John Mackey, RIP
John Mackey, Hall of Fame football player and crusader for better medical benefits for retired players, died at 69 this week. A former head of the NFL Players Association, he helped inspire the 88 Plan which provides up to $88,000 a year to former players for health care.
Mackey has become closely associated with the plight of many former players who helped build the NFL in the era before million-dollar contracts, safer equipment and better health care. He suffered from frontotemporal dementia in later years that is believed to have been caused by the contact associated with playing football. Four years ago, the dementia forced Mackey into living in an assisted-living facility. The costs associated with his care, which far outpaced Mackey's pension, led to the "88 Plan" for retired players. Now, former players are pushing for better pension plans and health benefits from the league.
A close friend of mine is a fanatic Denver Broncos fan and as a teenager wrote a letter to every member of every starting Broncos team from the 1960's asking for memorabilia, autographs or anything for his collection -- this friend has a room dedicated to his Broncos ephemera. He was quite surprised at how many of these letters were returned by other family members because the player in question had died. This was the period when most of these players would have been in their 50's or early 60's. It was clear to my friend even then that football had a health problem in its future.
I love football, but I think we still don't understand how detrimental the sport is to players' health. Thanks to the efforts of former players like John Mackey, the league is finally paying attention to the issue.
