semiskin Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 On Sportscenter right now more to come. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spjunkies Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 WTF Are you serious? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
semiskin Posted July 25, 2004 Author Share Posted July 25, 2004 Just imagine if we would have taken him instead of Roland that year. Apparently he's going to go do some traveling and go back to school. You know finding himself and all that crap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spjunkies Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 It's on the front page of ESPN right now. IT'S TRUE!!!!! This guy is insane. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Skins11 Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 That is crazy. But when Master P negotiates your contract, it can't bode well for you at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimster Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 Trade them Betts for O-gun! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Makaveli Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 just saw it on ESPNews wowwwwwwww Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redskns21 Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 Originally posted by jimster Trade them Betts for O-gun! I wish. I don't know that I'd want to get rid of Betts, but we could sweeten our offer with Betts. Don't know how much interest he'd garner, though 2 FA runners were signed this week both Smith and George so the cupboard is pretty bare. Sucks to be the Dolphins after everything they gave up to get him only having him for 2 years. You can't say that you saw this coming though no matter how wierd he is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghost of Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 WHOA Amazing. I know that not everyone loves football like we do, and that Ricky is offbeat, but damn. Dan LeBatard is talking about him. Ricky wants to do something else, meaningful with his life, etc. Of course, he can't do that in the offseason or save up money, invest and then donate to charity or anything. Great of him to wait until a week to training camp to do something he's considered for months(according to discussions with LeBatard.) Ricky is MY AGE. Chreebus, play a few more Ricky, it ain't like you're going to be a doctor! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redskns21 Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 Here's an article written by LeBatard... http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/sports/columnists/dan_le_batard/9237156.htm?1c Posted on Sun, Jul. 25, 2004 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 marijuana 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 marijuana, 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 marijuana 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. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OrangeSkin Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 Wow, he's always been a weird one, but this is way out there. He sure fukked the Dolphins over hardcore. I'm sort of ambivalent to the situation as a 'Skins fan, just a bit surprised, but I would be furious if I was in any way associated with the 'Phins. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bnacpa Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 wholly $hit ... this is amazing. I am in a partial keeper league and one of my opponents who had him and gets far into the playoffs every year is now fuc'd This is truly shocking. At least Miami now has the money to sign Ogunleye if they want to Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Da_Truth Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 GIVE US OGUNLEYE!!!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoCalSkins Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 Doesn't this hurt Miami more finacially in terms of his signing bonus getting accelerated? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spjunkies Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 Does his money come off of Miami's cap now? :helmet: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimster Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 wow. We all LOVE football passionately and couldn't imagine how great it would be to be paid big money to be involved in it for a living, but I guess if you don't enjoy it just becomes a job you don't want, and we've all had one of those at one time or another. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
70Chip Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 :cannibas: :bong: :high: :cloud9: :ciao: Dat boy crazy. This is a great example of the stupidity of big-time sports. Most guys his age need a job and stuff. Ricky apparently is going to go sit on the beach in Jamaica. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EvoSkins Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 Sucks for the Dolphins. He was set to make 3.735 million this year and 3.74 million next year. They could use that money to sign O-Gun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gilgamesh Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 How much of his SB will be accelerated into this season's cap? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimster Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 Betts and a 5th rounder for O-Gun. We let Sultan and John Simon battle it out for back-up. ..actually I'd rather keep Betts too. Is Travis Minor any good? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bnacpa Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 I doubt they would take Betts and a 5th rounder, but if they were looking for Samuels and a 1st, maybe they will take Samuels and Betts? Somehow I think Trung Candidate will be getting a call this week. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimster Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 I don't think it was ever Samuels AND a 1st - I think it was just Samuels OR a 1st and another pick. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bnacpa Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 This is still so mind boggling ... Wanstadt is a goner ... The Dolphins ownership almost fired him after last season. Does anyone here think that the Dolphins without Norv as an Offensive Coordinator (yeah he sucks as a head coach, but he is a good O-Coord) and without Ricky Williams really have a chance? Dave should start trying to figure out which teams will need a new D-Coord for next season. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bnacpa Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 Damn ... this makes our trade with New Orleans even that much sweeter, now that he has left the league after only 5 years. Sure we no longer have Champ Bailey, but we were able to improve our team dramatically based on that trade and everyone who has had Ricky Williams has been burned, just like his joint Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimster Posted July 25, 2004 Share Posted July 25, 2004 this can't be layed on Wandstat, but it sure isn't going to help - although it could buy him the owners sympathy for another year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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