Cincinnati Bengals

Bo Jackson doesn't want his kids to play football

Updated Mar. 4, 2020 10:19 p.m. ET

Fansided, John Buhler/Fansided

Bo Jackson may be a former Heisman Trophy winner for the Auburn Tigers, but he really doesn’t want his kids playing football from what he knows about CTE.

Bo knows baseball, football, and apparently now CTE. That’s right. One of the greatest athletes of this last half century Bo Jackson doesn’t think he would have played football if he knew what he knows now about head injuries.

The 1985 Heisman Trophy winning running back from the Auburn Tigers told USA Today Sports, “If I knew back then what I know now, I would have never played football. Never. I wish I had known about all of those head injuries, but no one knew that….there’s no way I would ever allow my kids to play football today. Even though I love the sport, I would smack them in the mouth if they said they ever wanted to play football.”

Jackson may not have needed football, but it did help him get to Auburn University where he starred on the gridiron as well as the baseball diamond. While Jackson was an unbelievable college running back, his real calling was baseball.

Jackson was an All-Star outfield for the Kansas City Royals in the 1980s. Had he stuck with just baseball, maybe Jackson would be enshrined in Cooperstown? He did things on the baseball diamond we haven’t seen since, the epitome of a five-tool player.

However, his notoriety as an SEC tailback had him always on NFL general managers’ minds in his early 20s. He refused to play for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers before eventually agreeing to split time in the Los Angeles Raiders backfield with future Pro Football Hall of Famer Marcus Allen.

Only fitting, Jackson would see his football career come to an end when he dislocated his hip in a game against the Cincinnati Bengals. That injury cut his NFL career short and brought his MLB career to an ending shortly there after.

Jackson was able to get out of the NFL without any serious head trauma. While his days down on The Plains in Auburn made him a legend, he’d be in Cooperstown if he just stuck to baseball professionally. Blaming potential head injuries is understandable for Jackson in dissuading his kids from playing football, but that wasn’t what caused Jackson to retire so soon.