Is there life after football?: Plunkett is among many who deal with the agony
By Jim Jenkins -- Bee Staff WriterPublished 2:15 am PST Sunday, January 1, 2006
Jim Plunkett is an icon of the Raiders' best years.
Of the team's three Super Bowl championships, he quarterbacked two of them, highlighting the 1980 and 1983 seasons.
Now 58, he still has vivid memories. But he's not demonstrative recalling those glory days.
There is no raising of his arms, signaling triumph or touchdown. It's a physical impossibility for the 1970 Heisman Trophy winner and first overall draft pick from Stanford, among hundreds of former NFL players coping with pain in retirement.
"This is as high as a can lift my shoulder," said Plunkett, extending an arm just above waist level. "It doesn't work."
Plunkett was talking about his left shoulder, not the right shoulder, his passing shoulder, illustrating a long inventory of injuries that required surgery or will.
"If you play in the NFL for a number of years," he said, "eventually it catches up to you. It just accelerates arthritis problems, joint problems, surgeries that you've had and come back to haunt you."
Plunkett, now a part of the Raiders' pregame radio and weekly television highlight shows, will tell you he doesn't go through a minute without pain from some part of his body.
"I have to get my knees scoped ever few years because of all the things I've gone through," he said. "I've had six operations on my left shoulder, rotator cuff surgery on my right shoulder. I have a terrible back. I can't run, play basketball or tennis anymore, only a little golf."
Most players find the game difficult to give up. Plunkett did. He had a mediocre start to his career with the New England Patriots and 49ers before Raiders owner Al Davis threw him a lifeline and resurrected his career. But perseverance is not without cost.
"When you're playing and have had an injury, often it keeps getting hurt, and that's another problem," Plunkett said. "The joints weaken and take a licking. Part of that is age, being knocked around so much. And because of it, I feel like crap today. To look at me, you wouldn't know. I walk straight, or try to, and don't complain in public. But I hurt every day of my life. It's no fun being in this body."
Indeed, Plunkett said the only time he is able to feel some comfort is when he's around Jim Otto, the Raiders' Hall of Fame center who, by his count, has had 50-plus surgeries, primarily relating to knee replacements and accompanying infections and circulation complications.
"Jim is remarkable, after all that has happened to him," Plunkett said.
Otto, 67, has had at least three life-threatening episodes related to football injuries, one as recently as six months ago when he faced the possibility of leg amputation. He lives in Auburn but maintains a smaller, second home near the Raiders' training facility in Alameda. Amazingly, he is walking again without a cane and in a normal work routine as the team's special projects coordinator.
But Otto is not out of danger. He has been treated for prostate cancer in addition to his other health issues.
"Most of the time, I'm sore or ache from something," Otto said from his office. "But here I am.
It's 10 after 5 in the afternoon, and I'm at a place I want to be."
Otto is on the high end of the casualty list, but there are sadder cases.
He and other Hall of Famers talk of going to Canton, Ohio, for annual inductions and mingling with disabled enshrinees, the very men who made the league what it is.
The reminiscing may be worth the trip, but those gatherings often take on the look of a hospital ward. Many NFL alumni acknowledge how challenging it is for them to walk, stand, or sit for long periods, sleep without discomfort, move limbs or perform even the most basic bodily functions without assistance.
The great Johnny Unitas before he died three years ago at age 69 had little use of the right arm that, in his heyday, launched all those touchdown passes for the Baltimore Colts. And that was just one of his maladies.
A few other examples:
* One-time Houston Oilers running back and NFL Most Valuable Player Earl Campbell, 50, has severe arthritis in both hands and can barely make a fist.
* Because of back and knee problems, mobility and bending over are a hardship for Joe Jacoby, 46, a member of the famed "Hogs" offensive line with the Washington Redskins.
* Former Raiders offensive lineman Curt Marsh, 46, had a leg amputated and fights neck, back, hip, knee and ankle pain, not an uncommon complaint.
Even Joe Montana, 49, thought to be indestructible in quarterbacking the 49ers to four Super Bowl championships, didn't get out of the game unscathed. He goes around the country as a spokesman for monitoring blood pressure but at a recent health-seminar news conference in Texas disclosed, "I just had my neck fused in February ... the repetitive hits take their toll."
Players still in the prime of their careers, like 49ers linebacker Jeff Ulbrich, hear some of these stories and ponder their inevitable retirement. Hurt in October, Ulbrich wanted to finish the season with a detached biceps tendon, but when doctors warned him of the long-term consequences, he opted for surgery and is sitting out the year.
"It wasn't worth the risk," Ulbrich said.
Startlingly, though, when ex-players are asked if they had regrets, most say no, that they'd probably do it again.
"The game is so fun," Montana said. "It's just really hard to explain. Sunday afternoon, there's nothing like it."
About the writer:
The Bee's Jim Jenkins can be reached at jjenkins@sacbee.com.
By Jim Jenkins -- Bee Staff WriterPublished 2:15 am PST Sunday, January 1, 2006
Jim Plunkett is an icon of the Raiders' best years.
Of the team's three Super Bowl championships, he quarterbacked two of them, highlighting the 1980 and 1983 seasons.
Now 58, he still has vivid memories. But he's not demonstrative recalling those glory days.
There is no raising of his arms, signaling triumph or touchdown. It's a physical impossibility for the 1970 Heisman Trophy winner and first overall draft pick from Stanford, among hundreds of former NFL players coping with pain in retirement.
"This is as high as a can lift my shoulder," said Plunkett, extending an arm just above waist level. "It doesn't work."
Plunkett was talking about his left shoulder, not the right shoulder, his passing shoulder, illustrating a long inventory of injuries that required surgery or will.
"If you play in the NFL for a number of years," he said, "eventually it catches up to you. It just accelerates arthritis problems, joint problems, surgeries that you've had and come back to haunt you."
Plunkett, now a part of the Raiders' pregame radio and weekly television highlight shows, will tell you he doesn't go through a minute without pain from some part of his body.
"I have to get my knees scoped ever few years because of all the things I've gone through," he said. "I've had six operations on my left shoulder, rotator cuff surgery on my right shoulder. I have a terrible back. I can't run, play basketball or tennis anymore, only a little golf."
Most players find the game difficult to give up. Plunkett did. He had a mediocre start to his career with the New England Patriots and 49ers before Raiders owner Al Davis threw him a lifeline and resurrected his career. But perseverance is not without cost.
"When you're playing and have had an injury, often it keeps getting hurt, and that's another problem," Plunkett said. "The joints weaken and take a licking. Part of that is age, being knocked around so much. And because of it, I feel like crap today. To look at me, you wouldn't know. I walk straight, or try to, and don't complain in public. But I hurt every day of my life. It's no fun being in this body."
Indeed, Plunkett said the only time he is able to feel some comfort is when he's around Jim Otto, the Raiders' Hall of Fame center who, by his count, has had 50-plus surgeries, primarily relating to knee replacements and accompanying infections and circulation complications.
"Jim is remarkable, after all that has happened to him," Plunkett said.
Otto, 67, has had at least three life-threatening episodes related to football injuries, one as recently as six months ago when he faced the possibility of leg amputation. He lives in Auburn but maintains a smaller, second home near the Raiders' training facility in Alameda. Amazingly, he is walking again without a cane and in a normal work routine as the team's special projects coordinator.
But Otto is not out of danger. He has been treated for prostate cancer in addition to his other health issues.
"Most of the time, I'm sore or ache from something," Otto said from his office. "But here I am.
It's 10 after 5 in the afternoon, and I'm at a place I want to be."
Otto is on the high end of the casualty list, but there are sadder cases.
He and other Hall of Famers talk of going to Canton, Ohio, for annual inductions and mingling with disabled enshrinees, the very men who made the league what it is.
The reminiscing may be worth the trip, but those gatherings often take on the look of a hospital ward. Many NFL alumni acknowledge how challenging it is for them to walk, stand, or sit for long periods, sleep without discomfort, move limbs or perform even the most basic bodily functions without assistance.
The great Johnny Unitas before he died three years ago at age 69 had little use of the right arm that, in his heyday, launched all those touchdown passes for the Baltimore Colts. And that was just one of his maladies.
A few other examples:
* One-time Houston Oilers running back and NFL Most Valuable Player Earl Campbell, 50, has severe arthritis in both hands and can barely make a fist.
* Because of back and knee problems, mobility and bending over are a hardship for Joe Jacoby, 46, a member of the famed "Hogs" offensive line with the Washington Redskins.
* Former Raiders offensive lineman Curt Marsh, 46, had a leg amputated and fights neck, back, hip, knee and ankle pain, not an uncommon complaint.
Even Joe Montana, 49, thought to be indestructible in quarterbacking the 49ers to four Super Bowl championships, didn't get out of the game unscathed. He goes around the country as a spokesman for monitoring blood pressure but at a recent health-seminar news conference in Texas disclosed, "I just had my neck fused in February ... the repetitive hits take their toll."
Players still in the prime of their careers, like 49ers linebacker Jeff Ulbrich, hear some of these stories and ponder their inevitable retirement. Hurt in October, Ulbrich wanted to finish the season with a detached biceps tendon, but when doctors warned him of the long-term consequences, he opted for surgery and is sitting out the year.
"It wasn't worth the risk," Ulbrich said.
Startlingly, though, when ex-players are asked if they had regrets, most say no, that they'd probably do it again.
"The game is so fun," Montana said. "It's just really hard to explain. Sunday afternoon, there's nothing like it."
About the writer:
The Bee's Jim Jenkins can be reached at jjenkins@sacbee.com.
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