Brain damage commonly associated with boxers and recently found in deceased NFL players has been identified in a former college athlete who never played professionally, representing new evidence about the possible safety risks of college and perhaps high school football.

As six former NFL players who died young have been found with the condition, called chronic traumatic encephalopathy, scrutiny has focused on the NFL. This new case, an athlete who stopped playing after college, testifies more to the sport of football itself, said doctors involved in its discovery.

The man, the former Western Illinois wide receiver Mike Borich, died at 42 of a drug overdose in February after a downward spiral of depression and substance abuse that is generally associated with the type of tissue damage found in his brain.

Dr. Ann McKee, an associate professor of neurology and pathology at the Boston University School of Medicine and co-director of its Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy, said: "The fact that we are seeing this disease, and it had a devastating effect on their lives, now in a 42-year-old who never played in the NFL, indicates that it’s a more pervasive problem than we recognize. What are we doing with our kids? Are we doing enough to protect against their developing this awful condition?"

Chris Nowinski, a former Harvard football player who was involved in the Borich case, said it was significant for what it could say about the unknown risks of amateur football.

"The focus of the discussion of brain-trauma issue has been on the NFL – it really needs to be on youth players," he said. "Ninety-nine percent of football players in this country are college and below."

No records show how many concussions Borich sustained while playing high school and small-college football outside Salt Lake City and then at Western Illinois.

"It never occurred to us that football could have these types of consequences," said his father, Joe, who played tight end for four years at the University of Utah. "Nobody had any idea – everyone figured the helmet was a panacea for anything like that. You’d come out of the game, shake your head and go back in. It bothered me when Mike or my other son, Joey, got a whack and had to come out of a game. But they went back in, just like I did. That’s what we did in those days. Unfortunately." (NYT)