Mike Mulligan

I'm older and I'm dealing with some injuries.

I'm dealing with some inadequacies because my body just isn't the way it used to be.

So I totally understand it's hard for people to really wrap their minds around a guy who's so young in his 20s, just signed with the Chicago Bears to retire.

But everybody's body ages differently.

And it's hard to know what that beating was unless you're actually living inside of that person.

I was surprised.

I mean, it is very young, especially when you are just signing with a new team like you did last year with the Bears.

You would expect that like if a guy is going to retire, you're going to hear some whispers about, you know, he's thinking about it.

He's dealing with offseason surgeries and he's struggling to come back.

But really, it was all quiet on that front.

I think it probably surprised the Bears almost as much as anybody.

So it was definitely a shock.

Yeah, it's definitely something that guys think about.

One of my good friends from Wisconsin, Chris Borland, he played one year, had an amazing season with the San Francisco 49ers as a linebacker, and he decided to walk away because he didn't feel like it was worth risking the health of his brain and possible long-term repercussions of the daily beatings that you take when you're a lineman, when you're a linebacker, when you're one of those positions that –

As a requirement of your job, you are smashing your skull against another human being 60, 70 times during practice, not just on the games.

And so it's something that you definitely consider.

I think they've done a great job of making the game safer.

When you're thinking about the brain, you only get one of them.

Last time I checked, they're not doing brain replacements.

And I think that's something that people have to think about.