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For those of us who don’t make millions of dollars a year, it’s hard to understand what would make a man like Antonio Brown walk away from his job making that kind of money especially doing something seemingly enjoyable like playing wide receiver in the NFL.
With all that money and a cool job, we often assume life would be so much easier and more enjoyable. We could pay to have someone do our dishes, laundry, and clean the house. We could go out to dinner every night at expensive restaurants. Everything in our house could be luxurious.
This is why it’s so perplexing to ponder why Antonio Brown ran off the field yesterday with his shirt off in the middle of the game between his team, the Buccaneers, and the Jets. Yes, you read that right. He took off his pads and helmet, stripped down to his bare chest, and jogged off the field apparently frustrated about how many passes he wasn’t getting thrown and, probably, much bigger problems troubling him we don’t know about.
But he did this yesterday. Right in front of us. All of us have seen countless football games and never have we seen a pro football player quit on his team during the game in this sort of absolute meltdown public fashion.
It was seeing something we almost never see live or even on replay, an act far more serious than funny, far more tragic than entertaining. This looked like and actually was a man who committed career suicide in front of millions of TV viewers – you won’t see him play another NFL game. Most dumbfounding of all, he’s really good at wide receiver, one of the best in the world. And he torched all that in the span of two minutes.
One of the greatest mysteries of our times is how little we understand about the human brain and how it affects emotions and triggers sad and hopeless feelings such as depression. We know it involves chemical irregularities, but we can’t really see this when looking at world-class athletes such as Brown or anyone else.
I have been thinking a lot lately about Kyrie Irving and Ben Simmons who, like Brown, has been acting in ways lately that don’t seem to make sense. Both are paid millions of dollars to play pro basketball and apparently don’t want to play or are frustrated and feeling emotions that make them upset and not want to do the normal thing: go to their jobs and play basketball.
Brown showed today the same troubling and incomprehensible behavior.
While I’m not a doctor, I feel I know enough to tell you I think in all three cases there are these guys who are suffering from mental illnesses. You’ve figured that out yourselves, probably.
This is not funny. This is not to be made light of. This is deadly serious stuff going on with these guys and all the other people battling mental illness, of which there are many even among world-class athletes such as Michael Phelps and Simone Biles.
No amount of physical talent or strength or speed can directly help overpower mental illness. Medications can help as well as psychological counseling. But mental illness is impervious to brute athlete prowess.
The hopeful truth is there is the possibility for Antonio Brown to address whatever’s troubling him. Forget about football and millions of dollars. That’s over and probably a good thing for him. The important step for him to take now is to recognize he’s not strong enough to fend off whatever demons are making him act so unusually and irrationally.
Let’s hope he finally comes to realize this. Money and fame can’t beat mental illness. Only Antonio can with hard work. Let’s root for him to one day soon wake up in the morning and feel good about himself and have a purpose in life that he feels excited about and proud to pursue. That will be so much more important and fulfilling than how many catches he’s made in the NFL.
As sad as it was watching him run out of the stadium, we can be optimistic this low point is the impetus to get him to turn around his life. I hope he simply feels good emotionally for the rest of his days.
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Sammy Sportface, a sports blogger, galvanizes, inspires, and amuses The Baby Boomer Brotherhood. And you can learn about his vision and join this group's Facebook page here:
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