Former Oakland Raiders quarterback and Super Bowl champion Ken Stabler, who died in 2015 from complications with colon cancer, suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy, according to John Branch of The New York Times.
On a scale from 1 to 4, Stabler had high Stage 3 CTE, a degenerative brain disease that has been linked to football and repeated blows to the head. Stabler had wished to have his brain examined after his death, as he wanted to help those left behind know why his mind seemed to slip so quickly in the final years of his life, according to Branch.
Stabler played 15 seasons in the NFL and was named the league's most valuable player in 1974. The Raiders quarterback led them to their first Super Bowl victory during the 1976 regular season, and he was known by the nickname Snake.
Stabler becomes the seventh NFL quarterback to be found with CTE by Boston University. The problem of concussions in the NFL is not going away anytime soon, as the league saw an increase in the number of concussions this past season.
Former New York Giants safety Tyler Sash, who died at 27 years old, was also found to have CTE by Boston University, which was made public last week. Families of NFL players who are left wondering what happened to their husbands, sons, and fathers are now starting to get answers from the work done by Boston University.
"Changes have to be made so that these guys are not forfeiting their brains - literally, their brains," said Kim Bush, Stabler's longtime partner, via ESPN. "And the impact, the damage runs across their whole life, from depression to anxiety to, my gosh, some of the guys have committed suicide out of desperation. I just think there would have been some peace in him knowing what was going on. He would want this science to change this horrible thing that's happening to so many players and find a way to make the game safer and better."
