The NFL’s Laziest Players

American football is by far the most popular and most profitable sport in North America. The NFL is among the highest watched programs on television every week and the Super Bowl is the most watched television program all year. Aside from that, football players are pretty lazy. You need at least ten coaches to tell players what to do and at least fifteen assistant coaches to care of everything else. American Football takes on average about 3 hours to complete and has about twelve minutes of actual ball in play action. This means that 95% of the game consists of borefest of standing around, scratching and slapping butts, drinking Gatorade and chatting with your line mates on the sidelines about where to go and eat after the game. At least in the NFL, a lazy player can be cut and not owed anymore money if the player is a lazy, good for nothing, athlete. Let’s look at some lazy NFL players…

Mark Sanchez

—I’m so lazy that my team traded for Tim Tebow to replace me.—

-Mark Sanchez is an American football quarterback for the New York Jets. Despite a subpar performance, Sanchez led the Jets to the AFC Championship Game and became the fourth rookie quarterback in NFL history to win his first playoff game. The next two seasons would be a regression for Sanchez as his team failed to reach the playoffs. Fans and media critics called for a struggling Sanchez to be benched. He eventually was replaced towards the end of the 2012 season. One unidentified Jets player told the media that ‘We have to bring in another quarterback that will make him work at practice. … He’s lazy and content because he knows he’s not going to be benched.’ Many of those same sources called for the team to dump Sanchez and trade for star quarterback Peyton Manning. The columnist quoted another player as saying of the organization’s policy toward Sanchez that ‘They don’t want to be truthful with him. They treat him like a baby instead of a man. He goes in a hole when someone tells him the truth.’ Another teammate said Sanchez is ‘not improving at all.’ Also, Sanchez ‘s 2012 season was a disaster that gave rise to the term ‘butt fumble’. Sanchez collided with the backside of his teammate Brandon Moore and fumbled the ball, which was recovered by the Patriots’ and returned for a touchdown. Within minutes, video of the butt fumble went viral on the Internet and it was widely mocked in the news media over the following week. Management had so much confidence in Sanchez at quarterback that they tried to bring in Tim Tebow as a replacement QB. Hopefully, Sanchez can regain his skills. But, after having arthroscopic surgery in the off season, this appears unlikely in the foreseeable future.

Albert Haynesworth

—There’s nothing more terrible than watching me doing conditioning tests—

-Albert Haynesworth will go down as the biggest free agent bust in NFL history. In 2009, Haynesworth signed a $100 million free agent contract with the Redskins. He became an NFL punch line when he needed 10 days to pass a conditioning test at the start of training camp and lost his starting job. In December, Haynesworth was suspended for conduct detrimental to the team. He was traded shortly afterwards for a 5th round pick. A former teammate of Haynesworth went on the radio and blasted him by calling Haynesworth ‘an awful human being’. Haynesworth would bounce around the league and be released by several different NFL organizations until he retired because of a lack of interest for his services. His former coach, Mike Shanahan, Called Haynesworth ‘lazy’ multiple times. His former coach said that Haynesworth was lazy, had a lack of passion, and a lot of times had a lack of character. We imagine that Haynesworth is living a lazy retirement with over 30 million$ in assets by being a lazy football player.

Matt Leinart

—So…you’re telling me that we CAN’T sit in hot tubs and play beer pong in the NFL?—

-Matt Leinart is the ultimate college party boy. He loved his time in college so much that he brought all of the vices of his college days back with him to the NFL. Leinart didn’t realize that he was getting paid big bucks to be a franchise quarterback and that he should show a little grace for his good fortune and professionalism for his craft. You will find ten times more information on his celebrity on Google than you will of his football career. It seems that Leinart is more interested in beer bongs, parties and chicks than he is at studying game footage and trying to get better as a professional athlete. We can imagine that great quarterbacks like Tom Brady and Peyton Manning aren’t doing beer bongs at their homes right now. There was a perception of Matt Leinart during his time in Arizona that he didn’t really care about being great, and that he was somewhat lazy and unmotivated. While on the radio, Leinart admitted this by saying ‘I was young and I didn’t know how to prepare.’ Also, it doesn’t help to add to the content of this article but Leinart grew up with Amblyopia-Strabismus – otherwise known as ‘Lazy Eye’. Leinart now holds a clipboard as a member of the Houston Texans. Leinart is a natural holding that clipboard and looks more suited as an NFL coach. The only problem is that he’s still an active roster player. We’ve never seen a player that is happier holding a clipboard and not having to physically play a sport than we have with Matt Leinart. He’s gone from Heisman trophy winner in college to holding a clipboard and getting towels for the starting QB of the team.

JaMarcus Russell

—I deserve a second chance. I was QB for the Oakland Raiders and every player on the Raiders sucks.—

-JaMarcus Russell was the number one overall pick of the Oakland Raiders in the 2007 draft. Russell played three seasons with the Raiders, compiling 7–18 record as a starter. Russell was later arrested on drug charges. Russell was arrested for being in possession of codeine syrup without a valid prescription. He was released by the Raiders and is now a free agent. Russell quickly developed a reputation in the NFL as a lazy locker room distraction. His lack of effort throughout the years has in part made him one of the biggest busts in NFL history. Senior NFL writer Will Brinson said that ‘Russell doesn’t exactly have a track record for being either fiscally responsible, good at football, or in shape.’ The rookie quarterback would allegedly fall asleep in team meetings. Another critique of Russell involved his physique. There are many stories of Russell showing up to Raiders training camp fat and out of shape. At one point, his weight spiked to 320 pounds. In a recent comeback attempt, Russell says he’s no longer ‘breathing like a fat man.’ It will be interesting to see whether any NFL team gives him a chance at making a comeback attempt.

Brett Favre

—I was too busy sending dick pics to concentrate on football.—

-Brett Favre is a former American football quarterback. He was a 20-year veteran of the NFL with the Atlanta Falcons, Green Bay Packers, Minnesota Vikings and New York Jets. Favre started at the quarterback position for the University of Southern Mississippi for four years before being selected in the second round of the 1991 NFL Draft by Atlanta In college,there was never a shortage of beautiful women who wanted to party with Brett Favre, and he believed in living life to the fullest in his early days. After some late night partying one night, he crashed his car and was seriously injured and had most of his intestine removed. He was able to overcome a drug addiction and helped the Green Bay Packers win a Super Bowl victory. At the end of his career, Favre wanted to play football without putting in the effort. Fans and the media called him a drama queen when he couldn’t make up his mind about whether he wanted to retire for three off seasons in a row. The man faked retirement on two separate occasions simply to avoid having to go to training camp and getting in game shape.

The NFL investigated Favre for allegedly sexting and leaving inappropriate voice messages for Jets ‘Game day host’ Jenn Sterger during the 2008 season. He was fined 50 000$ by the NFL for not co-operating with the investigation. It seemed that Favre was more worried about taking pictures of his penis on his phone than he was on concentrating on football. When he knew his career was over in Green Bay, he did a lazy job of mentoring future Super Bowl-winning QB, Aaron Rodgers. We hated the Brett Favre who toyed with the emotions of fans over and over again and seemed to revel in the national media spotlight. It’s hard to deny how good Favre was as a football player. But, his reputation as a lazy guy and a pervert at the end of his career has left a black eye on what was largely a distinguished career.

Our final article will focus on lazy athletes from more unconventional and international sports. It seems that being lazy goes beyond American borders and can be found in athletes all across the globe. Stay tuned.