The life of a retired athlete can be a stressful one. It is not relaxing and glamourous as most people may think. Making millions of dollars practically overnight is tough for people to handle, especially young twenty two year olds. The main problem a retired athletes has is the fact that they continue to spend their money to maintain the lifestyle they had while they were playing. Simply poor money management and over spending leads to bankruptcy for these former players. The reason these athletes struggle so much making this transition is because the famous lifestyle is all they know. For them it about maintaining an image. What this says about our sports culture is that we value fame and appearance. The importance is placed on the salaries and not so much the actual sport itself. In my opinion i cannot understand how these athletes can go broke. I wonder is it really that hard to save and manage money. Of course this is easy for me to say when i don't have what seems like an infinite amount of money in the bank. I aspire to be in the NFL one day so this issue is a big deal for me. Too many athletes lose their money so if i do make it to the NFL this is something i must pay extra attention to.
I agree that these athletes should be managing their money, when they know that their athletic careers will end one day. The US idolizes fame so much that they tend to forget that these people are putting their lives at risk and are devoting their entire lives to athletics. This is their profession, and it is sad that the life after is so difficult.
ReplyDelete-Wesley Morton