win over Bob Gibson and the St. Louis Cardinals.
“He always said he hurt his chances to get into the Hall when he was released,” Freehan added later. “Toronto wanted to sign him and have him be their designated hitter, and he could have really padded his stats. But he was a Detroit boy, and he already made more money in business than he made playing baseball.”
Playing behind the plate in the major leagues has always been a rough-and-tumble business. Catchers were taught to block the plate, base runners taught to plow through them.
What’s more, baseballs fouled off a catcher’s mask are enough to leave a player with “their bell rung.”
In other words, concussions were commonplace. In all sports.
“(Bill) was a three-sport athlete and he played quarterback in high school,” Rick explained. “Notre Dame wanted him to come play football, but they wouldn’t let him play baseball, too. So he played football and baseball at Michigan before he signed with the Tigers.
“He lost track of just how many concussions he had over the years. It was just too many concussions.”
Bill Freehan, now 77, lives in hospice care, having suffered from severe dementia for years. A story in the Detroit Free Press last year reported that he can no longer walk, speak or feed himself.
What is known about the effect of repeated trauma to the brain has been under intense scrutiny since it was discovered by forensic pathologist Dr. Bennet Omalu 17 years ago. In medical terms, experts are just now scratching the surface about the neurodegenerative disease he named Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE).
Entire article:
https://www.spokesman.com/stories/2019/sep/04/he-lost-track-of-just-how-many-concussions-he-had-/
