post mystifying sports careers in this thread

[pissydan]

[Guy Incognito]

"What are you guys doin' in here?"

[Guy Incognito]

although ricky williams is less mystifying and more admirable

[Dear You]

Oh yeah, I recently watched the 30 for 30 on Marcus Dupree and the arc of his playing days is really something else.

[unpredictable landlord]

[Hal Jordan]

although ricky williams is less mystifying and more admirable

i like the guy, but i'm not sure what's so admirable about ricky williams

[universe]

Yeah I tried to watch his 30 for 30 cause people said he was this great character and I came away thinking he was just some asshole.

[gallits]

Trautmann is worth a mention. Goalie who broke his neck during a match and carried on.

3.35 (pretty crappy video)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bert_Trautmann

In the 75th minute Trautmann, diving at an incoming ball, was knocked out in a collision with Birmingham's Peter Murphy in which he was hit in the neck by Murphy's right knee. No substitutes were permitted, so Trautmann, dazed and unsteady on his feet, carried on. For the remaining 15 minutes he defended his net, making a crucial interception to deny Murphy once more. Manchester City held on for the victory, and Trautmann was the hero of the final because of his spectacular saves in the last minutes of the match. His neck continued to cause him pain, and Prince Philip commented on its crooked state as he gave Trautmann his winner's medal.[34] Trautmann attended that evening's post-match banquet despite being unable to move his head,[35] and went to bed expecting the injury to heal with rest. As the pain did not recede, the following day he went to St George's Hospital, where he was told he merely had a crick in his neck which would go away.[36] Three days later, he got a second opinion from a doctor at Manchester Royal Infirmary. An X-ray revealed he had dislocated five vertebrae in his neck, the second of which was cracked in two.[36][37] The third vertebra had wedged against the second, preventing further damage which could have cost Trautmann his life.

[pickles]

Billy Collins was once considered a rising contender in the welterweight class. He easily won his first 14 fights. Then he fought Luis Resto and was absolutely destroyed. His face was smashed in and his vision was damaged. He never boxed again, and died in a drunk driving accident several months later. For years people accused Resto of removing the padding from his gloves before the match, while Resto denied it. Then, 20 years later Resto admitted that not only had padding been removed, plaster had been inserted. It was supposed to knock Billy Collins out in the early rounds, but he managed to go the whole fight to his detriment.

Jesus Christ.

This really pisses me off. What a cheating bastard.

[pickles]

Fucking scumbag even hugs him at the end. What a piece of shit.

[pickles]

I wonder how furious watching Assault in the Ring will make me.

[Bernie]

Cliff Lee going 5-8 as a middle of the rotation no-name for an awful Indians team in 2007 to going 22-3 and winning the Cy Young in 2008, turning into one of the best pitchers in baseball. Also his 18 walks in 212 innings in 2010 is mystifying as well.

awful indians team in 2007? huh?

[Ted Pikul]

Jason Grimsley stealing Albert Belle's bat from the umpire room by crawling though the ceiling

[Guy Incognito]

i haven't seen the 30/30 on williams, i guess all i know is the whole "giving up sports and a shallow if lucrative lifestyle to follow your true spiritual dreams/drugs" narrative

[good pups]

2005 - From the Toronto Star: "since his black 2003 Mercedes Benz was seized (and sold on eBay) by the authorities, the 6-foot-9 beanpole has taken to riding a motor scooter around town, which makes him hard to miss."

URBANA – Former National Basketball Association player Keon Clark of Danville is headed back to prison again on a driving-related conviction.

Clark, 35, admitting that he drove in Champaign County on Feb. 14 of this year at a time when he had three prior convictions for driving under revocation.

Urbana attorney James Dedman, who represents Keon Clark, did not present any evidence.

"His record and his behavior suggests he has a serious mental problem," Dedman said. "It's possible he's unfit to stand trial or be sentenced, or that he's insane."

[unpredictable landlord]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dexter_Manley

After his career in the United States ended, he revealed that he was functionally illiterate, despite having studied at Oklahoma State University for four years.

Dexter Manley, the All-Pro defensive end for the Washington Redskins, recently came out with an embarrassing confession. He almost made it to the age of 30 without being able to read.

In his efforts to conquer the written page, Manley has been tutored and has gone to night school for the last four years at The Lab School of Washington. His teacher said he was at first extremely defensive, insisting he simply wanted to improve his vocabulary. But she quickly discovered that he was merely guessing at the words. Once Manley admitted just how poor his reading level was, he pursued his goal with what his teacher calls ''fierce determination'' and he arrived successfully at reading fluency. But the disturbing fact remains. As a functional illiterate, Dexter Manley somehow graduated from high school and somehow was accepted at Oklahoma State University.

[keykey]

Cliff Lee going 5-8 as a middle of the rotation no-name for an awful Indians team in 2007 to going 22-3 and winning the Cy Young in 2008, turning into one of the best pitchers in baseball. Also his 18 walks in 212 innings in 2010 is mystifying as well.

awful indians team in 2007? huh?

Yeah I was wondering what this was about too

[Hal Jordan]

i know how dexter manley feels, i didn't learn to ride a bike until i was 27

[keykey]

[Feech La Manna]

[A.C.] Green is known as deeply religious and is well known for proclaiming that he began and ended his NBA career as a virgin. During his playing days, his teammates would frequently send women to tempt him to compromise his morals. Instead, Green would respond by calmly quoting scripture.[3] Currently, he runs youth camps through his A.C. Green Youth Foundation promoting abstinence until marriage.

[Hal Jordan]

I wonder how furious watching Assault in the Ring will make me.

based on my experience, real furious.,

if it makes you feel better, resto's life was complete shit after the fight and he has been homeless for years (it won't make you feel better)

[darger]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dexter_Manley

After his career in the United States ended, he revealed that he was functionally illiterate, despite having studied at Oklahoma State University for four years.

not really that shocking.

[Feech La Manna]

oh yeah, and

# Green suffered from singultus, or chronic hiccups, during his NBA career, the hiccups only stopping when Green was running or working out. Reportedly, Green never slept more than two hours at a time due to the condition. He has since recovered.[4]

[Uppercrust]

my earliest memory of basketball is watching arvydas sabonis lumbering around the rose garden.

[Hal Jordan]

kin to cedric?

[Hal Jordan]

wait is that the same guy

how did arvydas become cedric

[WAC]

Kermit Washington's mother Barbara[2] graduated from Miner's Teacher's College (later subsumed into Howard University), where she was an excellent student; his father Alexander was an X-ray technician.[2][3] Washington had a rough childhood.[3] When he was three years old, his parents had a fight in which his maternal uncle became involved and in which someone violently attacked his uncle with an iron.[3] His parents soon divorced, with his father awarded custody of the children. His mother, who suffered from bipolar disorder, then took him and his older brother Eric from their father on an ill-advised sojourn for which they were poorly prepared.[3][4] Struggling to find money to feed the children, she eventually called their father, who came and took them back.[3] His stay with his father did not last long, and he and his brother were passed around to various relatives on both sides of the family.[3]

The effect of being shuttled into and out of the homes of family members led to a feeling of not being wanted, which made Washington extremely shy as a youth.[5] The only time he recalls feeling a sense of self-worth was when his great-grandmother on his father's side had the pair for a while.[5] According to Washington, she loved the boys but was extremely strict, domineering, and at times, physically abusive.[6] After his father remarried, the children moved back in with him and his new wife. Washington felt a sense of optimism for the first time, saying "I thought it was our dream come true. All our lives we had seen nice families on TV. Real ones. Now we were going to be a real family."[7] However, he again felt unwanted this time by his stepmother.[5] As a small child, Washington said that he had no recollections of ever being hugged, and only felt close to his older brother, Chris.[5] Washington was a poor student who hated school throughout most of his childhood.[8] He had to retake many of his classes in summer school to raise his grades.[9] When he entered high school he played football merely so he could be around a close friend, and have someone to walk home with at night with as he was terrified of walking home alone.[8]

As a senior in high school, Washington stood 6 ft 4 in (1.93 m) but weighed a mere 150 lbs.[8] After some rare positive feedback by his biology teacher, Barbara Thomas, he began to study and put forth a greater effort in that class.[10][11] He quickly became a solid student in biology but poor in all other subjects.[11] When Thomas became his home room teacher and saw his grades in other classes she encouraged him to try hard in all of his courses.[11][12] Washington rapidly improved his marks, making the honor roll in his senior year.[11]

His basketball performance in high school was unimpressive.[13] He came off the bench to average four points per game (ppg).[11][14] His stepmother informed him that when he graduated high school he would be thrown out of the house.[11] Chris had been able to leave home on a football scholarship and would later play in the National Football League, but Washington himself had nowhere to go.[11] He trained for three hours a day toward the end of his senior season, and showed up uninvited at a playground game featuring top high school players from Washington and Pennsylvania, where he talked his way into the game.[15][16] Tom Young, who had recently left his job as an assistant coach at Maryland University to become head coach at American University, saw him play there, and although Washington did not perform particularly well, Young was impressed by his hustle and how he ignored the poor treatment he received from the people who organized the game.[17]

And this was all before he became one of the best players in the country from scratch and then committed the most infamous act in pre-Malice NBA history.

[beausoleil]

loved dexter manley as a kid

[beausoleil]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Stratton

A 6-foot-5-inch right-hander, Stratton made his debut with the White Sox on June 2, 1934. He became a starter in 1937, winning 15 games with a 2.40 ERA and five shutouts, and made the American League All-Star squad. The following season, he again won 15 and completed 17 of his 22 starts.

On November 27, 1938, Stratton was hunting rabbits on his family farm when he fell, accidentally discharging a holstered pistol. The bullet struck his right leg, damaging a main artery enough to require amputation.[1] Equipped with a wooden leg, Stratton worked with the White Sox the next two years as a coach and batting practice pitcher. When World War II started, he tried to enlist but was rejected. Then, he organized a semipro baseball team at Greenville, Texas, and constantly practiced coordination on the field.

Throughout the early- and mid-1940s, Stratton attempted to come back from his injury, pitching in the minors and semi-pro games.[1] His return to baseball encountered difficulties because other teams persistently bunted balls out of his reach, but Stratton finally was able to make a successful comeback, winning 18 games with the Class-C Sherman Twins of the East Texas League.

[Hal Jordan]

man. all i and i'm sure most people ever knew of kermit was the punch. good background story, hate that he's only known for that one moment.