Brett Favre once reflected on devastating toll of ‘thousands’ of concussions - “Do I have early stages of CTE?”
Brett Favre took plenty of hits throughout his Hall of Fame career and, like some former NFL quarterbacks, suffered many concussions. The Packers great spoke about the impact of concussions on his career. In a 2018 interview with Megyn Kelly, he guessed that he had “probably thousands” of concussions during his 20-year career.
The legendary signal-caller told Kelly that he thought he had CTE due to the many concussions he suffered:
“I wonder if that is what it is, or do I have early stages of CTE? I don’t know. It makes you wonder.”
Favre added:
“I feel as though I’m lucky, to this point, but … I find that my short-term memory, someone I met six months ago, it has gotten a lot worse. Simple words that would normally come out easy in a conversation, I’ll stammer.”
Brett Favre holds the record for the most consecutive starts for a quarterback at 297 and the fourth-most sacked signal-caller in NFL history (525). He played the first 16 seasons of his career with the Green Bay Packers, winning a Super Bowl and three NFL MVP awards with them.
The Southern Mississippi star was traded to the New York Jets after the 2007 season. Favre played just one season with the team before ending his career with the Minnesota Vikings, playing two seasons with them.
Brett Favre and his battle with painkillers
The three-time first-team All-Pro also suffered from an addiction to painkillers during his NFL playing days. He talked how the addiction started with an injury early on with the Packers and how many he took on his Bolling with Favre podcast:
"It sort of numbed the pain, but it also felt pretty good. I found that if the pain lingered, if you know what I mean, I could get more pills. And it snuck up on me. It was two pills that gave me a buzz, and then it was four. At its peak, I was taking 16 Vicodin ES all at one time."
He later admitted that he got rid of the painkillers by way of the toilet in an another interview:
Brett Favre quit painkillers cold turkey by flushing them down the toilet: https://t.co/bweqCwUfQ9
Brett Favre overcame the addiction as his story is a tale for current NFL players to hear.
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