Goodbye then

Vontae Davis played football in the NFL long enough to be chosen for the Pro Bowl team twice, and he seems to be one of those guys who knows when enough is enough.

We talked earlier this summer about Colby Rasmus, a man being paid by the Orioles baseball team to catch fly balls and run around the bases, who decided to throw in the towel after a game, and of course there was the immortal John Kruk, who, upon reaching first base with the final hit of his career in 1995, turned right, headed for the White Sox dugout, shook hands with his teammates and drove home to West Virginia, retiring just like that.

Davis raised his retirement game way above Rasmus and Kruk. On Sunday, he and the rest of the Buffalo Bills went into the locker room at halftime in a game with the Los Angeles Chargers, trailing by 28-6. When the third quarter began, the Bills came back onto the field, all but Davis. Rather than stay around for the 31-20 final score, he retired.

“Pulled himself out of the game. He communicated to us that he was done,” Buffalo head coach Sean McDermott told reporters.

Davis put out the statement pictured below, and also later apologized to his teammates, saying he meant no disrespect, but "today on the field, reality hit me and hard. I shouldn't be out there anymore.”

His teammate, Lorenzo Alexander, a linebacker, said, "Coming out they said he's not coming out, he's retired,” adding that he had never seen anything like what Davis had done.

“Pop Warner, high school, college, pros. Never heard of it. Never seen it,” he said, according to ESPN. “And it's just completely disrespectful to his teammates.”



Davis, of course, has every right to stay around or leave, as do we all (except people in prison; that wouldn't do at all.) I've heard of people walking off their jobs in gas stations, radio stations, shoe stores and grocery stores.

Those people probably weren't making $4,312,500 for their services, as Davis was, but again, it's up to him.

It's easy for us in the income brackets beneath his level to say we'd hang in there until they dragged us away in a wheelbarrow for that sort of money. I hope he's saved his money over the course of his ten-year playing career and won't have to patronize the sort of shoe stores and grocery stores where employees walk out on him.

But that would be ironic, would it not?