Randy Cross, a lineman on three 49ers’ Super Bowl-winning teams, is among 30 former NFL players who have pledged to donate their brains for research, the Concussion Legacy Foundation announced Thursday.
Cross, 62, is one of the biggest names of the latest group to help medical researchers better understand the causes of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), a degenerative brain disease that can only be diagnosed after death. Physicians believe the disease is caused by repetitive blows to the head that occur in sports such as football, hockey and soccer.
“I can’t imagine why anybody that played the game and that cares about the guys and the kids that are starting to play the game now, wouldn’t donate,” Cross said in a statement.