Orange County Saved NFL Great Dick Butkus?

Categories: Main, Moxley, Sports
butkus51.jpg
The Bear's Butkus
You can blame Orange County for many things: Laguna Beach, The Hills, TBN, professional Holocaust deniers, Allan Mansoor, Public Enemy Number One Death Squad, Curt Pringle.

But a Chicago newspaper is reporting this morning that OC might have actually made a positive contribution to society.

Yep, according to the Chicago Sun-Times, legendary NFL star Dick Butkus was saved on our precious soil.

In August 2001, the retired Chicago Bear's linebacker accepted a free, five-minute heart screening at the Orange County Heart Institute and was startled to learn that he "had one foot on a banana peel and the other in a grave" because of "an alarming buildup of calcium in his veins," wrote reporter Sean Jensen.

In response, Butkus--who turned 68 this month and nowadays lives in Malibu--underwent emergency heart surgery that he believes saved his life.

You can read the Sun-Times story HERE.

--R. Scott Moxley / OC Weekly

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