Rangers defenseman Fox spearheading father-in-law's fight with ALS 

GREENBURGH, N.Y. -- Troy Green jokes about how, at first, he didn't want to like Adam Fox.

As Green says, he was simply following the unwritten big brother code, which to him meant he wasn't supposed to like anybody who became romantically involved with his younger sister, Tate, as Fox was when the two were at Harvard University.

"I'm extremely protective of her," Green told NHL.com, "and it was really hard to not like Adam."

It seems impossible now.

Not only are Fox and Tate married and raising a baby girl, Greer Rose, who was born in March, the New York Rangers defenseman has joined in the Green family's personal fight against Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, the incurable nervous system disease known as ALS or Lou Gehrig's Disease.

This Thanksgiving, and every day, Fox is thinking about and fighting for Tim Green, his father-in-law and a former NFL linebacker, who was diagnosed with ALS in 2016 when Fox and Tate were getting to know each other.

"Being around their family, how they've come together and persevere through it, it's pretty inspiring and it definitely gives you a lot to be thankful for," Fox said.

That includes Tackle ALS, a fundraising initiative that Tim Green, who played eight seasons with the Atlanta Falcons, started jointly with the Sean M. Healey & AMG Center for ALS at Massachusetts General Hospital in 2018.

Tackle ALS raises money that goes directly to establishing ALS treatment and therapies to fight the disease that recently claimed the lives of former NHL player Mark Kirton, Hall of Fame defenseman Borje Salming, Calgary Flames assistant general manager Chris Snow, former Ottawa Senators assistant Bob Jones and thousands of others on an annual basis.

Every cent donated to Tackle ALS goes directly to Mass General to fund ALS research.

Before this season, Fox announced that he would be personally donating $1,023 for every goal he scores and $523 for every assist to Tackle ALS.

So far, he has donated $15,098 with his three goals and 23 assists, including three assists in a 6-2 win against the Boston Bruins in the 2025 NHL Thanksgiving Showdown on Friday, and one assist in a 4-1 loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday.

To date, Team Adam Fox has raised more than $101,000, according to TackleALS.com. More than $10.3 million has been raised since fundraising began in 2018.

Donations can be made by anyone who goes to TackleALS.com.

"They've done so much," Fox said of the Green family. "They started Tackle ALS to raise money for trials, new technology for people with it. Being around them now for a long time you see the impact of it. I think everyone has something that is close to their heart. For some people it's cancer, or a different illness, different cause, and this one has just been close to my heart for a while. I am in a fortunate position to have a little influence, a little impact to raise awareness and raise some money to go toward it. I just thought it was something I really wanted to do."

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Tim Green, 61, is confined to a wheelchair and needs the help of a ventilator to breathe. He communicates through a tablet that has a fixed camera to read his eyes. Everything he says he types with his eyes. He can do three to five words per minute, Troy Green, said.

He has written two books that way.

"He's still superman, it's just in a different way," Troy Green said. "His last two books he wrote entirely with his eyes and they're hundreds of pages, so it takes him years to do it. That kind of sums up who he is; there is no quit, no give up, no back down. It's all systems go all the time."

Fox said Green's perseverance impacts him daily.

"Everyone gets caught up, especially in our life, with a win or a loss every day," Fox said. "I'm not saying it's not important, but you see the finer things in life when you're around him. Around him you really see the support of family and what it does. It's just his resolve. He's written books. He still works at his law firm. He meets with clients, comes to Rangers games and meets with clients. He doesn't let it stop him from doing anything. He's remarkable."

Fox said Green came down from his home in Skaneateles, New York to be at the Rangers game against the San Jose Sharks on Oct. 23. He is planning to be at the 2026 Discover NHL Winter Classic on Jan. 2, when the Rangers play the Florida Panthers outdoors at LoanDepot Park in Miami.

"He does honestly a lot of normal things," Fox said. "That's the biggest thing with ALS, and it's what we've tried to do with bringing families to games, is you get back to that normalcy. You're not just the person in the chair and silenced off and waiting for your days. The physical element deteriorates, but that person is still there, and you can still do some normal things."

Fox regularly meets with ALS patients. He has a suite reserved at Madison Square Garden for those who are living with or families like his own who have been impacted by the disease.

He did it on the ice before a game against the Seattle Kraken at Climate Pledge Arena on Nov. 1.

Kraken defenseman Brandon Montour's older brother, Cameron, died from complications with ALS on Oct. 20. Fox spoke with Montour during warmups.

"I know when something like that happens there's only so many words, you're not going to help the way he's feeling too much, but I wanted to let him know that I knew what he was going through," Fox said. "I don't know if he had known about my father-in-law, but I just let him know that it was something that was personal to me too. There's not many words I was going to say that were going to make him feel too much better, but I wanted to let him know I was there with him, I understood the illness a little bit, and if his family or his brother's family needed anything we would be there to help him."

Fox said Tate is trying to work with the NHL Players' Association to create more ALS awareness.

"There is a direct influence on my family with that disease," Rangers coach Mike Sullivan said. "I have a member of my family, my wife and I, that has been diagnosed with it and is dealing with it right now, and it's extremely hard. I think it affects a lot of people. When it affects your family directly it takes on a whole different level from a personal standpoint. It becomes personal. That's where ALS is with my family right now."

Troy Green said, "It's a disease that you don't really know anything about until it affects you, and then once it affects you or a loved one you become an expert in it. But Adam, with his platform, the stage of the NHL and one of the premier teams in the NHL, yeah it's going to get a lot more people looking at the disease, talking about the disease and fundraising for the disease."

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There is optimism in the ALS world that medical breakthroughs are coming.

"How we do that is through a master platform trial," Troy Green said. "A master platform trial is what turned breast cancer. Breast cancer used to be considered a death sentence and now most of the time it's a very treatable thing. It still sucks but it's very treatable and that's because they did this thing called the master platform trial in oncology where basically they were able to fund and study 18 drugs at once in the first year and in the second year I think they were in the high teens too. Ultimately, over a two-year period, it changed the disease."

Tackle ALS is funding the first master platform trial for ALS.

It is set up at Massachusetts General Hospital and Green said there are testing sites all over the U.S. and some in Canada. The platform trial allows the testing of multiple drugs at the same time and continues to test new treatments as they are discovered.

Green said Tackle ALS has already helped fund five drug trials in two years, a process that likely would have taken five times as long, and it's being done at roughly 70 percent of the normal cost because of the efficiency of the master platform trial.

Fox, who married into this fight, plans to continue to do his part; score goals, dish out assists, donate money for each and raise the profile of Tackle ALS along the way.

"I've got to give him a hard time because he's my brother-in-law still, but it shows why he's such a good fit for our family," Troy Green said. "The thing about Adam is it's not an act. You can see it in his interviews on TV. You can see it in him interacting in public with other players. He's a very authentic person and that's why he's been such a good fit for our family."