Approaching Defenders on the soccer field and garden walls on the baseball diamond he couldn’t stop Bo Jackson, but the two-sports sensation finally found his match: hiccups.

The former Kansas City Royals and Los Angeles Raiders star, 60, says he has had the hiccups for nearly a year. The ailment caused him to miss a recent ceremony honoring Auburn University star Frank Thomas, he he said Wednesday on «McElroy and Cubelic in the morning» on WJOX-FM in Birmingham, Alabama.

“I have had the hiccups since last July and I think I will have a medical procedure at the end of this week to try to remedy it,” he said.

Bo Jackson in action during a 1990 game with the Kansas City Royals.Photos Rich Pilling/MLB via Getty Images

“But I’m busy sitting in the hospital while the doctors prick me and shine lights down my throat, testing me in every possible way to find out why I’m having this hiccups, so that’s the only reason I wasn’t there. «

Jackson was emphatic when asked if anyone had found a reason for his hiccups or if there was a cure.

«Hell no,» he said.

“I’ve done everything: scare myself, drink water upside down, sniff a porcupine’s ass. It doesn’t work,” he said, as the hosts laughed.

Hiccups can be classified into one of three ways, according to an article in the British Journal of General Practice. posted on the website of the National Institutes of Health.

“Depending on its duration, hiccups are classified as transient hiccups (episodes lasting seconds or minutes), persistent hiccups (more than 48 hours), and recurrent hiccups (hiccup episodes that last longer than transients and often repeat frequently). ”, the article says.

To find out what is the cause of hiccups, the article recommends «carrying out an exhaustive medical history, asking about smoking and drug abuse, drugs, gastrointestinal symptoms (heartburn, dysphagia, regurgitation or abdominal pain), cardiorespiratory symptoms (pain chest pain, cough, or dyspnea). ), and neurological symptoms (headache, diplopia, dizziness or abnormal sensitivity)”.

bo jackson
Bo Jackson carries the ball for the Los Angeles Raiders during a game against the Kansas City Chiefs in 1990.Mike Powell/Getty Images

The article also says that patients should undergo a physical examination and, when necessary, a battery of tests, including blood tests, chest X-ray, ECG, gastroscopy, abdominal CT scan, and cranial MRI.

Jackson is considered one of the greatest athletes in history, winning the Heisman Trophy in 1985 as the best college football player. He would later star as a running back with the Los Angeles Raiders for four years, while also playing Major League Baseball as an outfielder with the Royals, Chicago White Sox and California Angels for eight seasons. His playing career in both sports was cut short after he suffered a hip injury during a playoff game with the Raiders in 1991.