Chiefs' Thompson alert, responsive after cardiac arrest (2024)

ASSOCIATED PRESS

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Chiefs defensive lineman B.J. Thompson remained hospitalized but was awake and responsive on Friday, one day after the second-year pro experienced a seizure during a team meeting and went into cardiac arrest at the Kansas City practice facility.

Chiefs trainer Rick Burkholder said the 25-year-old Thompson was placed on a ventilator and heavily sedated Thursday night at the University of Kansas Health System. He was brought out of sedation on Friday and his prognosis is good.

"He's alert. He's awake. He's coming through quite well," Burkholder said. "We don't have a diagnosis and in medicine sometimes you don't have that. But he's awake and alert and he's headed in the right direction."

Thompson, a fifth-round draft pick out of Stephen F. Austin last year, was in the meeting room before the Chiefs were scheduled to have their final voluntary workout of the offseason. He began to have a seizure and kicker Harrison Butker immediately ran to the trainer's room and summoned assistant trainers Julie Frymyer and David Glover.

They were joined by Burkholder in helping Thompson as he went into cardiac arrest. Dr. Jean-Philippe Darche soon arrived from the Kansas Health Sports Medicine and Performance Center, which adjoins the practice facility.

"Our team of that group of people provided CPR for him," Burkholder said. "He had one AED shock and came back. He was in cardiac arrest for less than a minute, a minute and a half. Our players, security staff, coaching staff — they were phenomenal in handling the crisis. We then turned him over to the Kansas City (Missouri) Fire Department."

The NFL mandates that teams practice emergency action plans for a variety of situations, including cardiac crises like the one that Thompson experienced. The Chiefs had just completed their most recent practice session on Monday.

Ex-Dolphin Howard accused of sending explicit photo to teen

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Former Miami Dolphins star cornerback Xavien Howard sent a male teenager a sexually explicit photograph of the young man's mother because she refused to get an abortion, a new court filing alleges.

The allegation was made Thursday in a lawsuit filed last year by a woman who is not the teenager's mother. That woman accuses Howard, 30, of secretly recording them having sex and then sharing the recordings with others. She says Howard also shared, without consent, sex tapes she had agreed to make.

Attorneys for the woman want the teenager, who is now 18, added as a plaintiff against Howard, who was released this off-season by the Dolphins in a money-saving move and is a free agent. The teenager is the son of another woman who attorneys say also had a relationship with Howard and was recorded having sex with him. That woman has not sued Howard.

In the original lawsuit, filed under the pseudonym Jane Doe, a woman says she dated Howard for several months in 2022. A few months after they broke up, she received an Instagram message from a woman who said Howard had sent her sexually explicit videos of himself having sex with various women, including Doe.

Gregory sues NFL, Broncos over fines

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. — Randy Gregory is suing the NFL and the Broncos claiming discrimination over being fined $532,500 for taking medication containing THC for disabilities during his brief time in Denver.

In the complaint filed this week in Arapahoe County District Court, the 31-year-old pass rusher who now plays for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers said he was prescribed Dronabinol for social anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorders but was denied accommodations to treat those disabilities with that medicine.

The NFL and the Broncos both declined to comment on Gregory's lawsuit when reached by The Associated Press on Friday.

The NFL no longer suspends players who test positive for THC, or tetrahydrocannabinol, the chemical responsible for most of marijuana’s psychological effects, but it remains among the league's banned substances subject to fines.

BRIEFLY

JAGUARS: Receiver Brian Thomas Jr. has signed his rookie contract with Jacksonville. Thomas was the 23rd overall pick in the NFL draft. He was slated to get a four-year deal worth $14.6 million under the NFL’s rookie slotting system.

LIONS:Detroit lost one day of organized offseason workouts after breaking rules relating to on-field contact during a practice last month. The Lions said in a statement Friday night that they take very seriously the rules set forth within the NFL’s Offseason Program and have worked to conduct their practices accordingly.