Retiring From the NFL to Live Your Best Life

Rashard Mendenhall is an running back for the Arizona Cardinals, or he was until he decided to not sign on with the Cardinals another year and retire at age 26. In his essay about the decision, published on the Huffington Post, he says he wanted to do this without fanfare, a quick fade to black and he’d be off traveling the world and pursue writing, but his decision was met with shock. The biggest question, or course, being, “Why would you leave all that money on the table?”

He sounds like a smart dude who knows what he wants:

Over my career, because of my interests in dance, art and literature, my very calm demeanor, and my apparent lack of interest in sporting events on my Twitter page, people in the sporting world have sometimes questioned whether or not I love the game of football. I do. I always have. I am an athlete and a competitor. The only people who question that are the people who do not see how hard I work and how diligently I prepare to be great — week after week, season after season. I take those things very seriously. I’ve always been a professional. But I am not an entertainer. I never have been. Playing that role was never easy for me. The box deemed for professional athletes is a very small box. My wings spread a lot further than the acceptable athletic stereotypes and conformity was never a strong point of mine. My focus has always been on becoming a better me, not a second-rate somebody else. Sometimes I would suffer because of it, but every time I learned a lesson from it. And I’ll carry those lessons with me for the rest of my life.

So when they ask me why I want to leave the NFL at the age of 26, I tell them that I’ve greatly enjoyed my time, but I no longer wish to put my body at risk for the sake of entertainment. I think about the rest of my life and I want to live it with much quality. And physically, I am grateful that I can walk away feeling as good as I did when I stepped into it.

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