Demaryius Thomas Diagnosed With C.T.E., Family Reckons With His Death

DUBLIN, Ga. — Demaryius Thomas’s parents see their son every day.

A painting of the former N.F.L. star rests against a wall in Katina Smith’s home, and Bobby Thomas, his father, keeps the same image on his cellphone. It depicts a cherished moment that now seems foreboding: The two beaming parents flank their son in the moments after his Denver Broncos won Super Bowl 50 as Demaryius looks downward with a pained expression, scratching the back of his head.

The receiver had been leveled by Carolina Panthers linebacker Luke Kuechly during the game and had a headache so bad that he missed most of the parties after the victory.

“He was like, ‘Hey, y’all, I need to leave and go by myself because I don’t feel too good,’” Smith recounted. “And so, you know, he left and didn’t even finish celebrating or anything like that.”

Demaryius Thomas died in December at 33, mere months after retiring from a Pro-Bowl career in the N.F.L. in which his charisma, humility and team-first ethos on the field made him a favorite of teammates and fans. Those closest to him said his behavior became increasingly erratic in the last year of his life, which was marked by the memory loss, paranoia and isolation that are hallmarks of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, the degenerative brain disease linked to repeated head hits.

On Tuesday, doctors from Boston University announced that Thomas was posthumously diagnosed with Stage 2 C.T.E., but his life and death were also complicated by seizures brought on by a 2019 car crash. They attacked with little or no warning and led Thomas to wreck other cars and fall down steps. The coroner’s office in Fulton County, Ga., has not yet ruled on the cause of his death, but doctors in Boston said he most likely died of suffocation after a seizure.

“He had two different conditions in parallel,” said Dr. Ann McKee, the neuropathologist who studied Thomas’s brain. She added that seizures were not generally associated with C.T.E.

Because of the dual conditions, Thomas’s C.T.E. diagnosis does not bring the neat clarity that has punctuated other N.F.L. players’ demises. His family, friends and former teammates will not know how much football is responsible for Thomas’s struggles and are only now coming to grips with the extent to which he suffered.

“It amazes me now when we talk about how a young man that age can be in so much pain but still smile,” said Carlos Jones, Thomas’s pastor who was with him when a seizure caused Thomas to fall down the steps in his home in early 2021. “It was just a testament of how strong he was.”

Reunited at the Super Bowl

Football changed the trajectory of Thomas’s life, his achievements on the field helping to stabilize his family that was fractured during his adolescence.

Thomas was born on Christmas Day, 1987, in Montrose, Ga., a speck of a town between Macon and Savannah. Katina was 15 when she gave birth to him, and she never married Bobby, who joined the army and was often away.

When Thomas was 11, federal agents burst into the family’s home with a search warrant and found money connected to a drug ring led by Smith’s mother, Minnie Pearl Thomas. They arrested Smith for conspiracy to distribute cocaine and after she refused to testify against her mother, she was sentenced to 20 years in prison. Minnie Pearl Thomas was given a life sentence.

Thomas bounced from home to home for a couple of years before settling with Bobby Thomas’s sister, Shirley, and her husband, James. Schoolmates bullied Thomas because his mother was in prison, but he found solace and affirmation in track, football and basketball. In sports, overcoming pain was a key to his success.

“He had a lot of injuries that he played through, and he would always say, ‘You know how I was raised, you know how I was trained, I’m not going to let my team down,’” said Paul Williams, Thomas’s high school basketball coach and close friend. He said Thomas always had a ready smile despite his many challenges off the field.

Denver drafted Thomas 22nd overall in 2010, the first receiver taken that year, and his career skyrocketed when quarterback Peyton Manning arrived in 2012, the first of five consecutive years in which he had 1,000 or more receiving yards. Thomas became a mentor to many teammates, including Bennie Fowler, a fellow receiver, and was a favorite teammate for his affable workmanlike approach to the game.

Denver reached the Super Bowl the next season and was trounced by the Seattle Seahawks, but Thomas’s 13 catches set what was then a record for receptions in the title game.

In the lead-up to Thomas’s next championship appearance, his family history gained as much attention as his play. After 17 years of appeals and lobbying from the family, President Barack Obama commuted Smith’s sentence as part of a Department of Justice…