ESPN Founder Announces He Has Parkinson's Disease

SEATTLE, WA — Four decades ago, Bill Rasmussen made a tremendous impact on the way people watch televised sports with the founding and launch of ESPN. Today, he is attempting to make another beneficial impact by publicly announcing he is suffering from Parkinson's Disease.

Diagnosed with the progressive brain disease in 2014, the sports entrepreneur revealed in a first-hand account published Monday on ESPN Front Row, "I didn’t feel anything different in my daily life and saw no reason to discuss the topic outside of normal family discussions about health matters. As the months and years passed though, I did indeed start to notice little differences in my physical abilities and learned more about PD – that’s when I made the decision to share my story with fans, athletes, teams, sports, businesses and hopefully stir the collective, creative geniuses among us to successfully attack this progressive brain disease."

The 86-year-old Rasmussen lives in Seattle with his daughter Lynn, a registered nurse, and her family, which has "been on this journey with me and without whom this Parkinson’s mystery would be a lot harder to tackle," he wrote. "Now, by expanding the circle, by sharing my experiences, my hope is that I can help others who are impacted by Parkinson’s and we’ll all learn more together."

Despite his illness, Rasmussen still travels around the country as a popular speaker. He recently flew to Connecticut to accept the Gold Key Award, one of the state's most prestigious sports honors, from the Connecticut Sports Writers' Alliance. Two days later, he was guest speaker at the dedication of the new location for the Enfield Athletic Hall of Fame, a shrine into which he was inducted in 1999.

In early September, he plans to return to the Nutmeg State to commemorate the 40th anniversary of ESPN's launch. After more than a year of planning and organization, the network debuted on cable television on Sept. 7, 1979.

"Now as part of the 40th Anniversary edition of Sunday Night Baseball, Sept. 8, I’m thrilled to be doing First Pitch honors along with ESPN President Jimmy Pitaro at Fenway Park when the Red Sox entertain the New York Yankees," Rasmussen wrote. "This is all part of a series of visits I’ll make with ESPN employees in Charlotte, New York, Bristol and Los Angeles that same week."

In a phone interview with Patch, Rasmussen said he's been practicing throwing from a mound, as evidenced by his photo taken last week by his granddaughter Sarah, and he has tossed nothing but strikes.

(Sarah Van Hollebeke)

Rasmussen has had to adjust to little things that had basically been taken for granted his entire life. He no longer drives, and said he no longer wears ties because he is unable to tie them.

ESPN Vice President of Communication Mike Soltys, whom Rasmussen hired as an intern in 1980, said, "Like the positive spirit he brought to the ESPN launch 40 years ago, Bill is facing this period of his life with the same positive attitude as he has everything else."

His hope in going public with his health issues is to increase awareness of Parkinson's Disease.

"I hope thousands will bring new interest, new talent, new research and new dollars to bear on this insidious disease," he said. "I’m a positive guy; I always look at the positive side of people, projects, ideas, etc. For some reason, Parkinson’s is kind of an orphaned malady – people don’t like to talk about it, as if it were taboo. Well, 40 years ago, people didn’t want to talk about a 24-hour sports network either as if competing with “The Big Three” broadcast networks was taboo. We never stopped asking questions, solving problems and selling the dream. A lot of really good people did believe and we see the results of that effort today.

"Let’s tackle Parkinson’s with the same enthusiastic effort. I’ll be talking a lot about PD in the weeks and months ahead – not as a victim, but as living, breathing proof that when you or a loved one hears the dreaded words, “You have Parkinson’s disease,” life is not over – it’s just the beginning of a new chapter."

Read Bill Rasmussen's full first-hand account at www.espnfrontrow.com.