Is Ricky Williams Selfish??

Was Ricky Williams’ retirement a selfish act? In my mind, no.

Was his retirement inconsiderate? Oh definitely!

Look, I know Ricky Williams is a weird guy. The man held news conferences while wearing his Saints helmet. His is in the realm of Dennis Rodman, Bison Dele or Mark Fidrych in that he does not fit the norm as far as athletes go. And he has every right to retire for whatever reasons he wishes.

But to “retire” the weekend before training camps start is just inconsiderate to the Miami Dolphins organization, the players, the ticket holders and the fans. Ricky Williams retiring from Miami is like if Peyton Manning retired from the Colts tomorrow. Or if Tim Duncan retired from the Spurs.

And for what? He hated football?? Well, wouldn’t you have hated it more….I dunno….when the season ended!?!? Why in July do you decide you hate football? Maybe he hated “drug tests”?

He screwed over the Dolphins nicely. Not only did it jolt the team before training camp….but there really isn’t much they can do about it now. Had Ricky made his feeling known earlier…Miami could have planned for it. Maybe if he retired before the draft….Miami could have selected one of the plethora of backs available. If he retired sometime in the spring…maybe Miami could have been the one to pry Corey Dillion out of Cincinnati instead of their rival Patriots. Heck, if he retired last week, they might have been about to land Eddie George. Now they have Travis Minor and front office guys glued to the waiver wire. Oh yeah…and if Wannestadt’s job wasn’t being held onto by a thread already…….

And in all of that, he screwed over his teammates. I mean, Ricky Williams WAS the Miami offense. Everything was built on that. Well, throw that plan out. So, Williams pretty much just wasted these people’s year. This was a team that was playoff-caliber and possibly AFC East championship caliber. They aren’t anymore. And, like I said, the Phins can’t do anything about it. So his team will go undermanned. He quit on them.

Worst of all, he screwed over the fans. Open up anything media related about the Miami Dolphins…and Ricky Williams was the guy pictured. He was the guy on the media guides…the ticket forms…and his jersey is the one Dolphin jersey you could find anywhere in the USA. He was the star. And fans bought tickets to see (a) Ricky Williams play and (b) to see the Dolphins be successful. Well, (a) won’t happen and (b) may get thrown out the window with it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah….there have been others to retire early. NFL running greats Barry Sanders and Jim Brown are two glaring examples. As are Sandy Kofax and Rocky Maricano. But all of them had achieved greatness in their careers before retiring. Williams has not. It is similar to when former Viking Robert Smith retired from the NFL. But Smith retired in the spring and as a free agent. So Minnesota wasn’t left totally off guard.

But Miami is….and that is a hard pill to swallow.