{"id":1040798,"date":"2026-10-30T01:27:15","date_gmt":"2026-10-30T01:27:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/1040798\/"},"modified":"2026-10-30T01:27:15","modified_gmt":"2026-10-30T01:27:15","slug":"rams-players-discuss-double-edged-sword-of-cte-and-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/1040798\/","title":{"rendered":"Rams players discuss ‘double-edged sword’ of CTE and football"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Rams<\/a> players are increasingly aware of the risks of playing their sport, especially as it relates to chronic traumatic encephalopathy<\/a>, or CTE<\/a>, a neurodegenerative brain disease.<\/p>\n

But they try not to think about it.<\/p>\n

This week, a Boston University study was published that analyzed the medical records of more than 2,000 deceased former NFL players. The study estimated<\/a> that 74.5% of them likely had CTE.<\/p>\n

Defensive tackle Aaron Donald<\/a>, 35, played 10 seasons before retiring after the 2023 season. He rejoined the Rams this season. When asked about the study and CTE, Donald said, \u201cThat\u2019s a real thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

But he said, \u201cYou don\u2019t think about it. You just play. When you sign up to play football, you know what you\u2019re signing up for.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou obviously don\u2019t want nothing like that to occur.\u201d<\/p>\n

Receiver Puka Nacua<\/a>, 25, said that as a young player he was grateful for information about the possible long-term effects.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s something that\u2019s obviously very prevalent in our sport and the more information, the better I think we\u2019re able to take care of ourselves,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Offensive lineman Kevin Dotson<\/a>, 30, wears a guardian cap on his helmet during practices and games but said that, \u201cit\u2019s almost like a placebo effect\u201d and was \u201cmore of a dampener than a savior.\u201d<\/p>\n

Playing a game that rewards financially but could have long-term effects is a \u201cdouble-edged sword,\u201d Dotson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s one of those things, you\u2019ve just got to keep that in the back of your mind that this is a possibility,\u201d he said. \u201cSo every time you think about retirement or stuff like that, you think the longer I play the better chance of me getting CTE.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rams players are increasingly aware of the risks of playing their sport, especially as it relates to chronic…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1040799,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2079],"tags":[46987,134946,134943,7,853,15134,6045,1014,58,539,2444,2611,6,134944,9735,92770,424,134945,189,817,3340],"class_list":["post-1040798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles-rams","tag-cte","tag-defensive-tackle-aaron-donald","tag-double-edged-sword","tag-football","tag-game","tag-helmet","tag-information","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-rams","tag-los-angeles-times","tag-losangeles","tag-losangelesrams","tag-nfl","tag-possible-long-term-effect","tag-practice","tag-ram-player","tag-rams","tag-real-thing","tag-season","tag-sport","tag-study"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/117527264823297158","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1040798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1040798"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1040798\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1040799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1040798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1040798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1040798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}