Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month 2023: Junior Seau

At the conclusion of May and the end of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month 2023, we will use our final article to honor one of our NFL greats whom we lost tragically, Junior Seau.

Junior Seau’s Life

Tiaina Baul “Junior” Seau Jr. left behind a beautiful legacy in football and life, and it is my pleasure to share this with you this week.

Early Life

Tiaina Baul Seau Jr. was the fifth child born to Tiaina Seau Sr. and Luisa Mauga Seau in Oceanside, California. Seau Sr. worked at a rubber factory and a school as a custodian, and Mrs. Seau worked at a commissary and a laundromat (can you imagine working that many jobs with five children?). Junior was even the grandson of the village chief in Pago Pago, the territorial capital of American Samoa.

Junior Seau moved to American Samoa with his family shortly after being born; the future football legend didn’t learn English until he was 7 years old. The family moved back to San Diego, where Seau Jr. slept in the one-car garage with his three brothers. Snug!

Seau had smarts and athleticism. The teenager was a multi-sport athlete at Oceanside High School, excelling at football, basketball, and track and field.

Somehow, Seau went from being named a member of the California All-Academic team in high school to being labeled a dunce in college. Junior got a 690 on the SAT, 10 points below the minimum required SAT score to play football as a freshman at the University of Southern California.

The transition to college was difficult for Junior Seau. He was a smart star athlete in high school, and at USC, he was a regular Joe. In an interview with Sports Illustrated, Junior said that he learned who his real friends were, no one supported him in the community, and his parents would get confronted at church with how much of an underachiever their son was and how he wasn’t ever going to make it. With friends like that, who needs enemies?

Seau went as far as to apologize to teachers and staff at his former high school for “failing” them. He should have waited and said sorry for lettering his final two years at USC and being selected as a first-team All-American his final year in 1989.

Going Pro

Junior Seau’s family and friends really picked the wrong guy to talk badly about. Seau left USC a year early (who can blame him?) and was drafted in the 1st round of the 1990 NFL draft as the 5th overall pick. Somehow it feels good to vicariously see Junior excel despite the haters, 23 years later.

The linebacker would play 11 seasons for the San Diego Chargers. Seau would win the hearts and minds of the San Diego people, becoming the face of the franchise and fondly being nicknamed the “Tasmanian Devil” after the antics of the cartoon character.

A few accolades the legend had include: 12 Pro Bowls, the 1992 George Halas Trophy, the 1992 Defensive Player of the Year, the 1992 AFC Defensive Player of the Year, the NFLPA AFC Linebacker of the Year from 1992 to 1994, and the NFL Alumni Association Linebacker of the Year in 2000. His career high of 155 tackles was in 1994, and he won the Super Bowl that same year with the Chargers.

Junior Seau’s career from 2000 to 2009 was plagued by injuries, and his best years were behind him. If you thought Tom Brady was the first player to double retire, you would be wrong; Junior did the same thing. Once in 2006 and again in 2010.

Junior Seau Off The Field

Entrepreneurial to the bone, Junior had many businesses during his NFL career and after. Seau had a successful restaurant, a clothing line, and a TV show. The former linebacker was also committed to community service and started the Junior Seau Foundation in 1992. The foundation provided children in the San Diego area with support in many areas, such as child abuse prevention, educational programs, and recreational opportunities.

In 2016, the Foundation donated $250,000 to the Challenged Athletes Foundation, which provided surfing equipment that accommodated different physical challenges participating individuals may have. This was in honor of Seau’s love for surfing.

Seau had four children: Tyler, first with his high school sweetheart in 1989; Hunter, Jake, and Sydney, with his wife, Gina Deboer. The couple was married from 1991 to 2002. Jake continued the athletic legacy of his father by playing lacrosse at Duke University and signing with the Dallas Rattlers of Major League Lacrosse. His youngest son, Hunter, has no interest in athletics, something his mother is more than happy with.

Other athletes in Junior’s family included his nephew Ian Seau, who was an undrafted free agent in the NFL; his other nephew Micah Seau, who was a college football player; and his cousin Pulu Poumele, who was a coach and player in the NFL and the CFL.

A little legal trouble followed Junior. In 2010, Seau suffered minor injuries after falling 100 feet off a cliff in Carlsbad, California. Allegedly, Junior said he fell asleep at the wheel; his 2012 actions may call that into question. The cliff situation occurred hours after his girlfriend reported a domestic assault to the police, something he was never charged for.

Junior Seau Dies Young

On May 2nd, 2012, Junior Seau was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound by his girlfriend. He didn’t leave a suicide note, but he had scribbled out the country music song “Who I Ain’t.” No alcohol or drugs were found in his system except for the prescribed medicine for his sleeping disorder. He had been struggling with insomnia for over seven years and needed powerful doses of Ambien.

There were no obvious signs of brain damage, and the medical examiner came to the conclusion that when Seau was alive, he didn’t exhibit symptoms like irritability and mood swings, so they felt he was unlikely to have neurocognitive decline due to brain trauma associated with football.

It’s a good thing Junior Seau’s family knew better; they sent his brain off to the NIH to have his brain tested. Despite not having a history of concussions in the NFL, Gina Seau knew he had them. It’s not unusual for concussions to be underreported due to poor reporting or a lack of testing. Former teammate Gary Plummer pointed out that players will play through anything to maintain their replaceable position in the NFL. Gary personally remembers Junior Seau playing through incredible, debilitating pain.

Plummer also mentions that mental toughness is a requirement – players will omit the truth when speaking to coaches and staff. They will not be honest so they can continue to play (what would happen to their career if they didn’t, especially pre-concussion protocols?).

This desire to be mentally tough doesn’t go away with retirement, either. It is very hard for many former players, and likely Junior Seau too, to admit they are experiencing symptoms associated with CTE. Junior Seau likely had no idea what was going on with his own body and mind, as he was slowly suffering alone and scared as he continued to decline neurocognitively. A horrific travesty that could be prevented with education from the league.

Low and behold, the National Institute of Health found that the former linebacker had CTE. If medical examiners are making calls regarding the neurocognitive health of former NFL players and can be so wrong, how many cases are going undiagnosed? You can’t see CTE from the outside of the brain; you have to disassemble it (as a sports injury epidemiologist, I study this, but I will leave it there for the squeamish).

Also, it’s unclear why the examiner determined he wasn’t exhibiting irritability and mood swings. His former wife and children said close family and friends saw that he had those symptoms, along with memory loss and depression that was progressively getting worse. Gina Seau and his children say he was able to hide his symptoms well in public, so maybe the ME was asking the wrong people. Also, his girlfriend reported domestic assault, and he drove over the side of a cliff “asleep” despite having insomnia in 2010. Did the medical examiner think that was fine? Is that the norm for 43-year-old men in their practice?

Tyler Seau experiences some heartache over not doing more and not being aware of the symptoms associated with neurodegenerative decline. His family saw problematic behaviors, but they didn’t know it was because of head trauma. Tyler Seau and the loved ones of everyone who experiences CTE-warning signs should not feel bad; these symptoms have not been widely communicated to football players and their families at all. That is another travesty. So much hurt, grief, pain, and guilt.

The Seau family filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the NFL. Good for y’all! The Seau’s and the NFL settled outside of court for an undisclosed amount.

A Trend

Even just ten years ago, we had significantly less awareness of CTE and its associated symptoms. There was a string of suicides of former NFL players in the early 2010s, and it helped defeat the NFL’s attempt to hide the relationship between neurocognitive decline and football and forced them to finally acknowledge the relationship for the first and only time in 2016. This period of NFL history also helped families learn about the risks and signs to watch out for in their current and former NFL players’ loved ones. This is not to say that a player will have CTE (maybe) or that it will cause them to engage in problematic behaviors (at all), but awareness is crucial.

Besides the former linebacker, Kenny McKinley, Dave Duerson, Ray Easterling, and Jovan Belcher committed suicide in 2010, 2011, and the last two in 2012, respectively. Jovan Belcher also killed the mother of his child, Kasandra Perkins, before he took his own life. These cases were shocking, especially when it came to well-known names like Seau. At least the greater awareness brought to CTE allowed something positive to come out of these tremendous tragedies – our thoughts are with the five families. May their lives never be forgotten.

The Legacy of Junior Seau

Junior Seau’s legacy lives on through each and every one of his children. He was a proud and loving father who showed up for his family as best he could.

The legendary linebacker received praise from NFL greats like Bill Belichick, John Elway, Tom Bass, and Dan Fouts. He was commemorated often: twice by the Chargers’ 40th and 50th-anniversary teams; his number was retired by the Chargers at his public memorial; and several locations in Oceanside are named after him.

Seau was inducted into the San Diego Hall of Fame in 2011 and the Breitbart Hall of Fame in 2013. He was also honored by ESPN, which did a 30-minute documentary on him that highlighted his career as well as life after football and his commitment to his family.

Enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2015, Junior was the first player of Polynesian and Samoan descent to be inducted into the HOF. In a moment of significant controversy, Junior Seau’s wish for his daughter Sydney to introduce him was turned down because of a policy at that time that did not allow people to speak for deceased inductees.

Instead, the New York Times published her full speech, and she was allowed to speak for three minutes on the NFL Network. A five-minute video was also planned by NFL Films that didn’t happen; they did not want Sydney to speak on her father’s death or CTE diagnosis. Sydney didn’t appreciate this censorship and wanted to be able to give the speech her father would have wanted. It’s yet another travesty that the NFL took that special moment from Sydney Seau, her family, and her father’s memory. For shame, HOF!

Not sure if you caught all of the Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month 2023 articles this month? You can find them here, here, and here.