Run Ricky Run…Right Out of Football!

Say it ain’t so Ricky!! Not marijuana…not again!! Are you kidding me?? Well, apparently Ricky is at it again. It was reported last week that the self maligned running back of the Miami Dolphins tested positive for marijuana again in April. This is the fifth time in his 8 yr. career and the first since being suspended for the entire 2006 season. For the last couple of years Williams has been out of the public eye studying holistic medicine in California and is eligible to apply for re-instatement with the NFL. He has done numerous interviews in the past month where he has stated he has been clean for over three years. Duh…OK!!

We know that Ricky is a very shy and reclusive individual who has been diagnosed with depression and social anxiety disorder. Medications have helped some, but if this last incident doesn’t prove that there is something very wrong going on inside him, nothing will. Look at the facts. As a rookie with the New Orleans Saints, Williams did interviews with his helmet on looking through a tinted visor and later, while a member of the Miami Dolphins, he decided two days before training camp that he would retire from football to smoke pot. Hellooo… is anyone home??

Ricky simply doesn’t like to play football at this level, or more to the point, doesn’t like the limelight that comes along with it. I truly believe he wouldn’t even try to be re-instated if he didn’t owe the Miami Dolphins $8.6 Million for breaching his original contract with the team. Think about it, given the commissioner’s recent stance on off-field conduct, Williams had to have known the NFL was going to test him as often as it could. I have always felt that Ricky Williams is an intelligent man, so… as the doobie actually touched his lips, I’m supposed to believe that he didn’t know this would happen?

The bottom line for me is that Ricky Williams wants to be thrown out of football and when the Dolphins decide, finally, to wash their hands of Williams there is a chance that he won’t have to pay his signing bonus back. Ricky’s locker was cleaned out and assigned to running back Lorenzo Booker last week, the Dolphin’s third round pick out of Florida State. I’d say that this constitutes a team and a coaching staff that is moving on and Ricky Williams may well be on his way to getting exactly what he wants.