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Major-league pitcher Joe Kennedy, who finished last season with the Toronto Blue Jays, died early Friday morning. He was 28. "We were terribly shocked," Blue Jays president Paul Godfrey said. "From what we understand he was in Bradenton … to be the best man at a wedding today."
Godfrey said he didn't have any particulars on the cause of death.


I am stunned.

It qouldn't surprise me if this were another case llike Darryl Kile, where a premier athlete's heart just gives out on him with little or no warning in the prime of his life...

This is the type of thing that always scares me to death....

lb13

I'm shocked too -- that's very sad.

The only thing I can think of is Marfan's, but that surely would have been mentioned in the news releases.

SportsFan68 wrote:I'm shocked too -- that's very sad.

The only thing I can think of is Marfan's, but that surely would have been mentioned in the news releases.

Only seen him a few times on TV but at about 6'4" and given his appearance as best I remember him from his days a member of the SAB's I think Marfan's is unlikely.

Perhaps some kind of cardiac arrhythmia like WPW or unfortunately perhaps steroid/HGH abuse seems more likely.

tanstaafl2 wrote:Perhaps some kind of cardiac arrhythmia like WPW or unfortunately perhaps steroid/HGH abuse seems more likely.

Now, come on, that's a bit much. It apparently was an aneurysm.

Weyoun wrote:

tanstaafl2 wrote:Perhaps some kind of cardiac arrhythmia like WPW or unfortunately perhaps steroid/HGH abuse seems more likely.

Now, come on, that's a bit much. It apparently was an aneurysm.

Sorry, but I disagree, don't think it is a bit much at all Steve. In this case apparently it was a natural cause and aneurysms in younger populations are indeed linked to Marfans although a brain aneurysm can be a congenital time bomb totally unrelated to Marfans or other systemic disorders. But it could also be exacerbated by hypertension resulting from steroid use.

The list of causes of sudden death in young otherwise health appearing athletes and people in general is pretty long and certainly can include use and abuse of anabolic steroids.

To think that a pitcher, and a marginal one at that who is trying to secure a job through free agency might have been using steroids in this day and age and that it could have contributed to his death in the absence of other information immediately following his death seems perfectly reasonable to me.

What ever the cause it is certainly unfortunate.