The effects of CTE, which cannot be definitively diagnosed until after a person has died but are routinely found in football players when researchers are allowed to perform post-mortem examinations, can be startlingly striking: episodes of confusion and memory loss, outbursts of anger and arguments, and sharp declines in communication skills. and decision-making skills.
“You just see them really transform into someone completely different,” said Heike Crane, widow of Paul Crane, who played center and linebacker for Alabama and eventually developed CTE before his death in 2020.
However, some 60 years ago, long before CTE was a recognized risk, in a place like Alabama, football was a waypoint to wealth, prestige and envy. Even now, in the midst of their agony, players and their families are often reluctant to wish football away from campuses or American culture. Change the sport, some say, but keep playing it.
Head injuries and CTE in sports
The permanent damage caused by brain injuries in athletes can be devastating.
For many of the men who played, health threats were worthy personal sacrifices back then.
“I came from kind of a small town in Tennessee,” said Steve Sloan, an Alabama quarterback in the 1960s who later became a athletic director and football coach at Duke, Mississippi, Texas Tech and Vanderbilt there.
“I wanted to get a scholarship, and I wanted to get a degree, and if it took a beating in the head, then that was fine,” said Sloan, who said he didn’t experience the severe symptoms of CTE. “I am just happy.”
The downfall of a happy life
Much like Sloan, Ray Perkins came to Tuscaloosa looking for a life beyond the rural town he grew up in. Bryant, who won six national championships before his death in 1983 and whose name is now on the 100,077-seat campus stadium, was the draw.