The New York Times story dropped like a bomb on football and the medical community on the morning of July 25, 2017. Dr. Ann McKee, lead neuropathologist at the Boston University CTE Center, had examined the brains of 111 former NFL players and found signs of CTE, or Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, in 110 of them.
The news broke the internet, sent reporters scrambling to develop their own takes, and sealed the deal for millions of American parents, doctors, coaches and players. Finally, the link between playing football and developing a terrible neurodegenerative disease seemed ironclad.
