21 ex-Steelers under 60 have died since 1996
Ed Varner
Commentary By Mike Lopresti
TAMPA — One died of a heart attack while hiking in the Grand Canyon.
Another was killed by a falling tree.
One's heart gave out shortly after watching a football game on
television. Another during a bike ride.
Men in their 50s or 40s or 30s, gone too soon.
Pittsburgh Steelers.
We keep hearing this Super Bowl week of the special brotherhood that
comes with the Steelers uniform and a franchise glued together through
the generations by a common bond.
"When one family hurts on the team," Hines Ward was saying the other
day, "we all hurt."
In many ways, it has been a blessed organization, filled with trophies
and rings and Hall of Fame inductions. Maybe more on Sunday. This week
has been one long applause for a proud history.
But fate does not always cheer for the Steelers. Look at all the
missing faces.
Twelve men listed in the team media guide as members of the 1970s
dynasty teams died before the age of 60. Overall, at least 20 former
Steelers younger than 60 are gone since 2000.
Two defensive linemen — half the front wall of the famed Steel Curtain
— passed away in 2008. Dwight White died because of a blood clot after
back surgery at 58, Ernie Holmes in a car accident in Texas at 59.
"It's hard to explain those kind of things," team President Art Rooney
II said. "Dwight White went in for back surgery, and a couple of weeks
later, he's no longer with us.
"You have to trust God and wish for the best. That's the best we can
do."
Some of the departed Steelers were victims of self-destruction, some
of the realities of aging and some just foul luck.
The causes of death are not uncommon to former players pushing 60,
many of them tilting the scales all their lives — cancer, accidents,
one suicide and, most of all, heart attacks.
Maybe there is a paradox here. The Steelers have been presented as how
a proper franchise works. They stand for the glorious possibility of
pro football, when a team can become a civic treasure.
Might they also be Exhibit A of the toll taken by the game they play?
"You put in perspective how fragile life is," said Rocky Bleier,
running back from the glory days of the 1970s. "You appreciate all
those memories, and it makes them more precious.
"One thing you understand is the average lifespan of an NFL player is
lower. … But when you start losing teammates, it becomes more
personal."
There are ironic tales. Steroids caused guard Steve Courson serious
heart problems, but it was a falling tree while doing yardwork that
killed him. Someone later found a 5,000-word letter Courson had
written, decrying that the NFL and its players didn't do more to
combat steroids.
And there are sad ends. Hall of Fame center Mike Webster, who suffered
a heart attack at 50, was a player renowned for his toughness. But he
was tormented by many demons — mental and physical — and died a broken
and troubled man.
Tunch Ilkin is a Pittsburgh radio broadcaster and was a Steelers
tackle from 1980 to 1992. For him, these are not just names from
obituaries. They were friends.
"Today I was watching the NFL Network, and they were playing one of
the Steelers-Cowboys Super Bowls," he said. "I was watching Webbie
(Webster), and my heart broke. They showed Steve Furness (heart attack
at 49) on the sideline with a big smile on his face, and that got me.
"It's not lip service with the Steelers. There is a closeness. When
you're part of this organization, there's a great feeling of being
part of history.
"Unfortunately, a lot of those memories of the past are being shared
at funerals."
Life is not simple, and neither are the Steelers. Come Sunday, this
flourishing and extended football family has a chance to become the
all-time leader in Super Bowl victories.
But it knows something about losing, too.
http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/sports/20090130/lopo30_st.art.htm
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21 ex-Steelers under 60 have died since 1996
Dave Hyde | Sports Columnist
January 25, 2009
From where Gary Dunn sits — at mile marker 84, on the back patio of
his hotel bar, facing the sun-kissed waters of the gulf — he counts
the funerals.
"Webby's was the first one I went to," he says of his former
Pittsburgh Steelers teammate, Mike Webster, the Hall of Fame center.
"It was in Pittsburgh, so everyone from the team just met there."
That was 2002. Webster, 50, suffered a heart attack.
"Next one I went to was Steve Courson's," Dunn says. "He was a great
friend. He was chopping down a tree, way out where he lived by
himself. They put together what happened, and it seems he was trying
to get his dog out of the way before the tree fell."
The tree fell on Courson, 50. That was 2005.
"The Steelers got a bus for all of us, and we went together to the
small town [Farmington, Pa.] where Steve was from for the funeral,"
Dunn says.
As he looks to the water from his Ocean View hotel and bar, the 1978
Super Bowl ring flashing from his hand, Dunn begins ticking off more
deaths. Ray Mansfield, 55, had a heart attack hiking the Grand Canyon.
Jim Clack, 58, battled cancer for years before dying of a heart
attack. Steve Furness, 49, had a heart attack at his home.
"Furnie walked in his kitchen and said, 'You know what?' I'm either
catching a cold or having a heart attack,'" Dunn said. "I couldn't
believe he was gone."
Twelve players from the Steelers' 1970s dynasty that won four Super
Bowls have died in different manners linked by the relative youth.
Adding to that sobering total, 20 Steelers under 60 have died since
2000 (21 if you go back to Mansfield in '96), including former Dolphin
David Woodley, in what has become a steady drumbeat of sadness.
Everyone in sports will talk this week how fortunate Pittsburgh is to
be the first NFL franchise to stalk a sixth Super Bowl title next
Sunday in Tampa. But will anyone talk of the obituaries that oddly
have accompanied this success?
"Just this summer, I got a call from a couple teammates, one after the
other, telling me about Dwight," Dunn says.
Dwight White died in June from a blood clot that developed after back
surgery. Dunn just had his right knee replaced a few days earlier and
the doctors refused to let him fly to the funeral for fear of
potential blood clotting in his leg.
"I had to call the guys and say I couldn't make it," he said.
What underlined White's death was that Ernie Holmes, 59, had died in a
January car accident. That meant two members of the Steelers' famed
Steel Curtain, the defensive line that provided much of the muscle to
those Super Bowls, were gone.
"When we get together, we talk about how crazy it is," said Dunn, a
defensive tackle and University of Miami alum who played with the
Steelers for 12 seasons. "There's no rhyme or reason why this is
happening."
Some of it is illness, as three Steelers died of diseases. Some of it
might be position and body upkeep: Eight of these Steelers died of
heart attacks, and a 2006 study by Scripps Howard News shows the
heaviest NFL athletes — typically linemen — were more than twice as
likely as their teammates to die before 50 because their hearts
couldn't support them.
Some might question the use of steroids, considering Courson admitted
taking them and others such as former player and NFL coach Jim Haslett
said they were prevalent on those 1970s teams. But steroids didn't
kill Courson. A falling tree did.
"All I know is a lot of friends are gone," Dunn says.
As Dunn sits on the back patio, the Ocean View's restaurant manager
comes up and asks about the Super Bowl menu. It will be a big day for
places like this across America. Dunn bought this place 12 years ago
with former Hurricane teammate Dennis Harrah, and it is a popular
place to watch NFL games.
Framed jerseys of the owners are on the wall, as well as photos and
posters of their teams. Steelers memorabilia dots the place, including
a painted insignia on a chair by the pool. The Super Bowl menu will
have a "Warner Wiener" for Arizona quarterback Kurt Warner and a
"Roethlis-burger" for Steeler quarterback Ben Roethlisberger.
"It should be a fun game," Dunn says. "All Super Bowls are —
especially when you play in them."
The ol' defensive tackle thinks the Steelers' defense will carry the
day, just as did in his day. That 1970s dynasty left the field years
ago. But its players continue leaving in surprising ways, one by one,
name after stricken name.
Dave Hyde can be reached at dh...@SunSentinel.com
Mike Webster
50, died of heart attack in 2002
Dwight White
58, died from blood clot in 2008
Steve Courson
50, killed by falling tree in 2005
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/columnists/sfl-flsphyde25sbjan25,0,2796656.column