PHOENIX (AP) – One by one, the newest members of the Pro Football Hall of Fame stepped onto the stage as their names were called. When the eighth man elected Saturday, the late Junior Seau, was announced, his two sons stood with the group.
“I wish,” 25-year-old Tyler Seau said later, “he was here in person with us.”
A field-covering, hard-hitting linebacker, the charismatic Seau, who committed suicide at age 43 in 2012, was the only first-time eligible candidate in the Hall’s class of 2015. Also getting in Saturday, a day before the Super Bowl, were modern-day players Jerome Bettis, Tim Brown, Charles Haley and Will Shields, contributors Bill Polian and Ron Wolf, and senior selection Mick Tingelhoff.
“It’s hard when you come into a group of men that have done what they’ve done, at their caliber, and they’re sharing stories and memories that they had together and playing against each other,” Tyler Seau said. “It makes you emotional.”
Researchers who studied Junior Seau’s brain said it showed signs of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a disease connected to repeated head injuries, including concussions.