John Urschel: Ravens’ starter and resident math genius retiring from NFL after three seasons

In a surprise announcement on July 27, Baltimore Ravens’ Head Coach John Harbaugh released a statement saying that his offensive lineman and resident math genius John Urschel, 26, is retiring from the NFL and leaving the Ravens.  Urschel would have been entering his fourth season with the league.  He was in contention for the starting center position this season. Urschel took part in all of the Ravens’ off-season camps “but did not report for the start of training camp Wednesday,” according to the Baltimore Ravens.

“This morning John Urschel informed me of his decision to retire from football,” Head Coach John Harbaugh said in a statement. “We respect John and respect his decision. We appreciate his efforts over the past three years and wish him all the best in his future endeavors.”

We still don’t know exactly what triggered Urschel’s decision to retire now.  He may have decided to give his academic career a higher priority.  The former Ravens’ lineman has been working toward his Ph.D. in mathematics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT.)  Urschel has written several research papers as an MIT doctoral student and has been earning straight A’s in his program of study, according to Yahoo! Sports.  Those of us that have been following his career know him as much for his affinity as a math genius as being a player for the Baltimore Ravens and the NFL. Urschel’s studies at MIT include work in the fields of “spectral graph theory, numerical PDE’s, matrix algebra, computational finance, mathematical physics and others,” according to the Ravens Wire.

Another potential reason for retiring is his desire to save his very valuable brain amid all the fears surrounding the very real possibility of contracting chronic traumatic encephalopathy [CTE] due to all the hits football players take to their heads. “A recent study found that nearly 90 percent of brains from players in the NFL had evidence of the brain disease chronic traumatic encephalopathy,” according to the Ravens Wire.  Urschel is on record as being envious of San Francisco 49ers’ linebacker Chris Borland who also took an early retirement from the NFL because he feared the possibility of contracting the debilitating brain disease now known to afflict football players.

 

Written by: Ace News Today Staff