Detroit Lions legend Barry Sanders retired out of nowhere after the 1998 season and everyone has been trying to figure out why for well over 20 years.
There’s been a lot of theories out there. Was he tired of losing? Did he have problems with head coach Bobby Ross? Was it a problem with the front office? Nobody has been able to find out until now.
Barry Sanders and Amazon Prime have come together for a star studded documentary that drops on Tuesday, November 21st.
Everyone from Eminem to Jeff Daniels showed up for this one. I watched it early Tuesday morning and it is a phenomenal documentary that I recommend every Lions fan watches.
***Spoilers beyond here***
If you don’t want to watch the documentary and you just want to know, here it is.
It’s really simple, Sanders just didn’t have the drive to play the game anymore. He didn’t have the passion for the game anymore. That’s it. That’s why he retired. I know it’s not the salacious answer that you’re looking for, but if you came into this thing hoping he would say that he retired because of the Lions or becasue the team kept losing, then you just don’t know Barry Sanders.
Did the losing have it’s place in this decison? Absolutely. Sanders even says that if the Lions had been coming off a deep playoff run, then maybe he would have stayed. He also noted that he never had any intentions of playing elsewhere and that he never even thought about it.
The other thing that had it’s place is that a lot of the players that Sanders had loved playing with in Detroit had taken off for greener pastures. That also had strong place in taking away the passion for Sanders.
This documentary really just drives home the type of guy that Barry Sanders is. He doesn’t want the attention and he doesn’t want the glory. He left the MVP trophy given to him by the team at Kevin Glovers house for a year for crying out loud. Sanders wanted to play football and that was it. When he didn’t want to play anymore, he stopped. End of story. It was the most Barry Sanders move ever.