ricky williams retiring form football ricky williams retiring form football according to espn...intersting. apparently he wants to pursue other things in life... best of luck to you.
Strange. Just saw the tail end of this on Sportscenter. It sounded like a done deal; did you catch how this was announced? Miami must be scrambling to talk him out of it.
i believe ricky just had is agent tell them today. out of the blue...the coach is pretty pissed and they are trying to talk him out of it.
Not trying to be an *******, but sounds pretty bi-polar to me. Either that or maybe he's going after his religious 'roots'. Has he ever been connected with any Muslim or ultra-Chrisitan societies? Just speculating. Hmm, apparently this doesn't seem as immediate as we might think; LONG article: http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/sports/columnists/dan_le_batard/9237156.htm?1c Ricky Williams: 'I'm retiring' Fed up with football, Williams is retiring at 27 DAN LE BATARD dlebatard@herald.com The 27-year-old running back's seismic decision to leave football in his prime, a week before the start of Dolphins training camp, is perfectly in keeping with his personality. It is outsized, enigmatic, brave, unpredictable, complex, interesting, selfish and surprising enough to leave your mouth hanging open. And, of course, different. Above all, right to the very end of a football career that will be finished when he formally faxes his retirement papers to the NFL offices early this week, Williams always has been relentlessly different. ''I'm finally free,'' Williams said by cellphone from Hawaii. ``I can't remember ever being this happy.'' Why is he doing this? Well, why not? This is how Williams has always floated through life, going wherever the wind guided him, so he never really fit within the drill-sergeant rigidity of football with all its rules, regimen and stopwatches. He relished the playing part with a child's enthusiasm, but the business part was always much too adult for him. Williams has an artist's sensibilities and sensitivities, forever fascinated by things beyond that ball, and he is no longer interested in playing his life away. He wants to study, learn, search, travel, question, write, meditate, read, wander, find himself, climb mountains, take pictures of waterfalls and be Dad without being interrupted by another 8 a.m. meeting to dissect film. His heart isn't in it anymore, in other words. And, in both running style and lifestyle, his body will not go if his heart doesn't lead. Williams doesn't do indifference. He either plays passionately, as he did for two bruising seasons as a Dolphin, or not at all. So not-at-all is what it'll have to be, even as this Dolphin season appears to be wrecked before it gets started, because Williams figures he'll either get injured or hurt the team playing in a sport this savage without motivation. He thought he might be able to make it through this one last season for his teammates, and only for them, but couldn't convince himself of it even after weeks of trying. He says he plans to call each of them individually in the coming weeks to apologize. He can't play for others. Williams has always been a locker-room loner, alone with his excellence, sitting apart from teammates even on the bench during games, and now he puts yet more distance between himself and those who play. ''I just don't want to be in this business anymore,'' said Williams, finished after just five NFL seasons. ``I was never strong enough to not play football, but I'm strong enough now. I've considered everything about this. Everyone has thrown every possible scenario at me about why I shouldn't do this, but they're in denial. I'm happy with my decision.'' LONG TIME COMING This is not some whim. Williams has been weighing this with friends for months and finally told an angry, crushed Dave Wannstedt on Friday night. Williams' decision was clinched while on tour recently in Europe with rocker friend Lenny Kravitz, who is so consumed with working and fame's responsibilities that he doesn't have much time for joy, or for himself. That's not what Williams wants to become of his own life. Williams says with conviction that no one will talk him into coming back, even though Wannstedt continues to try. This isn't about any money dispute or leverage or the recent headlines involving his mar1juana use. It's about outgrowing games. Williams' conviction has grown into clarity in recent weeks. He kept finding examples for why he should do this everywhere he looked -- backstage with Kravitz and Snoop Dogg, while befriending homeless people in Australia, on Jamaican beaches with Bob Marley's carefree kids. ''The people in Jamaica, living in these little tin shacks, they were the happiest people I've ever seen,'' Williams said. ``This is an opportunity to be a real role model. Everyone wants freedom. Human beings aren't supposed to be controlled and told what to do. They're supposed to be given direction and a path. Don't tell me what I can and can't do. Please.'' Society and the NFL say he can't smoke mar1juana, for example, and that's one of the many rules of his confining workplace he will no longer abide. He says without apology he has gotten around NFL drug tests with a special liquid players all over the league consume by the gallon before tests to avoid detection. He says he simply didn't drink it before getting busted in 2002, and that he still hasn't heard on his appeal of a second failed test, but that the recent mar1juana issues have nothing to do with his decision to retire beyond confirming how stifling celebrity can be and how ill-fitting the NFL is for him. FAME AND MISFORTUNE Williams has never been interested in money or fame, finding the former empty and the latter corrupt. He keeps thousands of dollars in hundreds in the unlocked glove compartment of an unlocked car and gives it away to strangers. He cut off his famous dreadlocks while on an Australian vacation (even though it cost him $750,000 from Gillette advertisers who wanted to capture the moment) because he craved the new anonymity baldness gave him. He has formed a friendship with controversial Jim Brown, another running back who retired in his prime to pursue a movie career. And he was moved recently by a long conversation with former Minnesota running back Robert Smith, who also quit at his peak to pursue a medical career because he thought the beatings that running backs took were inhumane. But what Williams is doing is still unprecedented. No great back -- not Brown, not Barry Sanders, not Smith -- has ever retired this young and this healthy. Williams is putting his cars and Miami homes up for sale. He already donated some of the money from them to a local school. He says he'll probably spend the upcoming football season traveling abroad -- he hasn't gone to Dolphin workouts in weeks -- but doesn't have a concrete plan for his future. ''I have no idea what I'm going to do,'' he said. ``Who knows? I just know it is going to be fun. Going to school again. Going to travel for the next six months. I'm half-way intelligent. I'll figure something out. I don't feel like I have to explain myself to anyone. All I end up doing anyway is giving rebuttals, and it is boring. I don't want to do it anymore. That's it. I don't want to do this anymore. If people really care about me, that would be enough for them.'' It isn't, of course. People care about the Dolphins a lot more than they care about him, so he'll become a traitor or worse in South Florida, just like that. That's another reason Williams disdains fame: Real love isn't this fickle. So he isn't terribly bothered that what was always a conditional, counterfeit sentiment (the volume of the cheering going up or down depending on his production) will now turn into a poison he won't even hear abroad. He says he plans to live in another country, and soon. ''The only people I'm accountable to are to my three children, and they love me anyway,'' Williams said. ``Whenever you are afraid to do something, you should do it. I've been afraid of this for too long. I'm not anymore.'' He was at the airport in Hawaii as he talked on his cell phone Saturday night, bound for a flight somewhere to Asia. The airline agent asked him for his return ticket to the United States. He said he did not have one. Abandoning the team a week before camp? Traitor? Lunatic? Williams doesn't care what anyone thinks of him anymore. He is following a voice only he can hear. He is done doing what other people want, done answering to yelling coaches who care only about their own self-preservation, done being hit by 350-pounders, done waking up in pain, done being a piece of meat, done being confined, done being polluted by fame and fortune and football. He's done. Perfectly Ricky, right up until the end. He's done running for money. Now he runs for free.
A psycho? How so? Sure, he's done some things that may be different from the norm, but that certainly isn't a bad thing. If he decides he wants to retire because his heart isn't in football anymore, than who's to tell him he's crazy? I respect him much more for that, than if he just decided to half-ass it to earn a paycheck.
I dunno. Sounds just like a free spirit to me. If the guy is tired of football, he should get out. Who was the Minnesota running back who left a few years ago to pursue his studies as a scientist? I mean, it's their lives. We are always so shocked, but it doesn't matter if you are making all the money in the world. If you hate your life, you need to get out of it.
Yeah, that was Robert Smith from Ohio St. Good call, Jeff. Let the man do what he WANTS to do with his life. It is HIS life, after all.
He's got a free spirit. He's gotten all he's ever wanted out of football, and wants to move on to other things. I still think Ricky's fondest memories came from his record breaking senior year at Texas back in '98. Watching Ricky dominate other teams that year was amazing. I still remember sitting in the front row in section 26 my freshman year cheering on "The Run."
HAHA this is hilarious! If you guys hate the Dolphins or just want to see some mayhem, go see the ESPN message board. This is just incredible news. I mean most all of you had to be thinking something like this MIGHT happen, but now...just incredible. Unbelievable. Bizarre. I can't think of a good word to describe such a situation. Wish him the best of luck in whatever he pursues. Of course, I can't foresee him visiting South Florida anytime soon...
I was listening to I think ESPN Radio on XM today where they talked about Robert Smith and how he basically ridiculed football. He said he got tired of going to training camp, practice, etc. because it was like going to a remedial math class. I think this was in a book that's either out or coming out.
Wow!!!! This is huge news. I really enjoyed reading the above article. I agree that Ricky is his own man and he should do what he feels is best for himself. If he does not feel like playing football and walks away in the prime of his career. More power to him. You just do not see this in professional sports. It is very rare that a professional athlete as blessed as Ricky Williams walks away at his own choosing and not based on injuries. Truly amazing story. I am sure everyone here in South Florida is going to wake up to huge surprise when they open up their Sunday newspapers! The Dolphins are in a world of hurt...
Isn't that kind of weird though? I mean the guy spends his entire life since he was probably about 13 or 14 devoted to football. Then 15 years later, he hates it.
I'm surprised nobody in the thread has made a 'too much pot' joke yet. But then I remembered where I am.
