Ryan Leaf verbally accosted Dr. David Chao at Radio Row from the site of Super Bowl LX in defense of the late Junior Seau.

Earlier this week, ESPN Los Angeles radio host and longtime San Diego sports media personality Scott Kaplan witnessed an interaction between Leaf and Chao on Radio Row. Chao joined Kaplan’s show and said Leaf has been accusing him of mistreating Seau before his 2012 suicide, claiming the former San Diego Chargers quarterback didn’t have all the facts.

Later, Leaf joined The Greg Hill Show on Boston’s WEEI from Radio Row where he admitted to confronting Chao and detailed the interaction from his perspective.

Ryan Leaf joins to exp;ain what happened when he confronted Dr. Chao on Radio Row 🤯 pic.twitter.com/zzmdcMtuZZ

— WEEI (@WEEI) February 5, 2026

“He is a quack isn’t he,” Leaf said of Chao. “It’s all about ethics for me. Junior was my teammate for three years. Those two apparently were really close, but he ended up being his drinking buddy. And then he was still prescribing him pain pills and Ambien, even after that first suicide attempt and I think he played a role in that.”

Leaf doesn’t like Chao, he’s been open about that for years. The former Chargers quarterback also sued Chao more than a decade ago. The lawsuit alleged negligence in treating Leaf’s injuries when Chao was team physician for the San Diego Chargers.

David Chao, otherwise known as “Pro Football Doc” is a popular sports radio and podcast guest as an injury expert. But the long list of shows that platform Chao seemingly ignore the history of scandals and lawsuits he’s been associated with. Chao was placed on a five-year probation by the California Medical Board in 2014. And the California Medical Board also investigated Chao for prescribing Ambien to Junior Seau in the months before his suicide.

“He enabled the behavior,” Leaf continued regarding Chao prescribing medication to Seau. “And he’s just never taken any accountability for it. I have a real problem with that…I hate to see doctors taking advantage of that. It feels more like he was being a groupie in the situation than anything else. Why couldn’t he just be his friend? Why was he still writing prescriptions to him? When you’re going through suicidal and depression, you don’t take Ambien, you don’t take painkillers. That’s stuff that takes you down.”

Ryan Leaf admitted he’s had an issue with David Chao for years, but this was the first time the former quarterback felt he had enough information about the Seau situation to address it in person. Anticipating seeing Chao on Radio Row, Leaf said he practiced what he was going to say with his wife at home.

“I was going to take the high road,” Leaf said of his initial plans for confronting Chao. “I was going to talk mild-mannered. And for whatever reason, the first person I saw on Radio Row yesterday was him! This was a test! And I failed it, miserably.”

“I walked by, and I don’t know if it was a projection on my part or something, but he looked like he gave me a little smirk. And I just said, ‘you effing fraud! You absolutely are the most despicable individual.’”

Leaf said he confronted Chao in an empty part of Radio Row, noting there weren’t many people in the building yet. No one except for Scott Kaplan, who heard and witnessed the altercation before taking it to the airwaves and conducting a follow-up interview with Chao.

Leaf confirmed Chao’s business partner Craig Dado invited them both onto Ross Tucker’s podcast to discuss their differences. And Leaf confirmed what Kaplan heard, admitting he responded by saying, “f*ck you and f*ck Ross Tucker.”

“Poor Ross Tucker,” Leaf told WEEI. “Got pulled into this, the nicest guy on the planet.”

Leaf admitted he gets emotional because as good of an NFL player that Seau was, he was an even better person, noting how impactful the Hall of Famer’s story of overcoming adversities was and still could be if he were alive today.

“And I’m telling you right now, if he was sitting at this table – overcome those adversities, the things he went through – and was telling you his story, it would be so much more impactful than mine,” Leaf said. “Why is my dumb ass still here and alive? That’s the big question I ask a lot of times.”