When Giants kicker Younghoe Koo’s foot hit the dirt instead of the ball, becoming an instant internet sensation, it sent an NFL fan in Kentucky into hysterics.
Literally.
He laughed so hard he went into a full-blown seizure. An incident that probably saved his life.
Like millions of other Americans, 59-year-old Mark Toothaker, of Lexington, Kentucky, was glued to his screen last season to watch the Giants take on the Patriots on Monday Night Football.
So, he was there when Koo botched a field goal attempt by kicking the ground, instead of kicking the ball.
Toothaker found the incident so hilarious that he laughed his way into a full-blown seizure that sent him to the hospital.
Doctors ran a CT scan and found a tumor the size of a tennis ball on the side of his brain.
“[Koo] saved my life because it could’ve happened any other time. I wholeheartedly believe I was in the right spot at the right time, and he was the trigger for that happening. It was a miracle,” Toothaker said, per Collin Ruggs.
The tumor was so large that it had reportedly pushed the Kentuckian’s six millimeters to the right. Toothaker, a stallion sales manager at Spendthrift Farm, had no idea of the tumor’s presence.
A big part of his job requires driving from farm to farm, something that is not lost on the 59-year-old.
“As tough as that thing was, as violent as that seizure was, I have no memory of it, and I would find it hard to believe that I wouldn’t have hurt somebody or hurt myself if I would’ve been behind a wheel,” he said.
The tumor was found to be benign, and Toothaker’s medical outlook is good. But if Koo makes that field goal, or even just kicks the ball correctly, things could have turned out much differently.