Sickle cell hits 'closer to home' for Clark

[SD2042]

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsbu ... 50957.html


Football isn't a game of life or death to Ryan Clark, yet he knows first-hand the risk of playing in the high altitude could make it one.

That's why the Steelers' starting free safety still hasn't decided whether he will play against the Denver Broncos next Monday night.

"I think it would be big for me to play," Clark said Saturday afternoon at South Hills Village, where he signed autographs for the $10,000 Man Cave Makeover contest through Verizon FiOS. "Sickle cell would be acknowledged a little bit more, because it is an ethnic disease. Let's be honest, it's not a disease that affects all."

While Clark lost his spleen and gall bladder in separate surgeries after the sickle-cell trait caused oxygen deprivation to several major organs during the Steelers' game at Denver in 2007, he also knows it can be more severe.

Clark and his wife, Yonka, served as best man and matron of honor in the wedding of his childhood friend, Kevin Norwood, in July 2008. This past March, just days before their planned trip to Las Vegas together, Norwood's wife, Kim, died from complications of sickle-cell disease.

"For me, it hits a little bit closer to home than most," Clark said. "I know how deadly it can be. You lose your spleen and gall bladder, but you still have a life. Looking at my friend's wife, she doesn't."

Doctors have cleared the 30-year-old Clark to play, so now it's up to him and the Steelers' coaching staff to determine whether it's worth the risk.

"I don't want to go out there and have my health more on my mind than playing football," he said. "That wouldn't benefit the team or myself."