Rod Taylor

Rod Taylor was born on September 9, 1943, in the County of Dorset, England. From a young boy, he started his football journey as a goalkeeper, but quickly found he was better at kicking and heading than catching the ball.

Rod’s pro career began at Portsmouth FC as a ground staff boy in 1958. He signed his first professional contract in 1961 at age 18 and went on to play at Fratton Park for two seasons as a wing half and central defender.

Rod met his future wife Penny Browning at a dance hall just around the corner from Fratton Park. The couple would go on to marry in Portsmouth in 1964. Rod and Penny had two children, Spencer, who was born in 1965 and Rachel, who was born in 1968.

After his spell at Portsmouth, Rod joined Gillingham FC in July 1963 and spent three years at Priestfield. In 1966, he returned to Dorset playing under manager Freddie Cox, who had signed him at Gillingham. Rod made 40 appearances for AFC Bournemouth in the Fourth Division before joining Poole Town in August 1967. During his playing career Rod started a building and decorating company with fellow professional Tony Priscott. The two continued their partnership for 20 years.

Rod was known as a tough tackling player, who had a good footballing brain. Unbeknownst to Rod or his family, his exposure to repeated heading of the ball and multiple concussive and sub-concussive blows, would ultimately lead to his death in 2018.

After his professional playing career ended in 1967, Rod remained involved in football as a member of the Portsmouth Former Players Association. He continued to play amateur county league football well into his early 40’s alongside other ex-professionals.

A life-long vegetarian who never smoked and only occasional drank, he took diet and exercise seriously all his life. However, throughout his life, he was quick to fly off the handle and sometimes suffered with low moods.

He readily jumped out of the car to face-up to someone who had annoyed him on the roads. The men working for him knew him as fair but no-nonsense. To his family he was loving, kind, funny, and intelligent, but sometimes melancholy.

Rod and Penny raised Spencer to be a professional golfer and Rachel to join the Royal Navy. Late in his career, Rod settled into a quiet rural life living in Dorset. Penny worked for the National Trust as a conservator and Rod continued building right up to when Penny was diagnosed with cancer in 2010.
Penny was told she had stage 4 bladder cancer. Specialists told her the only hope of saving her would be for a radical cystectomy to be carried out at the Royal Marsden in London.

In August 2010, Penny had her bladder removed and the next six weeks she hovered closer to death than life. During this time, Spencer and Rachel took turns to be in London to support Rod, who by this time was showing signs of acute anxiety and mental incapacity. On one occasion, Rachel took the stairs to the intensive care unit but Rod took the lift due to his bad knee. For 30 minutes, Rachel stood outside the lift on the basement floor waiting for her father to arrive. It was just one floor, but Rod pushed every button. He was not sure which floor to get off on – despite having visited the intensive care unit every-day for six weeks.

The signs were there, but Spencer and Rachel put it down to him being stressed and worried about their mother. Finally, after nearly two months, the family returned to Dorset.

At 66-years-old, both Rod and Penny were never able to work again. Instead, they started to watch their lives unravel while Rachel and Spencer were unable to stop it from happening.

2010 – 2018

Penny never fully recovered from the radical cystectomy and instead of being able to take life easy, she had to care for Rod. By this time, Rod was becoming increasingly depressed, anxious, and forgetful. Penny kept a lot of what was going on secret from her children and close friends, as she wanted to protect Rod. Their world became narrow and small – friends would cross the road if they saw them out shopping. The two struggled on for a few more years and finally around 2016, Penny agreed to Rod seeing a neurologist to get him formally diagnosed. She frequently said, “I don’t need to stick a label on him to know its dementia,” but finally a consultant Neurologist provided the label. Rod was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s.

Rod tried multiple medications, but the drugs only made him worse. His gait became shuffled and he complained of the carpet “moving underfoot.” He slept much of the day. At night, he paced around measuring the bed cover and removing it whilst Penny tried to get some rest. Rod became incontinent and Penny began to worry he would choke on his food.

The dementia nurses couldn’t understand why his Alzheimer’s was progressing so fast – they had never seen anything like this before.

In 2017, Penny herself started to show signs of neurodegenerative illness. Her right leg developed a tremor and a neurologist diagnosed her with Parkinson’s soon after.

Despite this, Penny refused to place Rod into a care facility. Eventually Penny became desperate for sleep and finally agreed to move Rod into full-time care in April 2018. Within a week, Rod fell and Penny and Rachel arrived at the facility to see an ambulance parked outside. They walked into Rod’s room and were greeted by the ambulance staff. Rod was on the floor. He fractured his hip in the fall.

Rod spent two weeks in Poole Hospital. Doctors operated on his hip and tried to fight a sepsis infection, resulting in a main line being sewn into Rod’s neck to try and save his life. Because of Rod’s confusion, his hands were placed in mittens, so he couldn’t pull out the main line sewn into his jugular vein.

On the 16th of April 2018, just before 11 p.m., Rod died with Penny at his side. Spencer arrived shortly afterwards to sit with his parents. Rachel was in a complete state of distress and stayed with her husband. She refused to see her father’s body.

Because of the hip fracture, Rod’s body was sent for post-mortem, and it was determined Rod had died of Alzheimer’s and sepsis. The family consented to Rod’s brain being removed and sent to Dr. Willie Stewart in Glasgow. It wasn’t an easy decision for Rod’s wife and children, but they all felt passionately they needed to know what went so drastically wrong with Rod’s brain. Brain donation was the only way to answer their questions and to try and protect other footballers and their families from this brutal illness.

The process of the brain donation was handled personally by family friend, Dawn Astle. As the daughter of the England International Jeff Astle, Dawn and her family launched The Jeff Astle Foundation in 2015 and had been supporting the Taylor family since 2016. It fell on Dawn to liaise with Dr. Stewart and the coroner’s office to arrange for the transfer of Rod’s brain to the Glasgow Brain Injury Research Group. For the Taylor family, knowing Dawn was dealing with this meant they could concentrate on arranging Rod’s funeral which was held on the 11th of May. In front of hundreds of friends and family, Rod was laid to rest in a beautiful plot overlooking the Purbeck hills.

A few months after Rod’s death, Dr. Stewart rang Penny to confirm Rod in fact had CTE and dementia with Lewy Bodies. The family’s reaction was two-fold.

First, it gave them clarity and a better understanding of why Rod had behaved in certain ways in the early-mid stages of his illness. Second, it provided Rachel with an urgent determination that her father’s death would not be swept under the carpet by football, that his death would not be just an inconvenience and inconsequence to the sport. Today Rachel is a proud and active Trustee of The Jeff Astle Foundation and ‘wing-man’ to Dawn Astle.

Penny Taylor succumbed to Motor Neurone Disease passing away on 26th December 2020, she was 76 years old.

Before she died, she told Rachel to keep fighting, to fight for justice for her father and all the other footballers and their families. She said to tell the world that Rod Taylor deserved better, that they all deserved better.

Barry “Tizza” Taylor

On March 24, 2018, Steven Taylor, the son of legendary Australian rugby player and coach Barry “Tizza” Taylor, spoke at the launch of the Australian Sports Brain Bank in Sydney, Australia. His father’s Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) diagnosis, made by researchers at the UNITE Brain Bank in 2014, was considered a “wake-up call” for the Australian sports community. Steven spoke of his father’s glory years, how the degenerative brain disease affected him, and what his father’s legacy will be. Below is the transcript of Steven Taylor’s speech:

Steven Taylor talking about his father’s Legacy.

Over 4 years ago, I was sitting on a lounge with Dr. Ann McKee in a Conference Centre in Richmond, Virginia and she said, “I’ve held your father’s brain in my hands.” To which I replied, “I think you’re the first person that’s ever said that to me!”

A brief history of Barry Taylor

The son of an Australian Champion Boxer, living in the working class of Glebe, Dad was brought up tough… and to be tough. At 8-years-old the family moved to Manly where he became involved in swimming. He had a natural talent for sport, coupled with a strong will and in a few years, he would become a NSW and Australian Champion in Surf Life Saving.

In winter though, it was Rugby Union. He played 325 Grade games for Manly and, although he wasn’t the biggest guy on the field, he was one of the toughest, and took great pride in getting straight back into the game after a big hit. And I’m told he took quite a few.

His ability to rally and motivate people led him onto his coaching career. It was his passion, and he was good at it. He always coached the same way he played: tough. His ability to read the strategies and psychology of the game of Rugby Union and win games led him on to Coach Manly, the NSW Waratahs, the Australian Under 21’s and then on to coach internationally in Western Samoa, Japan, England and Uruguay.

Towards the end of this time overseas, Dad, in his late 50’s, began to show signs of abnormal behavior. Mum, who was always at his side, had to start covering for him. We didn’t realize that these were the first signs of dementia. After some challenging times, they returned to Australia and the madness began.

Living with CTE

So, I’m going to ask you a question. Think back to 1999. Where were you? What were you doing?

Today it is 2018. That’s 19 years, right? That’s how long Dad’s illness was. Who knows, it may have been longer. How do I try to explain what it’s like to live with someone with CTE and squash all those years into a few minutes? I’ll try.

Those of you who have experienced dementia with a loved one will have an idea of the roller coaster ride of craziness. There is no rhyme or reason to it. It moves and changes continuously, the only thing that remains constant is the steady decline, which, in dad’s case seemed to drop, then plateau for a while, drop again, then plateau, then drop, etc, etc. Sanity goes out the window, it’s confusing, frustrating, harrowing, frightening, destructive, illogical and extremely difficult to carry out a normal life. And the repetitive questions… relentless. The worrying, he must have asked Mum at least 40-50 times every night if all the lights were off, there’s no fun in it. No fun at all. Just when you thought you were on top of managing Dad’s madness, it would take off in another direction.

The Taylor family at the launch of the Australian Sports Brain Bank in March 2018.

In the beginning, it was fairly normal forgetfulness: Where are the car keys? Where did I park the car? Losing directions to somewhere he had been a thousand times, forgetting people’s names. Then the anger. Explosive moments of irrational anger, him wanting to fight, I suppose it was the internal frustration he must have felt, knowing that there was something terribly wrong going on in his mind. Dad never spoke much about his emotions even when he was well, and we never, ever spoke about it throughout his illness. Then it started getting scary. His aggression was spiraling. On one occasion we got into an argument — I can’t remember what it was about – and he had me up against a wall, with his fist clenched in a fit of rage. His eyes were crazy. This wasn’t my Dad!  There were plenty of times as a young fella when I probably deserved a proper belting, but this was just craziness, it was the illness…

Fortunately, I was able to pull him down to the ground and just hold him until he calmed down. Luckily neither of us suffered any great injury. Very, very disturbing stuff. This happened more than once. So with the madness at its peak, we spoke with his GP (general practitioner) who diagnosed him with Alzheimer’s and began drug management. For some reason I didn’t think it was Alzheimer’s… I’m not sure why. One symptom of his illness at this point was paranoia; he wouldn’t take any pills because he thought we were trying to kill him. So, the doctor prescribed a drug in liquid form so it could be put in his food or a glass of water. Can you imagine having to do that?

But these drugs were way too heavy, we felt awful to see him so drugged so we set out to find a solution. Eventually we found the right balance of anti-psychotics and anti-depressants to try to give him some quality of life.

With Mum as his full time career and my sister Jenny and I doing our best to help out, the next few years were still extremely challenging and at times we were all pushed to our limits. Jenny was struggling with raising her two babies and trying to help out with caring for Dad and I unfortunately slipped into depression, which really wasn’t much help to anyone and it’s a battle that I still fight to this day. And Jenny and I have spoken since then about our own fears: Are we going to get this too? But at least Dad was now somewhat manageable, he was quite happy in his favorite chair and enjoyed short walks and drives in the car with Mum. But of course, the illness continued on its decline and eventually he lost control of his bodily functions. It was time for him to go into professional care; there was no way that Mum could possibly care for him at home any longer. She had, in my opinion, performed superhuman feats in caring for Dad and holding our family together, but it had taken its toll on her, she was mentally and physically exhausted.

We were lucky with the facility we found for Dad. Not only were the staff kind and considerate with him, they were also there for us as a family. Visiting him there was heartbreaking to say the least and the heavy feeling of guilt every time you left never got any easier. One day when I was visiting, I knew that he had already forgotten who I was, so out of curiosity I asked him what his name was.

He just looked at me and shrugged.

That’s how bad it got, he literally didn’t even know his own name. Part of the tragedy, is that his fearlessness and the physical contest of the sport he loved deprived him of a dignified old age and his family and friends of someone whom they loved. One night we got a call from the nursing home. He had finally passed away. He was 77 years old.

Closing

Peter (FitzSimons) spoke with Mum a couple of days later and after offering his condolences asked if the family would consider donating Dad’s brain to Boston University for research into CTE. We said “yes.” Dad had never been to Boston so it seemed like a good idea. As a family we are incredibly grateful to everyone involved who made it possible for Dad’s brain to make its incredible journey. It wasn’t easy, with many hurdles, but somehow it all happened. A year or so later we were invited to the Inaugural Family Huddle, a conference put on by the [Concussion Legacy Foundation] for all the families who had donated their loved one’s brains. It was fascinating to learn about the research by this wonderfully dedicated team of people into CTE, and surprisingly comforting to be amongst a group of strangers who had all been through similar experiences that we had. Swapping stories that night was such a healing experience, that we were not the only family that had gone through the horror of living with a loved one with CTE.

At the end of the evening, there I was on that lounge with Dr. Ann McKee, who performed the dissection and analysis on Dad’s brain. After telling me that she had held my father’s brain in her hands, she looked at me very compassionately and said, “I don’t know how he was functioning on any level at all, I can only imagine what you went through as a family.” I asked her if there were any markers of Alzheimer’s in her testings. She shook her head and said, “No, it was emphatically CTE that killed your father.” Finally, we had an answer to our years of questioning. Finally, we had closure.

So, we, the Taylor family, are very excited and hopeful that the Australian Sports Brain Bank will be a great success. We would like to congratulate all the people here who have worked so hard to set it up, and hope that research that can be carried out right here at home will lead to not only changes across all the sporting codes in regards to concussion, but more importantly, may lead to the ability to diagnose CTE in living patients. Perhaps then we can even find ways to treat this disease to prevent other families from going through the nightmare that we had to endure. Thank you.

To read Peter FitzSimons’ story of helping get his former coach’s brain donated after Barry Taylor died in 2013, click here.

Daniel Te’o-Nesheim

On behalf of our entire family, I would like to thank everyone for all the love and support shown to us since the passing of our beloved Daniel Te’o-Nesheim. Your prayers and various acts of kindness throughout the years continue to help us find peace and some sense of closure given that he was called home so suddenly. We also want to thank his lawyer Samuel Katz and his firm Athlaw LLP, his agent Eric Kaufman, Bobby Abdolmohammadi of Boston University, and Lisa McHale with the Concussion Legacy Foundation. We admire the guidance of the teams at the VA-BU-CLF Brain Bank and the Concussion Legacy Foundation to help us navigate systems to find more in-depth answers and help us carry on Daniel’s legacy.

Daniel was born June 12, 1987 in American Samoa. He was always an energetic, humble boy with a smile that could lighten any mood. When he was 3, we moved to Seattle where he began playing soccer, baseball and basketball. When he was 12, we lost our dear father and our whole world changed.

In 2001, Daniel was given the opportunity to attend Hawaii Preparatory Academy (HPA), a boarding school in Hawaii. He flourished and continued to play basketball, baseball, and found a new love for football. Many times, you would find him in the weight room after hours training.

In 2005, Daniel graduated and was blessed with a D1 scholarship to the University of Washington. He was ecstatic to return to our father’s hometown and continue his football career where he chose to study art and photography. Daniel flew home to Hawaii as much as possible and visited his family and friends where he would continue to train and spend quality time with us.

On December 5, 2009, Daniel plowed his way into the UW record book by setting the school’s all-time sacks record with 30.

“If anyone on our football team or anyone in this conference deserves a record, it’s Daniel Te’o-Nesheim,” said then-UW head coach Sarkisian. “There is not a guy who practices harder.”

In 2010, Daniel was drafted by the Philadelphia Eagles in the 3rd round with the 86th overall pick. His lifetime dream came true. He continued this dream for five years, ending his career with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2015. Daniel traveled home less during this time and after his career ended, he decided to return home for good. From 2015 to 2017, Daniel coached football back at HPA and he enjoyed every minute.

Seeing him more on a regular basis, we noticed Daniel complained daily of headaches and excruciating pain in various parts of his body. He forgot crucial commitments and unintentionally blew off friends. He would go to the grocery store with a list in his mind and only come back with two out of five things but felt he had purchased everything on his list. We thought this was just him getting sidetracked and harmless forgetfulness.

Although we occasionally confronted him about the differences we saw, he refused to seek help and would defiantly insist that everything was fine. He brushed off requests to see a doctor or he would forget about appointments, even with reminders.

Daniel’s untimely passing on October 29th, 2017 was like déjà vu to when our father passed. Both times were without warning and neither allowed any of us to say goodbye. However, this time around, I pledged to step up to find out why someone so young, vibrant, and essentially in good physical condition had gone so soon. More importantly, I will honor my brother and ensure that his legacy lives on through raising awareness about the causes, signs, symptoms, and impacts of concussions.

Even though he was the youngest sibling, Daniel tried to shield us from so much of his pain and suffering because he did not want to worry us with his struggles from football. It wasn’t until his passing that we learned about the grueling pain he endured from his years playing the game he loved. We now know about steps he took to get help with the physical, emotional, and neuropsychological agony he was facing every day. We learned after his passing that Daniel reached out to a former colleague four months before his passing about issues he was dealing with. Daniel knew this athlete was going through much of the same issues and was suffering from many of the same disabling symptoms. Daniel reached out for help. Thankfully, his friend introduced Daniel to Sam Katz of Athlaw LLP.

In early October 2017, Daniel traveled to Texas for a physical with the NFL. In true “protector” fashion, Daniel simply told us he had to “go finish some NFL things.” Unfortunately, the NFL scheduled Daniel’s neuropsychological and neurological tests for a different date and were unable to evaluate Daniel’s cognitive issues during his physical. This made it impossible for Daniel to be fully mentally and physically evaluated, despite Sam telling him how important it was for him to attend both appointments and get fully evaluated. Even amid his struggles, Daniel always put the kids he coached first because he wanted to inspire others. That’s just who Daniel was. Instead of going for his necessary appointments, Daniel showed up to a football game and inspired a youth team.

When he returned home, he said the appointment in Texas went well. The doctor said he had the ankle arthritis of a 70-year-old, degeneration in both of his knees, neck pain with movements, radiating pain in his back, shoulder pain that caused him difficulty with activities, among other substantial functional disabilities. Daniel mentioned that he may need to go back but never mentioned any more specifics beyond that.

The morning after his death, we were trying to find answers about what happened to Daniel. We recovered his paperwork from various medical exam records during the NFL. It looked like a college textbook. We read through these painful visits, unknown surgeries, and journal entries of experiences during the NFL. We saw daily reminders on his cell phone for simple, everyday tasks. We then realized the depth of his pain. When we found notes from Sam Katz, we reached out to Athlaw LLP and started to piece together the many parts of Daniel’s life that he kept to himself.

With Sam’s help, we were able to learn Daniel missed the neurology and neuropsychology portion of testing. Sam also let us know about the amazing work being done at Boston University by Dr. McKee and Dr. Jesse Mez. We were also made aware of the work by Dr. Chris Nowinski and the team at the Concussion Legacy Foundation and that we had the option of donating Daniel’s brain to Boston University’s Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy Center. Due to Daniel’s sudden death and him being so young, I called the medical examiner and insisted they perform the autopsy immediately as it was a very rare incident and we needed answers immediately. When my mother and I agreed to donation, I contacted the medical examiner at Kona Community Hospital and explained what we were trying to accomplish. The medical examiner was honored to help and performed the autopsy on October 30, 2017.

Daniel’s agent Eric Kaufman helped us realize Daniel was experiencing very major symptoms associated with CTE during his final years in the league. I wish I had known more about this degenerating disease that stems from repetitive head injuries so I would have been able to help Daniel seek the help he needed. Looking through and filling out surveys from BU, I began to see he had almost all the symptoms of CTE.

In the aftermath, knowing what we do now, we can look back and see the signs that we missed and were untreated for so long. We missed mental and behavioral changes from Daniel’s years of playing high school, through college for the University of Washington, and in the NFL, that are now obvious because we know more about the signs and symptoms of what he and many former players have gone through. Daniel loved football, and he gave his life to the sport, but a diagnosis and cure must be found for this terrible disease!

As we continue to face the realities of this life without Daniel, we are committed to furthering his legacy, celebrating his love of football but recognizing the risks it poses and trauma that can result from it, which contributed to his sudden death at an early age. Our family is committed to doing our part to raise awareness about concussions and CTE, including taking steps to protect our athletes, educating them on how to recognize signs and symptoms if affected, as well as developing a stronger network of support for struggling athletes and their families. Together with experts in the field, we join the ranks of affected families and are now passionate about making sure no one else has to go through the pain of losing a loved one to this disease as we did.

Our family misses Daniel tremendously. Daniel was like a big brother to his niece and nephews and his loss has hit them hard. We are comforted in knowing Daniel’s name and legacy lives on, as we have become advocates for concussion awareness, support, and research and have also created an award named after Daniel at HPA. Daniel loved the game of football and his unique love for inspiring children is why we created The Coach Daniel Te’o-Nesheim Award to acknowledge a senior football player who is recognized by coaches, staff, teammates, and peers as exhibiting the rare combination of qualities that made him special:

-Unrelenting effort
-Dedication
-Preparedness
-Quality execution
-The highest respect for competition

The award goes to a player who inspires teammates to elevate themselves, who is respected as a leader on and off the field, and who has a clear and honest love for HPA. Through this award, Daniel will live on through the youth he loved to inspire even during his darkest times.

Owen Thomas

 

This is dedicated to Owen Daniel Brearley Thomas. Owen’s name has become world-famous because of his struggle with CTE, a degenerative brain disease that is the result of head trauma, which resulted in his taking his life. To most, he is one of the youngest people to be diagnosed with CTE; but for the 21 years prior to his death, Owen Thomas was so much more than a name associated with CTE. This is a piece of his story.

 

On April 26th, 2010, a shockwave ripped through the social fabric of Parkland School District: one of our greatest sons, Owen Thomas, killed himself. The shocking news spread like wildfire across text-message lines, Facebook inboxes, and phone calls, and within an hour, hearts all across the United States were devastated over the loss of a brother, a friend, a student, a son. He was 21 years old.

Owen Thomas was more than your average man, far more. He was an A-type personality, a vibrant smile, and a bull of a body with a thick neck and flowing orange hair. To the girls who passed him in the high-school hallway or had class with him, Owen was a gentle giant, a gentleman. He was also the brightest mind in all of his classes, humbly keeping a GPA above 4.0; his friends only knew if they asked. To his opponents on the football field, Owen was a mythological creature. The fiery tips of his sweat-glossed hair, which flared out of the bottom of his helmet, were his calling card; running backs did not run towards that hair, nor did quarterbacks throw. To his coaches and teachers, he was one in a million, an inspiration to those whose job it was to inspire. Owen’s teammates, who unanimously voted for him as captain, thought of him as a fearless leader, similar to the way Scotsmen felt about the brave William Wallace as he proudly galloped out in front of the modest Scottish army. No matter what their odds were in the fight, Owen’s teammates were ready and willing, confident of victory with O.T. leading the charge. Those who were closest to Owen knew that he was all of these things and more.

There was, however, a heavy price that Owen paid to be such a fierce and dynamic person. He was a dedicated student who would often lock himself in his room, working for hours with the Beatles playing in the background until every assignment was completed flawlessly and to the satisfaction of his teachers. His work ethic when it came to academics was baffling to his friends. Even greater was his dedication to competitive athletics – especially football.

 

Whether it was running sprints, powerlifting, or practicing on the field, Owen’s tenacity was unmatched.  He seemed to enjoy the pain and struggle that everyone else dreaded. Owen never complained, and he was never hurt. In fact, he challenged his own teammates to question whether they were truly injured, or just “banged up a bit.”  It was a coach’s dream to have Owen around because he would raise the entire team’s effort simply with his stoic presence on the field.

Owen Thomas was the embodiment of old-school American football – hard-hitting, nose-for-the-ball, hit ‘em in the numbers football. On Fall Friday nights under the lights of Orefield Stadium, when the tests and papers had all been turned in and a hard week of practice had ended, Owen shined. Thousands of fans watched in awe as #31 went to work, pouncing on the ball-carrier like a hungry lion. After high school Owen moved on to the University of Pennsylvania where he was admitted into the illustrious Wharton School of Business; he continued to be a dominating force on football field for the Penn Quakers. It was not surprising for his friends and family back home to learn that he was quickly endeared by everyone he met at Penn, where he was voted team captain and helped lead the team to an Ivy League Championship.

He played the brand of football that people wanted to see – the brand of football that made it America’s favorite pastime. Owen’s style was similar to Chuck Bednarick, Jack Lambert, and Dick Butkus: he was not blazing fast, but he would always find his way to the ball, and when he got there, he was mean. All the good that came from Owen’s abilities, the 17 straight wins at Parkland High School, the Ivy League Champion ring, the trophies, the entertained fans, the community pride, it all came with a price – a sacrifice.

Owen was a pitbull without a leash on the field, and it was silently killing him. CTE, or chronic traumatic encephalopathy, developed in his brain as a result of head trauma from football. Scientists believe this disease causes symptoms of depression and affects rational decision-making. In 2010, in his apartment, Owen took his life. He is the youngest and one of the first football players to be diagnosed with CTE. Since that day, awareness of the disease has skyrocketed. Campaigns to make athletics safer have resulted in rule changes from youth sports all the way to the NFL, and new equipment has been designed to prevent head trauma.

 

In six short years since his death, the whole persona of football has changed. The helmet-to-helmet hit is no longer glorified, and that is a good thing. Concussions are treated as life-threatening injuries, because they are. CTE is being studied and cures are being researched. In general, our society is having a revolution in sports safety that is keeping the passion of the game intact while caring for the health of athletes.

We should revere and respect the way Owen and others like him played their sports with passion and unmatched tenacity.  We should also learn from their stories. We should join the fight to make sure that athletics do not die out, but grow stronger and better – safer. It is for this reason that Owen’s friends have decided to join the Concussion Legacy Foundation’s My Legacy campaign. Every dollar donated to this campaign goes towards research and education of sports safety, helping to ensure a safe future for generations of athletes.