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Yet another standout NFL player retiring under 30 for health reasons
Former franchise left tackle Eugene Monroe is retiring from football at age 29, he announced Thursday at The Players’ Tribune (ESPN’s Josina Anderson had the news first) and cited health reasons as the biggest concern.
I’m only 29 and I still have the physical ability to play at a very high level, so I know that my decision to retire may be puzzling to some. But I am thinking of my family first right now — and my health and my future.
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Monroe added this chilling worry:
The last 18 years have been full of traumatic injuries to both my head and my body. I’m not complaining, just stating a fact. Has the damage to my brain already been done? Do I have CTE? I hope I don’t, but over 90% of the brains of former NFL players that have been examined showed signs of the disease. I am terrified.
The Baltimore Ravens released Monroe this offseason after three seasons with the team. He had missed 15 games over the previous two seasons, after missing a mere four his first five seasons, which were spent with the Jacksonville Jaguars.
The former first-round pick out of Virginia in 2009 (No. 8 overall) was traded by the Jaguars to the Ravens midway through the 2013 season and later franchised by the Ravens as their left tackle. He started 90 of his 93 career games.
Monroe has become a vocal marijuana advocate, something the NFL has considered a taboo subject. It even was speculated that this fact played into the Ravens’ thinking when it came to letting him go. They had tried to work out a trade with the New York Giants, but it fell through. The Giants were one of a handful of teams that were interested in signing Monroe in recent weeks before he made his retirement intentions known.
It’s a convenient yet apparently incorrect narrative that Monroe is ending his NFL career to be a casual pot smoker. His intentions appear noble and his feelings strong about the medical benefits he believes it can have — especially for NFL players who wreck their bodies and are seeking less addictive and more effective pain-relief sources.
Although he said he was nervous about his future, Monroe said in his farewell piece that he plans to be an advocate for medical marijuana research, particularly in regard to CTE. Monroe’s belief is that NFL players are forced to rely too much on dangerous opioids for pain relief, which in his mind is more troublesome than cannabis to that end.
As the latest well-known player under the age of 30 to walk away from the game amid health concerns, the NFL’s crisis with health management continues.
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Eric Edholm is a writer for Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at edholm@yahoo-inc.com or follow him on Twitter!
