Quote:
Originally Posted by Brainiac
Barry Sanders is getting a lot of love in this thread. I was a big fan of his until he decided to totally **** over his team and his fans by abruptly retiring at the start of training camp without even bothering to tell ANYONE. He just fled the country without telling anybody where he was. The Lions opened training camp, and the big question was "Where is Barry Sanders?". After everyone wondered for several days what the hell had happened, he FINALLY faxed a letter to his hometown newspaper announcing his retirement.
He walked away from football at the age of 30 and still in the prime of his career. I'd be just fine with that if he'd had the guts to tell his team that he was going to do that. But he didn't. He was a total coward who showed a complete lack of respect for his team and his fans. The Lions gave him an $11 million signing bonus as part of his $35 million contract just two years prior to that, and they deserved better than that.
That single act destroyed the goodwill of a lot of fans of his.
|
From what Barry has shown, he's been one of the classiest players in the league. I will choose to give him the benefit of the doubt on believing that he had excellent reason to retire from football. He lost his love for the game, and didn't want to continue doing something he didn't love doing. Honestly I wish a lot of other players would take this route so teams aren't wasting money on players who no longer care.
Barry wanted to win a championship, and the team was never in a position to even sniff that, despite what Barry did to help out.
I read a bit of his book, but that was years ago.