Getty Image
At one point in their careers, Pittsburgh Steelers teammates Antonio Brown and Le’Veon Bell formed one of best offensive duos in the NFL.
Fast forward several years and both are out of league and more well-known for their questionable (to put it nicely) decision-making.
Bell made an appearance recently on Brown’s CTESPN show and discussed several topics, including whether or not they both believed they have CTE.
“Do you think I got CTE,” Brown asked.
“I don’t think you got CTE,” Bell said.
Brown then asked Bell if he believes he has CTE.
“I don’t think I got CTE. But we’ll never know until we die,” Bell answered.
Brown continued to ask questions, prodding Bell about what he thinks about CTE.
“Ain’t CTE like basically like when we forget s—,” Bell answered.
Brown stated that he doesn’t think people understand CTE, and that it could. be a bunch of different things.
By the book, CTE stands for Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy.
It is defined as “a progressive degenerative disease affecting people who have suffered repeated concussions and traumatic brain injuries, that may occur in some athletes and others who have been exposed to concussions and repetitive head impacts.
A study by Boston University found CTE in the brains of 345 out of 376 of former NFL players studied. That shakes out to 92 percent.
Both Brown and Bell had lengthy NFL careers. And Brown, in particular, took several notable hits that fans believe caused CTE and led to the decline of his career.
Brown theorized that all children develop CTE around three to four years old
“As a kid and as a person, we all grow with our traumas,” he continued. “Even me and you. Our dad not being there. I mean, some of these will help us to be great. But sometimes these hurt us, hinder us, in some situations because it makes up be stubborn.”
That, of course, is not how CTE develops. We have plenty of scientific evidence to prove that. But it’s sure what Brown and potentially now Bell as well believes.