Blake Martinez, a former inside linebacker for the Las Vegas Raiders, abruptly retired from professional football in the middle of the season last November, after a seven-year career.
Blake started his career in 2016 with the Green Bay Packers after being drafted by the franchise in the fourth round. Later, he played for the New York Giants for one season and the Raiders for one month before retiring. His shocking decision left the NFL community perplexed.
However, the LB recently revealed his reasoning behind such an unexpected announcement at such a young age.
What was the reason for Blake Martinez’s retirement?
During the COVID 19, Blake discovered a passion for Pokémon cards and began a side business selling them. Even during the 2022 off season, Blake founded a company named Blake’s Breaks, which came out as a huge success.
After realizing his true destiny, the 29-year-old decided to devote his entire effort to the business, which provided him with pure entertainment and nostalgia as well as booming profits. Keeping up with football and business wasn’t actually worthwhile for the athlete.
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“Every single day when I wake up, my shoulder doesn’t hurt and my back doesn’t hurt anymore,” Martinez revealed. “When all that hurts are my fingers from opening, like, 1,000 packs of cards per day, I think, ‘I’m going to keep doing this.'”
I am sure we all can relate to the Packers linebacker, as we have faced such conundrums in our lives. We had to choose a professional career that we didn’t want at first but still had to keep going to keep our other dreams alive.
Martinez played 84 games in his career, completing a total of 706 tackles and 13 sacks. Prior to joining the NFL, he was a member of the Stanford Cardinal football team.
The former professional is now selling rare Pokemon cards, earning over $5 million in just seven months while employing 15 other people at his company. Blake Martinez’s life is undoubtedly going well.
