Bo Jackson: ‘I would have never played football’

Former two-sports star Bo Jackson said he would not have played football had he known of all the head injuries the sport can cause.

“If I knew back then what I know now, I would have never played football,” Jackson said in an interview with USA Today Sports. “Never. I wish I had known about all of those head injuries, but no one knew that. And the people that did know that, they wouldn’t tell anybody.”

Jackson, famously known for his “Bo Knows” campaign with Nike in the late ’80s and early ’90s, now knows about chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), the degenerative disease found in the brain after repeated blows to the head. Because of the information, Jackson said he would not let his kids play football.

“The game has gotten so violent, so rough,” Jackson said. “We’re so much more educated on this CTE stuff, there’s no way I would ever allow my kids to play football today. Even though I love the sport, I’d smack them in the mouth if they said they wanted to play football. I’d tell them, ’Play baseball, basketball, soccer, golf, just anything but football.’”