Speaker 1: What's up everybody.
Speaker 2: This is Spice Adams and you're listening to the NFL
Speaker 2: Player's Second Acts Podcast.
Speaker 3: Baby, and welcome back. Thank you for tuning in to
Speaker 3: the NFL Players Second Acts Podcast. It's been a minute,
Speaker 3: but were back on, Peanut, and I got my uncle
Speaker 3: Whitney as always, mister Roman Hormal.
Speaker 2: So what's happening you good? I was not ready for
Speaker 2: the drum roll or whatever you call that at the beginning.
Speaker 1: That's not the normal introduction, that's not how it actually works.
Speaker 2: I will not say your name because I don't want
Speaker 2: to give away who our guest is, but just know
Speaker 2: that it's a different.
Speaker 4: Opening every single time come on here.
Speaker 2: It's it's so I never know what's going to happen
Speaker 2: comes out of this guy's mouth.
Speaker 4: I don't know as well.
Speaker 2: All right, before we get all that this, you know,
Speaker 2: I want to thank all of our listeners for always
Speaker 2: tuning in. Could you give us a five star rating
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Speaker 2: Please give us a listen, a follow, subscribe. Let's continue
Speaker 2: to push it on forward. Peanut, who's our guest today?
Speaker 3: Today? We got an oldie but a goodie. This gentleman
Speaker 3: played seven years for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. He was
Speaker 3: drafted in the second round by Love Smith, one of
Speaker 3: my former coaches. He's a Super Bowl winning champion. He's
Speaker 3: an All Pro guard. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Ali Marpetts.
Speaker 3: What's going on, boss?
Speaker 1: I appreciate you, Thank you.
Speaker 2: Hold on all right now, all right, before you even
Speaker 2: go into Ali, we gotta address the elephant in the room.
Speaker 1: All right.
Speaker 4: You were a second round pick by Tampay Bucks from.
Speaker 2: A Division three, Yes school, that means you, William Smith
Speaker 2: and Baylor.
Speaker 3: I can't even pronounce it. They got like eight names.
Speaker 1: You got like three different D three programs right there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so yeah, so three player. Uh so I'm hyping myself
Speaker 1: up here. I like to do it. You should introduction.
Speaker 1: I'm proud of it. Now.
Speaker 4: So I was the I'm playing with D two guys,
Speaker 4: never get three.
Speaker 1: That was the highest drafted Division three player in NFL history.
Speaker 1: So that the small school guys. You gotta you gotta
Speaker 1: have school guys. Yeah.
Speaker 3: So I read though that you were the offensive player
Speaker 3: of the year as a lineman.
Speaker 1: Yeah, other things I feel proud of. Yeah. So I
Speaker 1: was co offense. I don't know if does that work
Speaker 1: another quarterback, but yeah, so I was a co offensive player.
Speaker 1: At the conference, I was did you have any touchdowns?
Speaker 1: No touchdowns or anything like that. So no real stats,
Speaker 1: but I'm telling you I was better. Just put up politely.
Speaker 1: I was better than my competition pretty significantly enough to
Speaker 1: to garner that honor. But yeah, so I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is what football is like. You just like dominate, dude, dominate,
Speaker 1: and then when you get to the NFL, it's like,
Speaker 1: oh no, it's a bit different. These guys are getting paid.
Speaker 3: To how much you have dominated a D three school?
Speaker 4: Nowhere near as much as that.
Speaker 2: I'm just saying, like, so I play with a guy,
Speaker 2: Jarry Evans, who went to Bloomsburg University. It was a
Speaker 2: D two, right, and so I was like, how do
Speaker 2: you get drafted from a D two school? And he
Speaker 2: went like fourth round? You being second round. It is
Speaker 2: like that's like being first round of any If you
Speaker 2: went to D one, you're going first round. But he
Speaker 2: went to small school, so everybody's like they're going to
Speaker 2: question it, but second round is just like going first
Speaker 2: round from where you are. And he was like the
Speaker 2: only way you get drafted from a small school is
Speaker 2: literally you have to destroy people as an offer to Lineman,
Speaker 2: You're like, you're carrying him out of bounds, your body,
Speaker 2: slamming somebody every play. You're like, you just jump off
Speaker 2: the tape. You're like, I don't know, the film's kind
Speaker 2: of grainy, I don't know where they're playing at, but
Speaker 2: this kid is just dominating, kicking ass everybody.
Speaker 1: I mean, so that is kind of I got a
Speaker 1: little bit hype myself up here, but a little bit.
Speaker 1: That's how it has to play out. And also like
Speaker 1: for me, like it takes a GM like or a
Speaker 1: coach like to take their SHOT's gonna take the shot
Speaker 1: on the It's so much easier pick the Alabama or
Speaker 1: the SEC. You know what I'm saying. So like it
Speaker 1: does take it like to kind of put it out
Speaker 1: on the line, be like I trust my ability scouts,
Speaker 1: my ability to evaluate talent, which is like a really
Speaker 1: hard thing to do for those.
Speaker 3: Smaller school So how was it when you went to
Speaker 3: the Senior Bowl?
Speaker 1: Yeah, so that was kind of like an eye opening.
Speaker 3: Experience, Like damn, okay, I'm not really storing people or.
Speaker 1: So I actually did okay the Senior Bowl too, and
Speaker 1: that was like a surprise for me. So like my
Speaker 1: first rep one on ones, like that's the that is
Speaker 1: Wednesday exactly. So like they say, the game doesn't really matter,
Speaker 1: it's just really one on ones that matter anyway. So
Speaker 1: my I'm like getting all fired up. It's exciting for me.
Speaker 1: My first rep. I'm at left tackle against Nate Orchard,
Speaker 1: who was the D one sack leader that year, you
Speaker 1: tah and and so I'm like, well, I'm about to
Speaker 1: get found out, like they're going about to realize that
Speaker 1: I don't belong here, Like what am I doing against
Speaker 1: a sack leader? First rap? And I ended up winning it,
Speaker 1: and I was like, all right, maybe I do belong
Speaker 1: And then slowly throughout the course of the week, I
Speaker 1: was like, oh wait, I can actually do this, and
Speaker 1: I can do it at high level. So there's a
Speaker 1: couple of moments where I was like kind of surprising myself, Yeah,
Speaker 1: along the way, does that make sense?
Speaker 3: Yes, competition.
Speaker 1: Here, and I realized they realized that I shouldn't be
Speaker 1: playing left tackle, I think right. That was another.
Speaker 2: Thing I was gonna say, like, so you played tackle
Speaker 2: in college and then you transitioned to guard, because yeah.
Speaker 1: Even if the senior ball is playing next to Trent
Speaker 1: Brown is a tackle and.
Speaker 4: Six eight, yeah Trent three.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yething like that and had a terrible pro day,
Speaker 2: terrible combine.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, great player, great dude, great player. But I was.
Speaker 1: I was playing left tackle and I'm six four, three
Speaker 1: oh seven or whatever. They got this left guard next
Speaker 1: to me who's six sevens whatever, he is three seven
Speaker 1: or something. Maybe we should switch those guys. You'll play
Speaker 1: left guard tackle, you play left guard. So that was
Speaker 1: a switch. Real.
Speaker 3: So you were at your heaviest weight, you were three
Speaker 3: or seven. What was that process like to go through
Speaker 3: and eat the calories? I mean you weren't naturally big.
Speaker 3: I think I read somewhere where you were like to
Speaker 3: eighty to ninety three hundred, and you just kept putting
Speaker 3: those calories on and on.
Speaker 1: Like yeah, I mean yeah, you can see where I'm
Speaker 1: at right now. I mean like, yeah, yeah, some down
Speaker 1: seventy five pounds or whatever like that. So I'm at
Speaker 1: my weight where I feel like I should be sitting that.
Speaker 1: But yes, it was hard, like when people tell me
Speaker 1: they can't gain weight like young athletes, and I talked
Speaker 1: to them like, yeah, I can't, Like you know, I'm
Speaker 1: trying to put on weight, like I can't gain with
Speaker 1: like sit eat with me for a day, Like I
Speaker 1: guarantee you you're going to gain weight. Like I had
Speaker 1: my alarm set to eat food. Like I'm sure you've
Speaker 1: heard the story, you know, the guys in the locker room,
Speaker 1: they're like need to like like it's the job is
Speaker 1: to eat right, And that was that was my mentality
Speaker 1: around food. And so now what I've done since I
Speaker 1: stopped playing is that I still had that mentality around food.
Speaker 1: I just had to sort of like the awareness around
Speaker 1: food is now changed. I just flipped that switch, if
Speaker 1: that makes sense. Like I always I still have that
Speaker 1: same awareness around food. I just now need to change
Speaker 1: what that that goal is for me sense?
Speaker 4: So do you eat less or do you eat differently?
Speaker 1: I just eat less. I last night I had went
Speaker 1: if I don't know if you guys been here, but
Speaker 1: who's your Chicago baste? So ocell there's an Ocean burger
Speaker 1: place here and there. Last night, I'm still eating your hood.
Speaker 1: I'm just.
Speaker 3: Bacon.
Speaker 1: One of the best burger get.
Speaker 3: You have no idea, one of the best Burgers in
Speaker 3: Chicago shout.
Speaker 1: Out to.
Speaker 4: Shout out.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so yeah, I just have to eat less of it.
Speaker 1: But again, the intentionality around food is not something I
Speaker 1: can just like, you know, forget. So that's that's ingrained
Speaker 1: in me from all those years of gaining to be
Speaker 1: you know, aligneman.
Speaker 3: So you look like a tight end right now. First
Speaker 3: said it looked like a tight end.
Speaker 4: Looks just like a tight end.
Speaker 1: Yeh. I don't know if I got the hands for it.
Speaker 2: So you you were co MVP and college you can
Speaker 2: do it.
Speaker 1: Hyping you up.
Speaker 3: Now you should come back as a tight end. You
Speaker 3: can go to tight End University to be with Greg
Speaker 3: Olsen and there do some stuff.
Speaker 1: No. So, Actually, one of my workouts for the in
Speaker 1: my senior year, I was with the Bills, and the
Speaker 1: o C tight ends coach and the line coach came
Speaker 1: to Hobart. So it was I don't know, two hour
Speaker 1: drive or whatever. So they all came out to the
Speaker 1: school and I did five minutes of line position work
Speaker 1: and then I did thirty minutes of tight end stuff.
Speaker 1: I was like, i'mbout to play tight end. This would
Speaker 1: be about to be cool, Like I'm gonna have a
Speaker 1: whole different experience around football, like I'm gonna get my
Speaker 1: name called and stuff like that and score touchdowns. But
Speaker 1: I didn't end up.
Speaker 3: What I want to ask is, when I retired, I
Speaker 3: built a boat. I built a rowboat, and I rolled
Speaker 3: across Lake Michigan. It's fantastically twenty twenty five, twenty six hours,
Speaker 3: non stop straight. We built a boat. My buddy of mine, Jake,
Speaker 3: we built a bowl a rowboat from scratch, and that
Speaker 3: was kind of a you know what, I still got
Speaker 3: it in my tank to do something competitive orthing like that.
Speaker 3: So you retired after seven seasons. You retired fairly young,
Speaker 3: and you lost seventy five pounds and you climbed Mount Killing. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I hope I said that right, you got it. Do
Speaker 3: you think you could have climbed that mountain at your
Speaker 3: playing weight?
Speaker 1: It's a good question. Uh. I would like to think
Speaker 1: that I could have. But so I was inspired by
Speaker 1: a teammate of mine, so Bo Allen, who was he
Speaker 1: was three, He was a de tackle. He did it
Speaker 1: at three twenty probably at the time. So I like
Speaker 1: to think that if he did it, I could do it. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then also, uh, that same trip Pilodinada. He announced
Speaker 1: his retirement up there.
Speaker 3: I remember that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, so I know you were So
Speaker 1: I did it a couple of years later. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: not to I heard stories about it. They need a
Speaker 1: little assistance now, But you're three thirty, you know, sometimes
Speaker 1: you need a little help carrying some So I like
Speaker 1: to think that I could do it. I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: I get it, I get it done.
Speaker 3: No is it Is it a walk or is it
Speaker 3: like like a legit climb.
Speaker 1: One of the reason it's so popular is because it's
Speaker 1: not like a technical climb, Like it's just like you
Speaker 1: just need you're on your feet for hours, so you guys,
Speaker 1: anyone can like get it done. Yeah, it's just it's
Speaker 1: just kind of a grind.
Speaker 3: And how long did it take?
Speaker 1: So it's six days in and out, but it's like
Speaker 1: five days in and like the summit night that's the hardest.
Speaker 1: The rest of the time you're just walking fine. So
Speaker 1: at like midnight, youbously you start your start your climb
Speaker 1: and you're hiking pitch black with your head lamps. Yeah,
Speaker 1: at like you know, seventeen thousand feet or something like that,
Speaker 1: and just one foot at a time. Incredibly slowly, just
Speaker 1: like inching away up until you get to at sunrise
Speaker 1: at six o'clock or seven o'clock in the morning when
Speaker 1: and that's when you reach the summit. That's kind of
Speaker 1: that's kind of what you do. It's it's a freaking
Speaker 1: crynd It's one of the hardest things I had to do.
Speaker 1: Like that hard. They're gooding getting up there to that
Speaker 1: that that peak summer night, totally totally manageable.
Speaker 3: Air, super thin, Like I was struggling.
Speaker 2: Really okay, So what was the training before you get there?
Speaker 2: Like did you train it all or you just showed up?
Speaker 4: Because you seem like a guy Ali that likes to prepare.
Speaker 3: I am you come off as that guy.
Speaker 1: I appreciate it.
Speaker 2: And so I'm friends with a guy that does a
Speaker 2: lot of these mountain climbs nowt he's really gotten into it.
Speaker 2: He has his own oxygen machine. He's like like high deprivation.
Speaker 2: He watches TV for hour every day and just at
Speaker 2: low oxygen levels just to like prepare and do all
Speaker 2: these things. The shoes, the gear, what all did you have?
Speaker 2: What did you not have? What would you suggest anybody
Speaker 2: else to do this?
Speaker 1: So I like to prepare. However, this trip kind of
Speaker 1: came last minute. Like three weeks before the trip, They're like, hey,
Speaker 1: someone dropped out, you want to come? I was like
Speaker 1: bet so. So what I ended up doing was buying
Speaker 1: all the gear and like walking around Central Park because
Speaker 1: like that's like what else are you going to do
Speaker 1: to train besides being on your feet? Like that's what
Speaker 1: they recommend. So I had three weeks from just walking
Speaker 1: with my dog around the Central Park trying to break
Speaker 1: in shoes that can work for it. And then when
Speaker 1: I get there, I realize you're supposed to have liked
Speaker 1: medicine that helps like your brain from swelling from like altitude.
Speaker 1: I didn't have that, So like I'm scrounging, like trying
Speaker 1: to get from other people whatever leftovers they have. So
Speaker 1: like I ended up it ended up working out, but
Speaker 1: I'm taking like a quarter of the dosage that they recommend.
Speaker 1: So like normally I like to prepare, this trip was
Speaker 1: like the last minute, Like, yeah, I wouldn't recommend that
Speaker 1: part of it. Okay, I recommend training for it and
Speaker 1: walking around, but yeah, the whole last minute, I.
Speaker 4: Didn't know brain swell either.
Speaker 3: I didn't either. You that's something new.
Speaker 4: I've never heard that. Did anybody know that the brain swell?
Speaker 3: You're not supposed to You're not supposed to tell.
Speaker 2: People that, right, because everybody just rose behind the cameras
Speaker 2: is all like, nah, I ain't know that.
Speaker 1: Nobody like isn't supposed to be at that elevation. Like,
Speaker 1: it's just your body is just not your organs aren't
Speaker 1: functioning properly.
Speaker 3: I was gonna say, let's climb the mountain, but you say,
Speaker 3: my brain is swelling. So I'm good, No, we're not
Speaker 3: gonna do that.
Speaker 2: I'm it's cold, I'm straight. I have adventures in my life,
Speaker 2: and I'm just like, no, I'm good.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but I'm.
Speaker 4: Glad you did that.
Speaker 1: It's fun, it's cool.
Speaker 4: It was really good.
Speaker 1: It's not for everybody, but that's cool too. But it
Speaker 1: was with honestly, I just want to plug it. It was
Speaker 1: with a great organization, so with Chris Long's Foundation, water Board.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so you're supposed to do it one year and
Speaker 3: I couldn't.
Speaker 1: Well, it's not too late, tapped out. Not too late.
Speaker 3: Hey, if you're listening at me, water boys, I'm down.
Speaker 3: Let's go. They're finalizing the list for next year, finalizing
Speaker 3: the list for next year. It's dope. So one of
Speaker 3: the reasons you got out, it's just for you know,
Speaker 3: talking about brain swelling and everything you played seven years.
Speaker 3: I mean, you just won a Super Bowl All Pro
Speaker 3: like Finn to come into like a large sum of cash,
Speaker 3: and for you you said, nah, I think I'm good. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I'm done. You just walked away. Why was that? How
Speaker 3: How hard was it that decision for you to get.
Speaker 1: To I mean, I think for most players and for myself,
Speaker 1: it's the hardest decision I've ever had to make. I
Speaker 1: mean it's it's so for me. I think I've always
Speaker 1: sort of valued my health, right, there are certain things
Speaker 1: that I value my life, and health is paramount for me.
Speaker 1: So if I'm going to live authentically within my own values, right,
Speaker 1: I couldn't continue to put my body in that you know,
Speaker 1: difficult place weekend week out. So like that's kind of
Speaker 1: was my framework was, Like, if I'm truly going to
Speaker 1: be honest with myself and I'm going to be like
Speaker 1: living within my health value, I can't keep playing football,
Speaker 1: and there's there's for me obviously, there's there's money on
Speaker 1: the table, right, and that's hard to walk away. From.
Speaker 1: But at a certain point, I think you have to
Speaker 1: be honest with yourself and say, like, what what sort
Speaker 1: of changes really is it's going to make for me?
Speaker 1: I think they're for me. It was really important to have.
Speaker 1: I'm satisfied kind of with where I was at, you know,
Speaker 1: like the truth is more, it can be better. But
Speaker 1: for me, it felt like I had reached a point
Speaker 1: where I could do the things that I wanted to do.
Speaker 1: I could travel, I a climb, kill and jar I
Speaker 1: could do the things that I wanted to and still
Speaker 1: having my health, and that was really important to me.
Speaker 1: Does it makes sense? It does it? Does?
Speaker 2: I want to put this perspective too, though, because it's
Speaker 2: not just a little bit of money.
Speaker 4: It was two years, twenty million dollars you left out there.
Speaker 2: I mean, so you checked a lot of boxes and
Speaker 2: so at that point, because I won't like for me,
Speaker 2: I'm like, did that decision did it already start to
Speaker 2: happen like early in that year or was it like
Speaker 2: starting your seven Like, man, I'm just tired because before retirement,
Speaker 2: we all kind of know that we sent something's changing
Speaker 2: in us, all right before we make that switch. And
Speaker 2: I'm just saying and I'm wondering for you, Ali, was
Speaker 2: it was it those thoughts already in your mind or
Speaker 2: was it Man I wanted I've got to the top
Speaker 2: of the mountain.
Speaker 4: I'm good. Yeah, now I can let go.
Speaker 1: So I so, actually, so my last game was actually
Speaker 1: Pro Bowl last the Pro Bowl out in Vegas, So
Speaker 1: that was my last game, which was kind of a
Speaker 1: cool way to end it for me. Yeah, but yes,
Speaker 1: I think actually, I know it sounds it might sound silly,
Speaker 1: but like I think I started my football career with
Speaker 1: the end in mind a little bit. I think, like
Speaker 1: we all know, right, it's not it's it's not forever,
Speaker 1: right exactly, And I think.
Speaker 3: Right starting at the end, So I think I.
Speaker 1: Think for me also coming from the D three school, right,
Speaker 1: so like anything was just like I felt like I
Speaker 1: was playing with house money, right, So, like I didn't
Speaker 1: think that I was going to have the career that
Speaker 1: I did. So I kind of always identified and expected
Speaker 1: that my career was not, i mean, going to be shorter.
Speaker 1: So I kind of always had that framework of what
Speaker 1: life after football is going to be.
Speaker 3: So it was just like a bonus for you to
Speaker 3: make it to the league, like I made it to
Speaker 3: the league. All right, cool, but it wasn't really in
Speaker 3: my I didn't see myself playing. But now that I'm here,
Speaker 3: y'all do it for a couple of years and then
Speaker 3: all right, now I'm gonna do something else.
Speaker 1: That's kind of how it felt for me. So like
Speaker 1: I wish I was the kind of guy that like
Speaker 1: circled like and like, I'm going to play in the
Speaker 1: NFL when I'm five years old, Like.
Speaker 3: That was not me, like a thousand person.
Speaker 1: I love that respect that was all day long. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I wish I could like and I worked.
Speaker 3: I worked for that. This is what I want to do,
Speaker 3: Like I have that mentality and Nope, I'm going to
Speaker 3: get drafted. I'm going to go here. I'm gonna like
Speaker 3: I had, I wrote out goals and you know I wrote,
Speaker 3: I had a chalkboard that I legit wrote my goal. Right,
Speaker 3: I'm going to run this, I'm going to this pro day,
Speaker 3: I'm going to do this, this, this and that and
Speaker 3: and it played out every way I I scripted my
Speaker 3: life and it played out exactly the way I wanted.
Speaker 3: And I think for me, it was harder to walk
Speaker 3: away from the game because I had wanted it for
Speaker 3: so long and so bad. So I respect the fact
Speaker 3: that you could say yeah, I'm good, whereas me I didn't.
Speaker 3: I didn't have that luxury. I didn't have that opportunity
Speaker 3: to be like, yeah, I can walk away.
Speaker 2: So first of all, you seem like a disaster prepper, right,
Speaker 2: like like I'm preparing for the worst all the time
Speaker 2: because when I get here, I'm like, dude, any at
Speaker 2: any time, I can be gone.
Speaker 4: Sure, which it actually turned out.
Speaker 2: To be a benefit for you, and so as you
Speaker 2: make it, because I still want to know, like when
Speaker 2: did you decide? Was it? Was it after Super Bowl?
Speaker 2: Was it at Pro Bowl?
Speaker 4: Was it during this?
Speaker 2: I want to know when you decided, like, you know what,
Speaker 2: this is probably going to be it, because I'm sure
Speaker 2: they didn't know that until yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean so, I definitely don't think I was ever
Speaker 1: going to be the guy that played ten twelve years.
Speaker 1: That wasn't going to be. After my first training camp,
Speaker 1: I realized that it's like in college, I'm like.
Speaker 3: It's hard camp.
Speaker 1: It's like for y'all hard, it's real, Like I'm not
Speaker 1: going to be like, oh I'm doing this ten more times.
Speaker 3: I know hard three And I was like this stuff
Speaker 3: is hard, Like I don't know, and I'm the guy
Speaker 3: that can run on and I was like, yo, I
Speaker 3: don't know if I could do this.
Speaker 2: I called my dad, and my dad this is like,
Speaker 2: I don't know, this is what I want to do.
Speaker 4: And he was like, Roman, I want.
Speaker 2: You to look at that check that you got all right,
Speaker 2: and you've been working for this your whole life. This
Speaker 2: is like what you wanted and just see what you
Speaker 2: really want to do. And I was like, you're right,
Speaker 2: get back out, get back.
Speaker 3: Here that limon go. Like what were your reps? Like
Speaker 3: do you do all the reps with like scout team,
Speaker 3: first team, second team, thirteen? Do you have to do
Speaker 3: special teams?
Speaker 1: Special teams do or something like that? There's no there's
Speaker 1: no you know, tapping anyone else in Like that's the
Speaker 1: thing about playing line. You're getting all the reps, especially
Speaker 1: as a young guy. And also that was always my
Speaker 1: mentality too, even like as over year six or seven,
Speaker 1: where maybe I could have cut back on something like
Speaker 1: I was always the guy that was going to try
Speaker 1: and get everything that I could, and I think that
Speaker 1: may have possibly contributed to the fact that I'd sort
Speaker 1: of burnt out a little bit from doing it. But yeah,
Speaker 1: that was always my mentality. But as far as your question,
Speaker 1: as far as like when did I know, like when
Speaker 1: it was that moment, I don't. The truth is I
Speaker 1: don't know if there was really like a definitive moment.
Speaker 1: I mean I will say like my rookie year, I
Speaker 1: knew that like if I had saved up X right
Speaker 1: if I Another indicator for me is like I saw
Speaker 1: some older guys like if I'm taking you know, like
Speaker 1: a celebrex or like an anti flammatory like every every
Speaker 1: day just to get if just to get through, that's
Speaker 1: an indicator that I should probably not be doing this.
Speaker 1: So that was another indicator for There's a lot of
Speaker 1: things that I kind of contributed to it, but.
Speaker 3: I was just so addicted, like I just loved it.
Speaker 3: But then again, but you're a lineman, so you guys
Speaker 3: are every plate.
Speaker 1: It's different.
Speaker 3: I was not like that corner safety like I just
Speaker 3: I just ran more right, I wasn't a banger.
Speaker 1: If it was running like I think like to think
Speaker 1: that it would be different. But again, there's no like
Speaker 1: getting away from It's like just sure.
Speaker 2: I've heard a lot of linemen talk about that, so
Speaker 2: tell me this part. How did your family take this
Speaker 2: friend's family? Did you get all positives when you're like,
Speaker 2: you know what this is? Like it's time because it's
Speaker 2: not just you. Yeah, because when you retire, we all retire.
Speaker 2: Like everybody's life changes because everybody celebrates when you win,
Speaker 2: we all kind of down when you lose. You are
Speaker 2: the heartbeat of a whole family. When you go to
Speaker 2: the NFL, I don't think everybody understands that. So how
Speaker 2: did how was their reactions? How's how did that play
Speaker 2: on your heart as well?
Speaker 1: Uh So to your point, my mom and I always
Speaker 1: kind of joked like I was obviously a big dude,
Speaker 1: so so big that I would have like gravitational pull,
Speaker 1: like that's what football does, right, things everybody is does.
Speaker 1: So my family wuld always congregate after games. So you're right,
Speaker 1: there's there's not just you, it's everybody. Everybody that's part
Speaker 1: of it. So I think even for like other people
Speaker 1: in my family, like just navigating what the fall looks
Speaker 1: like this past fall, like all right, what do we
Speaker 1: do without football? It wasn't just me, but you're right,
Speaker 1: but everybody was incredibly supportive. I think that was that
Speaker 1: was lot so mom was like, whatever you want to do, Like,
Speaker 1: we totally unconditional, so that I had. Fortunately, I had
Speaker 1: a support system around me that like got it and
Speaker 1: that helped the decision.
Speaker 4: So you being so young, like, yeah, what are you
Speaker 4: twenty nine?
Speaker 3: I'm thirty thirty?
Speaker 4: Okay, just turned the Big three? Oh yeah, April?
Speaker 1: Right, should you guys do? Come on?
Speaker 4: Called research?
Speaker 1: It's called preparation. It's like watching game film.
Speaker 3: Little bit.
Speaker 4: We got good coaches too, Sure we got good coaches.
Speaker 3: Still a good team, damn good team. But would you do?
Speaker 3: Like thirty is a big one, you know, thirty forty fifty,
Speaker 3: you got to do some big Like what what would
Speaker 3: you do for the Big three?
Speaker 1: I'm loky, so like I love one, I love food,
Speaker 1: I love you know, people around me. So I had
Speaker 1: people at the house, got a sush sushi chef pretty
Speaker 1: much like all you can eat sushi and just hung
Speaker 1: out there.
Speaker 3: What's your favorite role sushi roll?
Speaker 1: Oh? Interesting, I know, I don't think I've been asked
Speaker 1: that question. Uh, just I'd go tune to salmon avocado
Speaker 1: something like that, something simple that we might go to. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: but I'm big huge food guys. You can tell Oshibol sushi.
Speaker 1: That's me.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so what what is your favorite type of food?
Speaker 3: Then out of you know, that was just I'm going
Speaker 3: Japanese sushi.
Speaker 1: Favorite.
Speaker 3: Have you ever been in Japan?
Speaker 1: No? I need to. So I have done a fair
Speaker 1: amount of traveling. So since that, we were going, Yeah,
Speaker 1: let's do it out there. We're doing the shots, so
Speaker 1: let's let's talk. Let's talk, let's talk travel, let's talk travel.
Speaker 1: So actually, my my fiance and I when we first
Speaker 1: sat down on our first date, we're like the three
Speaker 1: places you want to go, right, So we both had Hawaii, Greece,
Speaker 1: and Italy. Right, those are those are like.
Speaker 4: Good places together?
Speaker 1: You guys? Which one? All three?
Speaker 4: All three?
Speaker 1: All three together? No?
Speaker 3: No, we didn't know why together. So we've we've been
Speaker 3: agree together.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Cool. Yeah.
Speaker 5: Anyway, so we did not hold hands romantic trip.
Speaker 3: Yeah, did not hold hands with this guy. No, I
Speaker 3: can't hold hands with your pass.
Speaker 1: No. But so that was Those are the first three
Speaker 1: trips that we took when I retired. It's like, all right,
Speaker 1: we have let's bucket list types of trip trips. So
Speaker 1: we did those three. Since then, we've done We did Thailand,
Speaker 1: I did India, with my dad did come and draw.
Speaker 1: We talked about London and Paris. We're going to Spain
Speaker 1: next month. So like all those types of things, like
Speaker 1: the things that I felt like I couldn't do when
Speaker 1: I played right, when I felt like I had to
Speaker 1: train NonStop. The gym's in Europe, like, that's not any
Speaker 1: that's not cutting it right.
Speaker 4: They don't fit you, they don't fit me.
Speaker 1: The free weights go up to forty five pounds. That's
Speaker 1: not I'm not training over there. So I put all
Speaker 1: that stuff off and now I'm able to do that,
Speaker 1: which is.
Speaker 2: I love child, and I think it's a I think
Speaker 2: you learned so much more. Uh, seeing other cultures, other people,
Speaker 2: how they live life and things like that. I'm not
Speaker 2: naturally somebody that loves to travel, but being married to one,
Speaker 2: uh it opens it up.
Speaker 4: And yeah, they did.
Speaker 1: Greece. That was really hard for you.
Speaker 3: We met you in Athens, met in Athens and got
Speaker 3: on a boat and went to We were in Greece,
Speaker 3: Athens in Italy, Croatia, Croatia in Italy.
Speaker 4: It was great.
Speaker 2: I do want to go to Japan though, I think
Speaker 2: Japan's got to be That's one of my bucket list
Speaker 2: places and the reason why I want to go to
Speaker 2: Japan so much. Number one is how techi in advanced is.
Speaker 2: But it's also the mindset that the Japanese people have
Speaker 2: is that, yeah, I do respect their culture and just
Speaker 2: like it's one of the few nations that have never
Speaker 2: been colonized, Like they've always had to depend on themselves
Speaker 2: to always make it. That's like they're things that so they.
Speaker 4: Always want to very forward thinking. They all, you know
Speaker 4: me guys.
Speaker 2: So this is like for me, I just want to
Speaker 2: be around that because I want to see it.
Speaker 3: The last Samurai coming here too with Tom Cruise, and
Speaker 3: they were talking about the whole Japanese custom and samurai
Speaker 3: and this, and so yeah, it really made me want
Speaker 3: to go check out Japan a little bit.
Speaker 1: We'll do a trip, take the show on the road,
Speaker 1: and we can.
Speaker 3: Let's go, Thomas, Melissa, let's go. We can we can
Speaker 3: definitely do this. Get the show in Japan perfect. We
Speaker 3: can definitely do this, and.
Speaker 4: We'll be right back.
Speaker 1: All right.
Speaker 2: So now let's talk about some traveling. We'll get back
Speaker 2: to that as well. But this new journey you're on education.
Speaker 2: You talked about why you're here, You're staying in the
Speaker 2: New York area.
Speaker 4: This last year and a half learning.
Speaker 2: Now, you were an economics major in college, but now you're.
Speaker 4: You're trying to be a psychologist.
Speaker 2: Like I understand the body, the health, the whole total
Speaker 2: wellness thing. This is your packet, Ali, Please let the
Speaker 2: people know share with us why you're on this journey.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think a big part, like when I said,
Speaker 1: I started with the end in mind. For me, I
Speaker 1: always talk about the values, right, some health being a value.
Speaker 1: Another value of mind, like being of service to others,
Speaker 1: which I think you guys can both relate to, right.
Speaker 1: So for me, I was trying to navigate ways in
Speaker 1: which I can be of service to my community right
Speaker 1: in a way that felt satisfying and interesting to me.
Speaker 1: And that's kind of how I landed on psychology because
Speaker 1: like I think we as players, there's so much that
Speaker 1: goes pours into the mental side of the game, right
Speaker 1: for sure. So I was always interested in that, right,
Speaker 1: that was my that's my interest, those are my passions,
Speaker 1: and I'm sort of merging that with the value of
Speaker 1: being of service to others, if that makes sense.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1: So that's kind of the mission that I'm on right now,
Speaker 1: and it's a long process. Right, So in the fall,
Speaker 1: I'll be starting doctor in psychology, So it's a five
Speaker 1: year degree, right, So, like I've got all this is
Speaker 1: a long time horizon. Yeah, but again, I'm learning about
Speaker 1: things that I'm interested in, and at the end of it,
Speaker 1: I hope to be able to help people in some capacity,
Speaker 1: which is I think something that feels really important to me.
Speaker 5: So I think, so that's kind of where if that
Speaker 5: makes sense, No, do you know what you would want
Speaker 5: to specialize in more or or as you continue to learn,
Speaker 5: like you're using this as a runway to now figure
Speaker 5: that out, you just know this is the pathway to it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I don't. The truth is I don't know
Speaker 1: specifically what population I want to work with, but I
Speaker 1: will say the full spectrum of mental health is incredibly
Speaker 1: interesting to me. So I think that there are people
Speaker 1: like you're probably familiar with sports psychologists, right that sort
Speaker 1: of work on the visualization techniques and how to improve performance.
Speaker 1: And there's also with people that work, you know, with
Speaker 1: higher needs populations, and I think all of that, all
Speaker 1: of that is interesting to me. And so as I
Speaker 1: continue my education, I'm going to try and dip my
Speaker 1: toe in a double a couple of different areas and
Speaker 1: see what really resonates. So I don't really know. I
Speaker 1: do know the full spectrum of mental health, oup performance
Speaker 1: and higher needs are are seem at least intellectually stimulating.
Speaker 2: So so like, I'm very stimulated by this too. Because
Speaker 2: I've watched I've gotten into a lot more tennis, Peanut,
Speaker 2: I know you don't know that, but I've gotten the
Speaker 2: whole conversation about it, And so before you got breakpoint
Speaker 2: was that. So that got me into it, And I
Speaker 2: just didn't realize how many of these great tennis players
Speaker 2: like there there are the world's best, and mentally they're
Speaker 2: all like they got cracks, all in the cracks everywhere
Speaker 2: because they lose way more than they win overall a
Speaker 2: lot of times, like you're losing matches and when you
Speaker 2: lose one match, you're out, out of the term, you're done.
Speaker 2: But so every term that you don't win, you're trying
Speaker 2: to figure out why. And these players are the best
Speaker 2: of the best, and they always have somebody right there
Speaker 2: on their side whole time, like tell them, hey, you're great,
Speaker 2: Hey you're you're goods for it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but do you have that when you play golf?
Speaker 1: No, I don't full swing because that's.
Speaker 4: I like full swing.
Speaker 1: You good all the time.
Speaker 3: I'm calling you to get golf.
Speaker 1: How do you how do you think you guys would
Speaker 1: do in an individual sport? Like if that like you're
Speaker 1: you're the guy, tennis, whatever the sport is.
Speaker 4: I think that a great, great question.
Speaker 3: I am going Thomas cannot curse. I can't curse. I'm
Speaker 3: crush it.
Speaker 1: I love that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm gonna suck it first, right, I'm going to
Speaker 3: be terrible at first, but the way I think and
Speaker 3: how I train, I'm going to obsess over it, and
Speaker 3: I'm going to work, work, work until I get whatever
Speaker 3: it is that i'm trying to fix or get better on.
Speaker 3: If you want to call it the Mamaman Mamba mentality. Yeah,
Speaker 3: that that's what I would do. I'm actually currently I'm trying.
Speaker 3: We need to play pickleball because I am going to
Speaker 3: crush it at pickleball.
Speaker 1: You haven't played, but you just know you're going to
Speaker 1: crush it.
Speaker 3: I played pickleball and it's so slow.
Speaker 2: It's the sport that you don't have to be an athlete.
Speaker 3: You don't have to be and I'm saying I would
Speaker 3: crush it. But that's just my That's how I think.
Speaker 3: Like I think as a guy man, like we size
Speaker 3: each other up, like all one of the first things
Speaker 3: you said, okay, he looked like he looked like it's
Speaker 3: tight end he sized and you go up. But naturally
Speaker 3: that's like what we do. Though I can't take him
Speaker 3: he kind of big or like we're sizing sizing each other.
Speaker 3: We're type of personality. So for me, anything that I
Speaker 3: do that I try to Yeah, anything that I try
Speaker 3: to do, I'm I have the mindset of like, oh yeah,
Speaker 3: I'm definitely gonna kill it.
Speaker 1: I think I think the big watching those documentaries, the
Speaker 1: biggest thing was like in times of failure, right, who
Speaker 1: do you have around you? Because like and who you
Speaker 1: have to be the one to sort of pull yourself
Speaker 1: out of it for sure? Like how did you do?
Speaker 1: Like I'm sure, I'm sure you've lost in some capacity.
Speaker 3: I have a guy.
Speaker 1: You got a guy, I have my guy.
Speaker 3: I have a guy in my corner. One of the
Speaker 3: best things that he ever did was I read a
Speaker 3: book called the World's Strangest Secret by Earl Nightingale, and
Speaker 3: people have pondered this since the beginning of the time.
Speaker 3: What is the world's saying, philosophers and everybody else. We
Speaker 3: become what we think about. And that is something that
Speaker 3: when I started playing, I read this book and I
Speaker 3: still use it with me to this day. So if
Speaker 3: I have success, I'm thinking, you know, something positive. But
Speaker 3: when I have failure, why did I fail? Okay, I
Speaker 3: was thinking about something at home, I was thinking about
Speaker 3: something else, and I thought that negative into existence. You
Speaker 3: know what I'm saying. I read what I sold and
Speaker 3: what I've really focused on now that I read that
Speaker 3: book fifteen twenty years ago. When something negative creeps into
Speaker 3: my mind, I tried to replace it with a positive
Speaker 3: thought because if I'm thinking negative all the time, negative
Speaker 3: tends to happen, you know what I'm saying. So that
Speaker 3: was something that I learned early. So that's why when
Speaker 3: you ask you that question like, oh, I'm gonna kill it,
Speaker 3: I'm gonna crush it, Like that's just that's just how
Speaker 3: my brain works. I try to take out that negative
Speaker 3: and then just one percent focus on the positive. Sure,
Speaker 3: you know it's all We'll talk offline, but I can
Speaker 3: give you the book. It's like a quick twenty minute,
Speaker 3: twenty minute read and Rome knows. It's like, I'm a
Speaker 3: guy of quotes.
Speaker 4: Yes, I read. I read a lot of hundreds of quotes.
Speaker 1: Take.
Speaker 3: I take quotes. I can't give you like five right now, yeah,
Speaker 3: but I have. I have them in my phone when
Speaker 3: I read them, and I'm like, okay, yeah, like I
Speaker 3: but that's how my brain. I'm attracted. I gravitate toward that,
Speaker 3: and that kind of helps me stay out of that negative,
Speaker 3: that down, the darkness and all that. So it's yeah,
Speaker 3: it's great. I love it.
Speaker 2: And Ali, I'll be honest, I think I would not
Speaker 2: be essex in an individual sport because I've always been
Speaker 2: a really good teammate. That's like what I pride my
Speaker 2: cell phone is that I've been a great teammate. I
Speaker 2: haven't always been the star. I've been around a lot
Speaker 2: of really great players, and I've always been able to
Speaker 2: add value to any situation I've been in. I know
Speaker 2: how to get along with anybody. I know to pick
Speaker 2: guys up when they're down. I know how to leave
Speaker 2: when other people are down. Shoot I'll step out there
Speaker 2: and do it, you know, And so I get this
Speaker 2: thing going. So I understand I be able to read
Speaker 2: the room. And so I am genuinely not a great
Speaker 2: individual sport guy. But I have gotten into tennis lately,
Speaker 2: and I've really gotten into golf, and I got the
Speaker 2: golf blug bad people that knows this.
Speaker 4: I try and golf as.
Speaker 2: Much as I can and whenever I can. I've gotten
Speaker 2: a lot better in a short amount of time because
Speaker 2: I'm actually focusing on it, and so.
Speaker 4: I'm seeing these results. And look, man, it's tough.
Speaker 2: All of a sudden, you get a bad lie and
Speaker 2: I should probably hit an iron out of this, but
Speaker 2: I'm gonna hit this three wood anyways, and I don't
Speaker 2: do well. And then trying to shake yourself out of that,
Speaker 2: and just like with all these individual sports, like we've
Speaker 2: seen on point break or full swings, these guys and
Speaker 2: these women, Man, when one thing happens, it's really hard
Speaker 2: to shake yourself out of it. When you don't have
Speaker 2: anybody else to lean on to get you out of
Speaker 2: It's you. You got to go out there and make
Speaker 2: the play every single time, and so it is tougher.
Speaker 2: It is a totally different thing. And you being a
Speaker 2: psychologist down the line, and I think it's these things
Speaker 2: are very very interesting, and you're going to have a
Speaker 2: unique perspective. Yes, you will from all of these, from
Speaker 2: all your sports. You know what sports has taught you
Speaker 2: and what has given you.
Speaker 1: I appreciate that. And I'll just say real quick again,
Speaker 1: so not clinical advice or anything like that, but I
Speaker 1: would say from a framework of experience right to your
Speaker 1: point on sort of being in that team environment, like
Speaker 1: what former players struggle with, right, So like what does
Speaker 1: that look like when we don't have that, when we're
Speaker 1: not leaning on each other? Just how much harder are life? Right?
Speaker 1: We don't have that locker room that we're used to.
Speaker 1: I think to your point, that's one of the many
Speaker 1: challenges that you guys know obviously that I'm navigating too. Personally.
Speaker 1: It's like, all right, I'm not in the locker room.
Speaker 1: What is who's my supports? I mean, I have a
Speaker 1: sports system, but like navigating all those things, it's it's tough.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And that's a perfect sad way to my next
Speaker 2: question was you know, with young guys now more and
Speaker 2: more retiring, they're looking up, they're retiring early, they make
Speaker 2: more money at an earlier age, and the NFL is
Speaker 2: being so successful and being so great and blessed so
Speaker 2: many of us. But when younger guys are starting to
Speaker 2: want to retire, what advice would you give them? You
Speaker 2: were a young guy that decided to retire in your twenties,
Speaker 2: and now you see that more and more often, what
Speaker 2: would be the advice for that you would give to them?
Speaker 2: The good, maybe some of the bad, and maybe some
Speaker 2: of the pitfalls that may be out there, especially like
Speaker 2: not being in the locker room anymore.
Speaker 1: Sure, Okay, so there's a lot to unpack and them
Speaker 1: them thinking about a lot of different things. But I
Speaker 1: would say we're still.
Speaker 3: Kind of going through it too though. You're still trying
Speaker 3: to figure it out though, right.
Speaker 1: So I think that that speaks to where, like where I'm.
Speaker 3: At, right, Yeah, And that's what I was saying, Like,
Speaker 3: great question, but you're still trying to figure it out,
Speaker 3: like you're navigating through it.
Speaker 1: I'm in it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm in it, That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I would I would say is and I
Speaker 1: I almost would say I anticipated feeling. I'm not like diagnosing,
Speaker 1: but like depressed the like things like I anticipated that
Speaker 1: after retirement. After talking to guys that are retired yea.
Speaker 1: And I would say that like the lack of structure
Speaker 1: and lack of clay, like those are things structured Claier,
Speaker 1: that's where I live, that's in a safe space. So
Speaker 1: like without those, I struggled, Uh you know pretty significantly.
Speaker 1: It's it's without that, it's tough. Like I'm still in it.
Speaker 1: I'm still navigating talking about like my professional interests, like
Speaker 1: I'm still I'm still narrowing in right. Yeah. So like
Speaker 1: even up until this point recently before I was in
Speaker 1: decided to go to to get my doctorate, Like there's
Speaker 1: a lot, there's a entire year of navigating. I was
Speaker 1: in a Master's of Mental Health counseling program. Now I'm
Speaker 1: doing this and doing that, and it's like this period
Speaker 1: of like uncertainty that just doesn't sit well day in
Speaker 1: day out. So it's I would just say for anyone transitioning, Uh,
Speaker 1: there's gonna be that period. Yeah, there's gonna it's just
Speaker 1: the the uncertainty is going to happen. And that's totally fine.
Speaker 1: And I think that there's there was a piece of me,
Speaker 1: a part of me that I kind of I don't know,
Speaker 1: I wanted to like pride myself and being like, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be the poster boy of like a successful
Speaker 1: transition of right, I want to be like one of
Speaker 1: the guys that knows how to do it the right way. Yeah,
Speaker 1: exactly exactly in my head like those those But then
Speaker 1: then that feels like burdensome to me, of like I
Speaker 1: need to do everything right and like if I don't
Speaker 1: have clarity and I don't have structure, Uh, then it
Speaker 1: almost just added into that anxiety and uncertainty that I
Speaker 1: was feeling throughout the transitioning processes. Does that make sense totally?
Speaker 3: I felt?
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I was the same way. Like I was like, all right,
Speaker 3: I know what I want to do. I'm gonna do
Speaker 3: this and that, and then I'm doing everything and I
Speaker 3: still struggled. I was just like, man, I miss football,
Speaker 3: Like what's god, I don't have my locker room mind.
Speaker 3: I got my boys, and I still had friends, like
Speaker 3: we talked and we did all this stuff, but there's
Speaker 3: just a piece of you missing because you've had this
Speaker 3: unique experience high school, college, NFL, and then like that
Speaker 3: it's over and you're just like, now, what am I
Speaker 3: going to do now? Even though you might have it
Speaker 3: planned out and you have your support system, you're still
Speaker 3: there's still gonna be some form of struggle. Like if
Speaker 3: you've done something for twenty years, thirty years, whatever, you're
Speaker 3: gonna you know, I had a buddy say, you lose
Speaker 3: you lose your a little bit of your identity. You
Speaker 3: go through a small or some form of depression forget
Speaker 3: I forget what the other one. But like, no matter
Speaker 3: how good you have it, you will you will struggle.
Speaker 3: But it's just how long does that struggle last? This
Speaker 3: last a month, two months, three months, and then once
Speaker 3: you're in it, then you come out of it and
Speaker 3: and you you were able. It's kind of like grieving,
Speaker 3: you know when you go to a funeral, you know
Speaker 3: the five stages or four stages of grieving, Like you
Speaker 3: have to grieve your your career, Like, yeah, I warned it,
Speaker 3: and then now you just once you get over it,
Speaker 3: that's when it, in my opinion, it starts to kind
Speaker 3: of blossom and grow and you start your new life.
Speaker 1: I didn't expect it, but there are times where like
Speaker 1: I would legitimately just I mean I did, I would
Speaker 1: cry or whatever, and it was because of the feeling
Speaker 1: of grief. Like it was a very similar process for me,
Speaker 1: so like, yeah, that was a part of my journey,
Speaker 1: and the way that I would describe it is just
Speaker 1: sort of unsettled. So God's transitioning, just like anticipate that
Speaker 1: there's going to be some unsettled aspect, like that's just
Speaker 1: part of finding your next thing or the next chapter
Speaker 1: is in any period of transition, it's just a little
Speaker 1: bit unsettling, and especially for me because I love clarity
Speaker 1: and that's what I had with the NFL, so I
Speaker 1: didn't have that and that was especially hard. And now
Speaker 1: I feel like I'm starting to get there, so that
Speaker 1: feels good again.
Speaker 2: I think for and this was my struggle was at
Speaker 2: I just I wasn't confident in myself in doing other
Speaker 2: things as well, Like I've just been so good at football,
Speaker 2: and I mean, I just.
Speaker 4: That's what I did.
Speaker 2: And you gain all this confidence because you confirm validity
Speaker 2: with all the successes that you have.
Speaker 4: You just continue to knock down doors.
Speaker 2: You know, you get the scholarship, the first scholarship, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean to go to college, so.
Speaker 4: That builds confidence.
Speaker 2: Then you get to college and you're on the bench
Speaker 2: and all of a sudden, you're playing you're like, dude,
Speaker 2: that builds confidence, and then you see yourself in the
Speaker 2: newspaper and then and now you get drafted, and so
Speaker 2: you just continue to stack all these things that happened
Speaker 2: for you're like, man, you just get more confident who
Speaker 2: you are. That switch is turned off. And now you're
Speaker 2: trying to transition because you know that's what we all
Speaker 2: say we're gonna do. We're gonna be great at it, and.
Speaker 3: You don't know, and you just you just like old
Speaker 3: block you've ever had in your life because you we've
Speaker 3: we've all been fairly successful, right right, you're the top
Speaker 3: one point one to make it to the league, right
Speaker 3: and then when you retire, when we retire, it's like that.
Speaker 3: It's the first I don't know, I would say roadblock
Speaker 3: that that's happened in our lives, Like whoa wait what happened?
Speaker 2: And for me and when I tried to do some things,
Speaker 2: it was like, man, am I even good? Like I
Speaker 2: don't know, like I know in ball because like you
Speaker 2: see it, do you understand it? And you get you
Speaker 2: get promoted because of it. In other lanes, it's just
Speaker 2: not as a clear.
Speaker 1: So here's the question I'd pose and I think it's
Speaker 1: like it's extraor rhetorical, like what does successful transition even
Speaker 1: look like? Like if I'm crying and I'm upset like that,
Speaker 1: that can still be part of the transitions. Like so,
Speaker 1: like I think I don't even like it's like I
Speaker 1: want to be I want to have a successful transition,
Speaker 1: but I don't even know what that looks like. At times,
Speaker 1: I didn't even know what that even meant, you know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying. So, like, I think navigating what that
Speaker 1: looks like and defining what that looks like for young players,
Speaker 1: I think, uh, or retiring is an important thing to do.
Speaker 3: I think that's what's huge. Yeah, that's great. That is
Speaker 3: what's I think it's what you make it. That's what
Speaker 3: makes it successful.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I have to take a day and cry a
Speaker 3: little bit and grieve and you know what.
Speaker 1: I think though, so and then another So that's at
Speaker 1: least something that I've I've found for myself. And then
Speaker 1: to your point as well as earlier in your question
Speaker 1: as far as other things for young guys transitioning and
Speaker 1: I'm still young guy transitioning, but the strengths that we
Speaker 1: have as players, right, so I know that people talk
Speaker 1: about that and your strengths you're saying in the locker room,
Speaker 1: like the community, like build whatever your strengths were as
Speaker 1: a player, though, that's your identity. That's the important thing
Speaker 1: to carry on. If you're the team player, if you're
Speaker 1: the guy in the locker room, if you know how
Speaker 1: to read people, like, how can I take these aspects
Speaker 1: of myself, these skills that I've developed developed playing football,
Speaker 1: and how do I bring that to my next career?
Speaker 1: And I think that I'm assuming that you've done that
Speaker 1: in some capacity. You're doing it's not a single man.
Speaker 1: It's not one dude doing the podcast, right, like you
Speaker 1: work in a team, like that's what you do. I
Speaker 1: think that's so important. And that's what I found that.
Speaker 1: I think that the things that I liked while playing,
Speaker 1: I'm going to try and you in my next career.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense?
Speaker 3: Total makes total sense? So so now the fun questions
Speaker 3: we all have had our bell rung, We've all had
Speaker 3: like wait, I'm in the league now, Oh snap, I
Speaker 3: remember mine, Like I'm in the NFL. You know the
Speaker 3: first time I went to the locker room some of
Speaker 3: my uniform and you just eyes wide open. What was
Speaker 3: that what was your welcome to the NFL moment when
Speaker 3: you got there your first like you know, first just
Speaker 3: whether it was a hit, whether it was looking at
Speaker 3: your pain like just like damn, welcome to the NFL,
Speaker 3: Like holy snap.
Speaker 1: So I mean I can say earlier like that moment
Speaker 1: one on one with at the Senior Bowl. Like for me,
Speaker 1: that was the first experience that I had. It's like, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm like you to think mentality like a D three,
Speaker 1: like I'm playing for the love of the game, right,
Speaker 1: there's no scholarship, like this is just this is just
Speaker 1: I'm out here. I'm like this guy's so Florida, Alabama
Speaker 1: or whatever. I'm like, oh wait, like I'm I'm I'm
Speaker 1: out here. So that was my first moment. And then
Speaker 1: after I was drafted, I'd say, uh, probably my first
Speaker 1: preseason game. Yeah, I was similar. I was. I can
Speaker 1: still picture like my hands were just like dripping sweat,
Speaker 1: like I was just like I was like, wait, this
Speaker 1: was a first preseason. I wasn't even starting. It was
Speaker 1: like nothing, nothing game and looking back on it, but
Speaker 1: like freaking out and then just I don't know, getting
Speaker 1: the flow and when you're starting to play football and
Speaker 1: then everything starts to kind of come together. Like I'd
Speaker 1: say that was another moment for me.
Speaker 4: But yeah, nice, all right.
Speaker 2: I mean my first preseason game, I think I played
Speaker 2: like four plays.
Speaker 4: I didn't even play. It was I mean, I didn't
Speaker 4: even care. I was just happy to be out there. Yeah,
Speaker 4: it happens, all right.
Speaker 2: My question is what is your best Tom Brady's story
Speaker 2: or I actually like Gronk too because he's pretty entertaining.
Speaker 2: Not gonna lie, give me one of those two. For
Speaker 2: those two to come to Tampa Bay, it probably really
Speaker 2: changed everything. I know, the ticket sales went way up.
Speaker 1: Oh sorry, having like I can define my career of
Speaker 1: what like football looked.
Speaker 4: Like prem post I'm telling you.
Speaker 1: Like like like like prior to Tom, like the bucks were
Speaker 1: weren't that that could yeah uh and like I don't
Speaker 1: know even like going out right and public, going to restaurants,
Speaker 1: but don't we cared. It's just fine, like I preferred
Speaker 1: that way. Yeah, yeah exactly. And then Tom comes around,
Speaker 1: we start getting you know, five uh, you know, primetime games,
Speaker 1: and people start to know what's going on. And I
Speaker 1: think either the community in Tampa became a little bit
Speaker 1: more of a football town which is awesome movie be
Speaker 1: a part of. But that was a cool, uh cool
Speaker 1: experience having.
Speaker 3: Him something something about when you start winning. We're like
Speaker 3: we were in Charlotte. We would come home at like
Speaker 3: midnight from you know, coming from the West Coast, and
Speaker 3: then we get home at like midnight one am, and
Speaker 3: it was fans outside and it was regular season already
Speaker 3: even in the Super Bowl yet you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: But it was just it's something about when you start winning,
Speaker 3: it's gravity. It pulls you in. You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 3: Like it's it's I don't know. I think it's just
Speaker 3: that's why I love the game football, man. It just
Speaker 3: it brings It really does bring a lot of people together.
Speaker 1: Is it bad?
Speaker 4: I'm gonna have to go back.
Speaker 1: And google, like what you look like? Seventy five pounds.
Speaker 3: You had longer hair, right.
Speaker 2: I think I'm looking at you and I'm just like,
Speaker 2: I can't even imagine you playing old line right now.
Speaker 2: You just don't even have to look. And a lot
Speaker 2: of people that lose weight like they look like they
Speaker 2: just had a.
Speaker 4: Big old head. It's all in your face.
Speaker 1: It was all my arrest of my body too. I
Speaker 1: mean I'll get you another kacure.
Speaker 3: You can see his cheeks.
Speaker 1: So I had a little a pretty unimpressive beard, but
Speaker 1: so I would what I do is I would cut
Speaker 1: my hair like once every two years, let it grow out,
Speaker 1: cut it again, buzzet right before the season, and then
Speaker 1: also I would let my facial hair grow out throughout
Speaker 1: the course of the season. So clean shaving and training
Speaker 1: camp and the beard grow out. Beard was pretty unimpressive.
Speaker 1: But my next profession, psychologist, I like to think, is
Speaker 1: another professional I can have a beard. So like two professions,
Speaker 1: football player and psychologists got the green light to grow beard.
Speaker 1: So I'm fired about that. I like that podcast host
Speaker 1: look at.
Speaker 3: This like I'm not used to seeing the you know
Speaker 3: all this, he's you finally just letting it go. I
Speaker 3: had a lot of.
Speaker 4: Haircutting, well my barber.
Speaker 2: My barber had his mom passed away, and just like
Speaker 2: just every everybody's off thank you, thank you.
Speaker 4: I feel like that appreciate it.
Speaker 3: So here's a Jewish question for you at my ancestry
Speaker 3: dot com, like two percent Jewish whatever.
Speaker 1: So how about that.
Speaker 3: Part of the tribe. So uh, I never had a mitzvah,
Speaker 3: Uh was never offered that as a kid because I
Speaker 3: didn't know I had the two three percent Jewish in me.
Speaker 3: And I know you passed on yours as a kid.
Speaker 1: Right, So so I yeah, I did not do a bumbs.
Speaker 1: But you keep going, this is going.
Speaker 3: Are you gonna have one?
Speaker 1: Is it?
Speaker 3: Is it too late to have one?
Speaker 1: No, it's not too late for either one of us.
Speaker 1: That's exciting. Dude. You want to have a bar mittal,
Speaker 1: Let's do it.
Speaker 3: Let's do it.
Speaker 1: You would have it would be an elite celebration.
Speaker 3: My god, I am so game.
Speaker 1: You know, I don't know if you're waiting for an
Speaker 1: invitation for who We'll get you connect to the rabbi.
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter. Let's let's do it. Well, do I
Speaker 1: need to do one too? So way we can do
Speaker 1: a joint bar mits. I'm with it.
Speaker 3: So I was at ah So Chicago, a lot of
Speaker 3: Jewish people, right, I know a lot of Jewish people
Speaker 3: in the community. So I'm in Houston and I'm the
Speaker 3: best man, and I get ready to give a I
Speaker 3: get ready to give a toast, and I grabbed my
Speaker 3: my my glass wine and I go lime everybody and
Speaker 3: it did not go over well. It was just cowboys
Speaker 3: and black people, and they were like, is he choking
Speaker 3: on something?
Speaker 4: What the hell is know your audience.
Speaker 3: In Chicago, but it's amazing. It's like, because I know
Speaker 3: there's a lot of Jewish people in the audience, I
Speaker 3: do that and they were like I was like, Okay,
Speaker 3: that didn't go over it. And it was like just
Speaker 3: give the toes, dumb and I was like all right, yeah,
Speaker 3: best man, love you, bless you, blessings right drinko.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but yeah, you're halfway through your bars now.
Speaker 2: So this is this is my last question is that
Speaker 2: it goes back to traveling because we talked about the
Speaker 2: traveling and we both kind of opened up about it
Speaker 2: a little bit. I want your top five travel destinations
Speaker 2: bucket list, whether you've done it before or that you
Speaker 2: want to hit next.
Speaker 1: So all the ones that I hit, So Italy to
Speaker 1: me is that's a must. So Florence is unbelievable. The
Speaker 1: Malfi Coast is unbelievable, but all put that as one.
Speaker 1: Two Greece is unbelievable. Islands off Greece are great. So
Speaker 1: those are two places that I've done, places that I
Speaker 1: want to go hit. Three Portugal I want to go
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna be going uh in Japan would be.
Speaker 1: Those are probably my next three trips. So yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: I can't wait.
Speaker 3: All of those places.
Speaker 1: Look at you.
Speaker 3: Every single place I've been to the.
Speaker 2: World Traveler, he is, he is, He's encouraged me to
Speaker 2: do I'm trying to encourage him.
Speaker 3: True story. We went to Croatia. We're in de Bruvnick.
Speaker 3: We went to the Brevnick Croatia, went jumped on the
Speaker 3: Mediterranean and tried to play like two big black guys
Speaker 3: trying to play water polo.
Speaker 1: How'd that go?
Speaker 3: Terrible? Because mister Harbor over here jumped in the lake
Speaker 3: or the met the sea. He jumped in and he goes,
Speaker 3: jumps down and comes up and goes, ain't no bottom.
Speaker 1: A little bit different. That's a little bit.
Speaker 6: Different, first of all, because it was like little kids
Speaker 6: out there. You got to understand, I just draw the
Speaker 6: picture for everybody, all right, So it's little kids out there.
Speaker 6: We're in our speedos because that's what everybody has, and
Speaker 6: and so we're all.
Speaker 1: In Oka and so.
Speaker 2: And then so so we get out there. I'm like,
Speaker 2: if little kids are out here doing it, like I
Speaker 2: could do it too. It wasn't that bad. So I
Speaker 2: go in and I'm just you know, standing up top
Speaker 2: at first. Then I'm just gonna kind of relax, go
Speaker 2: down and then come back and get my breath. And
Speaker 2: I went down and I kept going, kept bro I
Speaker 2: came back up like, I ain't no bottom, this is
Speaker 2: not it. And so from there on I was very
Speaker 2: uncomfortable the rest of the time the water polo bottom.
Speaker 4: The water polo experience was not good for me. It
Speaker 4: was not great.
Speaker 2: We had a good time, but overall, I mean I
Speaker 2: just didn't realize that you just you know, you're just
Speaker 2: out there.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, it wasn't it was.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Mary was great, but that was probably his worst experience.
Speaker 3: It was I just remember him coming and saying, it
Speaker 3: ain't no bottom.
Speaker 4: I was like laughing. So I was a little nervous.
Speaker 1: O my god.
Speaker 3: All right. The final question to you Mount Rushmore. Okay,
Speaker 3: who would you put on your Mount Rushmore? The people
Speaker 3: that have helped you, uh just kind of guided you
Speaker 3: along the way. They were there before you retirement, when
Speaker 3: you play, coaches, teachers, just a group of people that
Speaker 3: have really been team Alley, ye your entire life thus far.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a great question. I think for me, I
Speaker 1: was super fortunate that like I could name the people individually,
Speaker 1: but like my family, So I'd start with my mom
Speaker 1: and dad, Like for them, you.
Speaker 4: Don't make that make it too because.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I actually put them one one into put
Speaker 1: them for two different reasons. My dad from like a
Speaker 1: work work ethic standpoint, like a standard of like sort
Speaker 1: of excellence like that coming from him. And then my
Speaker 1: mom just from like I don't know, from an emotional standpoint,
Speaker 1: like from a compassion to myself and others and being
Speaker 1: the service of others. Those those two things that are
Speaker 1: ingrained in me. So those two i'd say, Uh. While
Speaker 1: I was playing my fiance right now soon to be wife,
Speaker 1: she was a huge support to me throughout playing. It's
Speaker 1: a hard it's a hard thing to do right, There's
Speaker 1: a lot of stress, a lot of pressure. To have
Speaker 1: someone to help sort of carry that load was absolutely
Speaker 1: massive for me. And then I would probably put for
Speaker 1: number four. Uh for my football career. Uh. He's now
Speaker 1: the head coach at at Hobarty was my offensive line
Speaker 1: coach and offensive coordinator. But Kevin Dawalla, he was a
Speaker 1: fantastic again standard of excellence of like how to hold
Speaker 1: yourself the high standard, and how to get improved on things.
Speaker 1: And you know that was that. He was absolutely massive
Speaker 1: for me. So and still as so we're staying in
Speaker 1: touch obviously. So those are my four.
Speaker 2: So you like the standard at your college, like, hey,
Speaker 2: if he can do it, you can do it, and
Speaker 2: before before and before you that.
Speaker 1: It's more like if you do everything right and you
Speaker 1: can check these boxes, then they'll find it. They'll find
Speaker 1: a way. Like that's the truth.
Speaker 3: So why do you think you didn't get like a
Speaker 3: D one offer or a D two offer? Why do
Speaker 3: you think that is?
Speaker 1: So? I grew up in Westchester, New York, so sellers
Speaker 1: in New York City. It's not really like football country.
Speaker 1: It's like so that. And then also I was super undersized.
Speaker 1: I was like two hundred and twenty whatever pound offensive lineman.
Speaker 1: It's not playing D one. And then I also didn't
Speaker 1: have the best frame of reference. I wasn't going to
Speaker 1: like camps and things like that and how someone tell
Speaker 1: me to do X, Y and z. So just navigating
Speaker 1: those things. So that's why cool. But I do have
Speaker 1: one other thing that I kind of can I tie together? Yeah,
Speaker 1: So talking about travel and quotes, right, because that's that's
Speaker 1: you too. I want to pull it up. But so
Speaker 1: I was in London, was doing some traveling recently in
Speaker 1: April or whatever, and we went to the Winston Churchill
Speaker 1: Museum and we get to see, you know, the war
Speaker 1: rooms were like where he conducted the war. Right, So
Speaker 1: it's a underground bunker, it's unbelievable. It's also a Churchill museum.
Speaker 1: And he had a quote in there that I love.
Speaker 1: Then I think that you'll want to make a note
Speaker 1: of if I can find it. Yeah, So I refuse
Speaker 1: to be exhibited like a prize bowl whose chief attraction
Speaker 1: is his past prowess. So I'll say it again, I
Speaker 1: refuse to be exhibited like a prize bowl whose chief
Speaker 1: attraction is his past prowess. So as that relates to
Speaker 1: formed players, right. So I think a lot of times
Speaker 1: we identify and and hang our hats on that. But
Speaker 1: I think as we look forward to the things that
Speaker 1: we can bring to our communities, I think that's what's
Speaker 1: going to excite us and invigorate us. And I think
Speaker 1: that that quote is awesome. You make a note of
Speaker 1: that one.
Speaker 3: I will get it after we wrap up on the
Speaker 3: show's not about just our football prowess.
Speaker 1: I feel like that's apt for our setting here so.
Speaker 3: Perfect and with that, we're done. That's that's my job.
Speaker 3: That's like the perfect outro.
Speaker 4: Don't drop the.
Speaker 3: Metaphor I heard gonna build us on that. We can't
Speaker 3: do that. Hey, Ali, I man, this is good. All right,
Speaker 3: well this was great.
Speaker 1: This is great for me.
Speaker 2: I appreciate it. Man, Thank you for all of our
Speaker 2: listeners out there. Continue to tune in wherever you get
Speaker 2: your podcasts. At oh, I can look into the camera.
Speaker 2: I forget we had got a camera out here. All right,
Speaker 2: wherever you get your podcasts. That was iHeartRadio Apple podcasts.
Speaker 2: Remember to give us a quick hit review. Subscribe five
Speaker 2: star rating. Please, we appreciate that. And like always, man,
Speaker 2: keep listening, keep looking at us.
Speaker 4: We're doing our thing.
Speaker 3: Tell a friend to tell a friend to tell a
Speaker 3: friend were out put. Hey, thank you, this is dopeciously.
Speaker 3: I'm glad we get to do him in person. We'll
Speaker 3: exchange rumbers offline. But like your transitioning everything, feel free
Speaker 3: to use me as a reference or a resource, not
Speaker 3: reference a resource room. He know everything. He's probably what
Speaker 3: he been playing. Would you retired here. He retired in
Speaker 3: twenty sixteen. But he started playing in the eighties.
Speaker 1: That's why.
Speaker 3: The first time I met him, I thought he was
Speaker 3: like forty five, but he was like, no, man, I'm
Speaker 3: twenty seven. I was like, ain't no way, but yeah.
Speaker 1: He just yeah. But wealth and knowledge, you said.
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh my god, so much.
Speaker 4: We're going to end the show.
Speaker 3: Oh sorry, we got to end the show. We appreciate
Speaker 3: shall thank y'all for tuning in. We out