“As a Parent, You're Relieved”: 49er Chris Borland's Father on Son's Retirement From Football

Jeff Borland didn’t let his son, Chris, play football until high school growing up in Ohio. He thought youth coaches didn’t know how to teach little boys how to be safe tackling.

So it was with great pride and relief for him and his wife, Zebbie, when their 24-year-old son, the sixth of seven siblings and a promising rookie linebacker for the San Francisco 49ers, announced to the world this week that he was retiring from the sport because he had researched what concussions could do later in life.

“As a parent,” Borland said Tuesday night in a phone interview with NBC Bay Area from Kettering, Ohio, “you’re relieved.”

Relieved, he said, because football usually means “physical punishment,” which takes a toll on the mind and body.

Now, the elder Borland said, his son will be looking at what to do next: "I think there will be more school," he said, without indicating what his son's next career path would be, adding that Chris Borland graduated with a history degree at the University of Wisconsin.

"He did what he had to do, and proved himself successful in the NFL," the elder Borland said. "There were many good lessons learned from playing football - preparation, discipline, team work. The challenge now is to transfer those skills to the next career."

Chris Borland began researching and reading all about concussions and head injuries, and announced his retirement on Monday to ESPN’s “Outside the Lines” reporters Mark Fainaru-Wada and Steve Fainaru. The two Bay Area brothers wrote a book and created a documentary, the “League of Denial: The NFL, Concussions and the Battle for Truth,” that changed the national conversation about head injuries and football.

"I just honestly want to do what's best for my health," Borland told "Outside the Lines." "From what I've researched and what I've experienced, I don't think it's worth the risk."

The decision had nothing to do with his ankle injury and shoulder issues: “I feel largely the same, as sharp as I’ve ever been," he told ESPN. "For me, it’s wanting to be proactive. I’m concerned that if you wait ’til you have symptoms, it’s too late.”

Borland is the most prominent NFL player to leave the game in his prime because of concerns about brain injuries, the brothers noted. More than 70 former players have been diagnosed with progressive neurological disease after their deaths, and numerous studies have shown connections between the repetitive head trauma associated with football, brain damage and issues such as depression and memory loss.

As the regular season approached, Borland’s father, owner of The Borland Group, a financial advisory firm, said his son began starting to think, “What am I going to do with my life?” That led his son to do some “reading and researching,” his dad said.

“He became concerned this could compromise his career after football," Jeff Borland said. "And he didn't want to jeopardize the next one."
 

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