What This Story Is About
Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell is helping raise money for ALS.
Why It Matters
Titans legend Chris Johnson announced his diagnosis a few weeks ago, spurring a resurgence of the 2010s’ ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, a social media trend to bring awareness to the illness.
What Happens Next
O’Connell challenged the president of the Nashville Predators, Bishop Joseph Walker of Mt. Zion and the entire Vanderbilt Women’s Basketball team to make their own videos next.
For Context
Nashville rapper Young Buck posted a video last week challenging O’Connell to participate in the challenge.
Catch Up
When Chris Johnson publicly announced his ALS diagnosis, a Middle Tennessee man’s phone started buzzing with calls and texts. He realized he had the former running back’s number and decided every one of those messages needed to reach Johnson.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WSMV) - Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell is helping raise money for ALS.
Titans legend Chris Johnson announced his diagnosis a few weeks ago, spurring a resurgence of the 2010s’ ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, a social media trend to bring awareness to the illness.
Rapper Young Buck, who is from Nashville, got a bucket of ice dunked him on camera as part of the challenge last week. In his post, he challenged multiple Tennessee leaders, including O’Connell.
During O’Connell’s roundtable event on Friday, WSMV4 asked him if he was aware of Young Buck’s challenge.
“Oh gosh, I was not,” the mayor responded. “We’re going to have to take that under advisement.”
He added, laughing, that there was “a strong possibility that I would do that.”
Just a few days later, on Tuesday, O’Connell posted a video of his own.
“Chris Johnson was perhaps the most electric player to ever play for the Tennessee Titans,” he said in the video. “And if through this process we can raise awareness, bring funding, improve research and maybe even deliver a cure for this disease, it will be the second transformational impact he’s had on our community.”
Then, the mayor was doused in icy water.
“Mayor 🤝#CJ2k. Nashville takes care of its own," his caption read.
O’Connell challenged the president of the Nashville Predators, Bishop Joseph Walker of Mt. Zion and the entire Vanderbilt Women’s Basketball team to make their own videos next.
A legendary NFL career
Johnson ran for 9,651 yards during his 10 seasons in the NFL, and 7,965 of those came while wearing a Titans jersey.
In 2009, just his second season in the NFL, Johnson joined the exclusive 2,000-yard club when he ran for 2,006 yards and averaged more than 125 yards per game.
At the time, only five players had accomplished the feat. The elite group has grown since to just nine players, after Saquon Barkley ran for 2,005 yards for the Philadelphia Eagles.
The Tennessee Titans released a statement from the team’s owner following Johnson’s announcement.
ALS plagues NFL players
Johnson’s ALS announcement is a familiar one in the NFL world.
Although the terminal disease was made famous by a baseball player, it has long been a concern of football teams and players at the highest level. Beloved New Orleans Saint Steve Gleason became the face of the debilitating disease when NFL fans watched as the athletic safety was forced into life in a wheelchair.
A worldwide push to find a cure for ALS exploded in the summer of 2014, when Pete Frates, Pat Quinn, and Anthony Senerchia started the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge video campaign. Gleason was also a part of this drive, which raised over $220 million globally, significantly boosting research and support initiatives for ALS.
FILE - In this Sept. 18, 2017 photo, Pete Frates, who is stricken with amyotrophic lateral...
FILE - In this Sept. 18, 2017 photo, Pete Frates, who is stricken with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, listens to a guest at Fenway Park in Boston. Frates, a former college baseball player whose determined battle with Lou Gehrig’s disease helped inspire the ALS ice bucket challenge that has raised more than $200 million worldwide, died Monday, Dec. 9, 2019. He was 34.(AP Photo/Charles Krupa, File)
What is ALS?
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), sometimes called Lou Gehrig’s disease, is a rapidly progressing neurological (nervous system) disease that progressively shuts down the body, according to the ALS Association.
ALS attacks nerve cells that control voluntary muscles, and when these cells die, voluntary muscle control and movement are lost, which leads to progressive weakness and disability.
People living with ALS eventually lose their strength, ability to move their arms, legs, and body, and the ability to breathe on their own. In most cases, their minds remain sharp and alert.
Although ALS progresses differently for each patient, the average life expectancy for people with ALS is 2 to 5 years, according to the ALS Association.
GMA reported that Johnson’s diagnosis appears to be a case of “sporadic ALS,” which is the most common form of the disease. He spoke with Strahan through a speech-generated device that creates audible words from his eye movements.
Strahan asked Johnson why he wanted the public to know about his condition.
“If sharing my story helps even one person get diagnosed sooner, inspires more research, or gives another family hope, then it’s worth it,” Johnson explained to Strahan through the speech device.
His wife, Brittany, admitted she was in a state of denial when Chris received the news from the doctor.
“All I can think about was our kids and how young they are,” she said. “You’re in denial. You want it to be anything else. You want the doctors to be wrong. The life that we previously had is now a thing of the past, but we’re still hopeful.”
Johnson revealed that in just one year, ALS has taken away his ability to even lift up his daughter.
Despite its rapid takeover of his body, Johnson vowed to Strahan on GMA that he would not give up.
“Seeing how hard these doctors and researchers are working gives me hope,” Johnson said through his speech device. “As long as they’re fighting for people with ALS, I’m going to keep fighting, too.”
To learn more about ALS and the research involved in finding a cure, visit here.
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