UnLucky Timing

If you’re anything like me, and that’s probably a bad thing, you may have been watching college football this past Saturday night. Watching Miami and Florida trade bad decisions like a couple of college kids at a keg party, something popped up on the scroll that made me do a spit take… nearly. I had to see it a second time, then a third, before jumping on Twitter to see if someone got hacked or someone trusted a fake account.

Sometimes people like to make parody Adam Schefter accounts and break “news” to troll people. However, this time, it was the real deal and it wasn’t a troll posting.

On Saturday night, the entire sports world, not just the NFL or football, was shocked at the sudden retirement of Andrew Luck.

You might recall Andrew Luck for his four years at Stanford and then the past six with the Indianapolis Colts. You may also recognize him from that awesome Captain Andrew Luck Twitter account which is a war parody. Regardless, the news sent shockwaves through the sports world and unleashed an unholy storm of bad hot takes and tributes for the signal caller.

Luck, who has suffered so many injuries it might take up an entire paragraph, stated during his press conference on Saturday night that he no longer loved the game, and that these various injuries have just taken the enjoyment away from him.

Unlike Doug Gottlieb who offered the embarrassingly cringe tweet of “Retiring cause rehabbing is ‘too hard’ is the most millennial thing ever #AndrewLuck” was promptly roasted by a good amount of fellow sports journalists and sports fans alike.

As a 32 year old, I fall into this millennial grouping, only three years older than Andrew Luck, and I’m not sure where Gottlieb is coming from with that kind of logic. Maybe he was simply trying to rile folks up with a trolling tweet, or he’s just that much of a jerk. I don’t know the guy personally, but he attempted to defend his tweet by putting out another one bringing up Washington’s quarterback, Alex Smith, who is trying to come back from a broken leg in his mid-30s.

Apples to oranges.

Smith, attempting to come back from a grusome broken leg that saw him nearly lose the limb, is already getting phased out of the Redskin’s plans at quarterback following the signing of another QB and the drafting of one.

The timing of Luck’s retirement is quite curious, week three of the preseason for crying out loud, but at the end of the day, you have to respect the man’s decision to do what’s best for him. He’s a 29 year old guy, recently married, and has gone through around seven surgeries in the past handful of years.

That’s a tough road for anyone much less someone who gets hit by grown men running full speed in pads. The guy tried to play with a lacerated kidney but we just commonly forget about that kind of toughness?

We praised a guy like Brett Favre who played through injury after injury to the point where his memory is shot. In 2013, Favre talked about his memory loss from the amount of concussions he’s suffered through his career. But he was a tough guy, a fearless gunslinger who has said that in the future he might not remember who he even is.

So when a guy like Luck, who won’t turn 30 until next month, choses to walk away for his own health and well being, people attack him, his fans boo him and the hot take brigade fumbles over themselves to make people cringe.

What would you rather have? Your heath at 30, millions of dollars and the ability to walk away with mind still somewhat intact, or, end up suffering in tragedy like so many football players have due to CTE.

Maybe Tom Brady summed up Luck’s decision in the best possible way when recently asked about it.

“It is his life. Everyone has the right to choose what he wants to do,” Brady told The Greg Hill Show earlier this week.

Luck didn’t owe anyone an explanation, most of all the fans that chose to boo him on Saturday night. It was his decision, and despite what might seem to be an inopportune time, we should respect him, and the toughness he showed for the past six years.