---
title: "Billy Ray Smith Jr., Chargers Linebacker Turned San Diego Broadcaster, Dies at 64"
description: "The fifth overall pick of the 1983 draft played a decade for the Chargers and spent the years afterward on San Diego television and radio. His family said he died Thursday after a long decline they attribute to dementia caused by CTE."
category: "Sports"
category_url: https://herald.la/category/sports
author: "Tyler Grant"
published: 2026-07-30T22:12:30.000Z
updated: 2026-07-30T22:12:30.000Z
canonical: https://herald.la/article/billy-ray-smith-jr-chargers-linebacker-turned-san-diego-broadcaster-dies-at-64
tags: ["nfl", "chargers", "cte", "obituary", "san-diego"]
---
# Billy Ray Smith Jr., Chargers Linebacker Turned San Diego Broadcaster, Dies at 64

The fifth overall pick of the 1983 draft played a decade for the Chargers and spent the years afterward on San Diego television and radio. His family said he died Thursday after a long decline they attribute to dementia caused by CTE.

Billy Ray Smith Jr., who anchored the San Diego Chargers defense for a decade and
then spent years as one of the most familiar sports voices in Southern
California, has died at 64. His family
[announced the death on Thursday](https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/49487068/family-ex-lb-billy-ray-smith-jr-dies-cte-caused-dementia),
saying in a statement that he "passed away peacefully surrounded by family" and
that he had faced "his long journey with dementia caused by CTE with unmatched
bravery, dignity, and strength."

## A decade in San Diego

Smith arrived in the NFL as the fifth overall pick of the 1983 draft, out of
Arkansas, where he had been a two-time All-American. He played all ten of his
professional seasons with the Chargers, finishing with 15 interceptions, 14
fumble recoveries and 13 forced fumbles, and was later named to the franchise's
50th anniversary team. In 2000 he was inducted into the College Football Hall of
Fame.

He stayed in San Diego afterward. Smith worked as a sports director at a local
television station and spent years as a radio co-host, becoming a fixture of the
city's sports conversation long after he stopped playing in it.

## What the family said, and what can be known

Chronic traumatic encephalopathy is a degenerative brain disease associated with
repeated head impacts. It cannot be diagnosed definitively in a living patient;
confirmation requires examination of brain tissue after death. The attribution in
Smith's case is his family's account of his illness, not a published
neuropathological finding, and it should be read that way.

That caveat does not make the account unusual. Researchers at the Boston
University CTE Center reported in 2023 that they had
[identified CTE in 345 of 376 former NFL players whose brains they examined](https://www.bu.edu/cte/2023/02/06/researchers-find-cte-in-345-of-376-former-nfl-players-studied/).
The center has consistently cautioned that its sample is drawn from families who
chose to donate brains, often because they suspected a problem, and so cannot be
read as a prevalence rate for former players generally. What the research has
established more firmly is that the risk tracks with cumulative repetitive head
impacts over a career, not solely with diagnosed concussions.

## A recurring story in the sport

Smith played in an era whose defensive linebackers absorbed contact on nearly
every snap and whose rules and return-to-play protocols bore little resemblance to
today's. The NFL has since restricted certain hits, changed practice rules and
settled a class action brought by former players over neurological injury,
while continuing to face criticism that the changes came late and remain
incomplete.

For San Diego, the loss is local before it is national. Smith was drafted by the
city's team, stayed after the team left, and spent the second half of his life
talking about the sport that had defined the first. He is survived by his family,
who asked in their statement that he be remembered as "a devoted father, husband,
son, and loyal friend."

## Sources

- [Family: Ex-LB Billy Ray Smith Jr. died of CTE-caused dementia](https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/49487068/family-ex-lb-billy-ray-smith-jr-dies-cte-caused-dementia)
- [Former Chargers LB Billy Ray Smith dies at 64](https://www.nbcsports.com/nfl/profootballtalk/rumor-mill/news/former-chargers-lb-billy-ray-smith-dies-at-64)
- [San Diego Chargers legend Billy Ray Smith Jr. has died at the age of 64](https://fox5sandiego.com/news/chargers-legend-billy-ray-smith-dead/)
- [Researchers Find CTE in 345 of 376 Former NFL Players Studied](https://www.bu.edu/cte/2023/02/06/researchers-find-cte-in-345-of-376-former-nfl-players-studied/)