#AndrewLuck #IndianapolisColts #FootballSeason #FootballFans
Andrew Luck, quarterback of the Indianapolis Colts, retired just before the start of this football season. He is 29.
He got tired of dealing with a four-year cycle of injuries, including a lacerated kidney.
He left millions of dollars on the table.
And the fans booed, as he walked off the field for the last time during a preseason game after his announcement.
Why?
Gracie Bonds Staples, who writes the “This Life” column for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, asked that very question in her Sept. 8, 2019, column.
Staples asked one expert, Erin C. Tarver, an associate professor of philosophy at Oxford College of Emory University, who wrote the book “The I in Team,” what she thought of Luck’s decision.
She called it terrible, but not surprising, Staples writes.
“Many fans come to identify so strongly with their teams that they cease to think of players as individual people at all,” Staples quotes Tarver. “If they do, it’s as people who owe them something: wins, more years of their lives, a willingness to subject themselves to serious long-term damage for the sake of the fans’ hometown,” the quote continues.
The long-term physical punishment to football players — punishment for the sheer pleasure of the fans and the income to teams, leagues and players – has come under the microscope in the past several years.
Football organizations at all levels are now addressing it, from children’s leagues to the pros. The particular focus is on repeated concussions, and long-term brain damage that may result.
Though football is a business for players, coaches, professional team owners etc., it is basically a game. Luck obviously wanted to be as whole a person as possible for as long as possible for his family, friends etc.
As a fan, one should understand this. It’s likely that Colts fans saw their team’s chances to thrive this season as diminished by Luck’s departure. But they should understand that he has taken a lot of punishment for their pleasure, and enough is enough. It was no longer worth the risk, or the money, to him. The decision undoubtedly was hard for him.
Though most of us are not professional athletes, we, too, can face issues of having a job that is slowly killing, or, perhaps, permanently injuring us.
This can happen in many ways, not just physical punishment. Stress, overwork, lack of time with family and friends can have long-term effects on us as people.
Feeling underappreciated by those who don’t know, or don’t care, what you are going through can hurt, too.
If you have a job that you feel is killing you, and you are motivated to change your situation, there are many programs out there that, by investing a few part-time hours a week, can put you on the way to potential financial freedom – enough to perhaps eventually kiss that killer job goodbye. To find out about one of the best such programs, message me.
Staples writes that Luck was not offended by the boos. He took out a full-page ad in the Indianapolis Star, thanking the fans for their support over the last eight years.
That’s a class act. Here’s hoping Luck can live a full life, free of pain and full of appreciation from grateful Colts fans.
Peter