Former Chicago Blackhawks player Bobby Hull is introduced to fans during the NHL hockey team’s convention in Chicago on July 26, 2019. Hull’s family announced he was suffering from CTE — the brain condition known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy when he died in 2023.
Amr Alfiky/AP
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Amr Alfiky/AP
The Hall of Fame hockey player Bobby Hull had chronic traumatic encephalopathy — the degenerative neurological disease known as CTE when he died in 2023, according to his family.
Hull, a two-time NHL most valuable player and Stanley Cup winner, was known as “The Golden Jet” for his electric play, bruising hits and marvelous goal-scoring abilities. His career spanned more than two decades, mostly in the 1960s and 70s with the Chicago Blackhawks.
His wife released the results of his post-mortem brain tissue analysis on Wednesday through the Concussion Legacy Foundation. In a news release, the organization says it hopes to raise awareness for the long-term effects of repetitive head impacts in hockey and encourage support for research. Hull’s family donated his brain to the Boston University CTE Center after he passed away in 2023 at age 84.
Deborah Hull said her husband felt strongly that no family should have endure CTE. “He insisted on donating his brain, feeling as though it was his duty to help advance research on this agonizing disease.” She said her husband knew his Hall of Fame career came with a price. In the last decade of his life, she says he struggled with many cognitive symptoms of CTE, such as short-term memory loss and impaired judgment.
CTE can only be diagnosed with an autopsy of the brain, meaning it can only be detected after death.
