I grew up in Dallas in the 80’s. Needless to say, I was a diehard fan of the Dallas Cowboys National Football League (NFL) team and January 10, 1982 will forever be seared into my memory. Late in the fourth quarter, the Cowboys were leading the San Francisco 49ers 27-21 in the conference championship with the winner moving on to the Super Bowl. But then, with less than a minute remaining, The Catch happened. Dwight Clark of the 49ers sailed over the Cowboys’ Everson Walls to catch Joe Montana’s game-winning pass in the end zone. I was crushed and had a dark cloud over my head for many days afterward.

Dwight Clark sails over Everson Walls for The Catch

Though I’ve lived in the Bay Area for the past twenty years and become a 49ers fan, it’s still hard for me to watch video clips of The Catch which is arguably this region’s greatest moment in the history of professional sports. Over the years of listening to sports talk radio, I heard interviews with and about Dwight Clark and have come to realize what a terrific person he was. So, I may hate that play, but I certainly can’t hate the man. That’s why I was as heartbroken as everyone else around here with yesterday’s news that Clark had succumbed, at only 61 years of age, to his battle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, an incurable neurodegenerative disorder that is usually fatal within 2 to 5 years after diagnosis.

Not surprisingly, the ALS Association’s Golden West Chapter, which covers the entire West Coast, was contacted by every Bay Area TV station about Clark’s death. In her KTVU news segment, TV reporter Deborah Villalon explained what Clark meant to ALS patient advocates who often feel invisible:

“To the ALS community he is a hero for raising awareness in the very public way he faced the disease. Clark faced the terminal illness head-on, speaking publicly of his challenges, even appearing on the big screen at Levi’s Stadium last fall, to thank fans for their support.”

At CIRM, we are funding two clinical trials run by Cedars-Sinai and BrainStorm Cell Therapeutics testing stem cell-based treatments for ALS. In Clark’s memory and for everyone in the ALS community, we hope these trials one day lead to new treatment options for the 5,000 thousand newly diagnosed cases each year in the U.S.