Fan Diagnosed With Brain Tumor After Laughing at Younghoe Koo Botched FG Attempt Led to Seizure

A botched field goal by New York Giants kicker Younghoe Koo may have saved a fan's life.

Mark Toothaker told Stephen Whyno of the Associated Press that he laughed so hard at Koo's whiff that it caused a seizure, and while he was hospitalized, a CT scan revealed a tennis-ball-sized tumor on the left side of his brain.

"(The) kicker saved my life because it could've happened any other time," Toothaker told Whyno in a phone interview. "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 was watching the Giants' game against the New England Patriots on Monday Night Football on Dec. 1 from his home in Lexington, Kentucky, alongside his wife, Malory. After realizing that her husband was having a seizure, Malory, who is a nurse at a rehabilitation hospital working for a brain-injury doctor, called 911 to get him transported to the hospital.

After the discovery of his brain tumor, Toothaker was transferred to the University of Kentucky's hospital, where it was surgically removed and determined to be benign. Whyno reported that he experienced "no lasting damage," and he will be in attendance at the Kentucky Derby this Saturday. He invited Koo to be his guest at the event, but he did not respond to messages from Whyno for the story.

"I know it wasn't his best moment, but it was beyond crazy," Toothaker said. "For she and I to be belly-laughing at his expense, which I feel terrible about now, but it all worked out in the end, that for me it couldn't have been a better moment."

Toothaker told Whyno that he didn't have any symptoms and worked full-time in the months before his seizure.

"I could have had it on a plane, anywhere," Toothaker said. "I didn't kill anybody. I didn't run over a family in my Expedition running up and down the road. I guess that would've been the hardest thing for me to live with if somebody would've got hurt out of this. Believe me, 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."

Malory echoed that sentiment and told Whyno that her husband is living normally.

"So many people aren't that fortunate," she said. "Really the first indication that he had a problem was the seizure — and to be in your own bed at home, not behind the wheel of a car or traveling, you're just so humbled and feel so blessed and just fortunate that if this had to happen, it was the best-case scenario."