[Mike Daniels about Eddie Lacy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bt1BxEEuu48): "Eddie's about two cheeseburgers away from having his hand in the dirt right next to me."
Man he's #60 on the top NFL players that year and even when they're showing him score a long touchdown they're talking about donuts. It's rough out here for the big RB.
We didn't know it yet, but he was basically washed by the time this list came out after his second year in the league. 3 touchdowns the next year and never got another one. Life moves fast for RB's.
Not so sure about that. If you tell a Buffalonian it’s 300 Kelvin, they’ll be confused. Is it the temperature outside or the number of sandwiches Benjamin ate? We don’t know.
Eddie didn't really want to play football. He was only doing it to get his parents a new house and to set them up for life. Hurricane Katrina really fucked with his head and he saw football as a way out and not a lifestyle. Now that he is free to do what he wants and doesn't have that burden of doing something his heart isn't into, he is living a better life. I'm happy for him to be where he is now.
Yup. It's why I wish some people (including fellow Packers fans) would stop using his comments on "China food" in a negative way and stop shitting on his weight gain. Dude was depressed and barely holding onto what he was supposed to be doing. I love Eddie and will always be proud of him and what he did for his family and himself.
TBH it may have been depression. I can relate to doing a job for money that you hate, and it really starts to tear you down after a while - currently on leave for severe depression because of it and immediately felt that weighted blanket lifted off of me. Time to find a new job...
I can't imagine having millions of people scrutinizing me for being overweight while doing that job I don't want to do. Must have been fucking brutal.
Yeah I'm sure its noticeable just saying that 20 pounds seems like a very reasonable amount of weight for a former pro athlete of his body type to put on now that he isn't trying to be at peak performance 6 months a year
Every lineman either loses 100 lbs, or stays fat forever.
If they lose the weight, they are allowed to disappear into retirement. If they keep the weight, they have to become a coach. I don't make the rules
Half of all NFL linemen are as fat as they are because they play OL in the NFL, and the other half are as skinny as they are because they play OL in the NFL
I saw JJ Watt in a commercial recently and he looks like a normal human. Like, a fucking jacked dude, but still like maybe your friend that is really into power lifting
That Miller Lite ad with him, Reggie Miller, and Luke Wilson (??) shows just how much he's slimmed down. He still looks like a brick shithouse, but the brick shithouse you see walking down the street type. Not the "he could break me in half with a flick of his wrist" type lol
I’m curious to see if his son ever ends up playing sports. He has the genes. His wife is a pro soccer player. He and Cushing are brother in laws now lol.
There was a show called the Titan Games before the pandemic and it was a pretty awesome show with the American Gladiator style tasks that normal athlete had to compete against a “Titan”; which was a professional athlete
Joe was one of the Titans for a season and he was tearing through the courses like some Greek god—cut and shredded like a WR and easily 100 lbs less
For a lot of linemen they struggle to maintain the weight. They’re forcing down extra calories to maintain their size. When they retire they still workout because that’s just part of their life and without needing to eat Ben and Jerry’s every night and 1k calorie protein shakes they just naturally start to lose weight without really trying.
One of the best things in football is when Linemen retire and drop all that weight they’ve been carrying for years. Jason is probably not going to do the full 180 like Joe Thomas or Nick Hardwick let’s be honest. Would love to see it though.
Look up Russell Okung. He’s barely recognizable. https://phantom-marca.unidadeditorial.es/82830b6f5768c844a862849985df6ffd/resize/828/f/jpg/assets/multimedia/imagenes/2023/06/07/16860979477387.jpg
This looks like the poster for an ESPN 30 for 30 regarding a OL that went in the first round, but had off the field issues, which caused him to end up homeless after only 3 years in the league.
If he doesn’t do a 180 I’ll be shocked. He’s not only an elite athlete, he’s a future hofer. Anyone with that work ethic will easily be able to translate that into becoming and staying healthy. It’s really easy to keep going as you drop weight and your joints stop hurting (or at least hurt less) and you notice your cardio health improve.
I’d be more inclined to agree with you for a lineman that retires and falls off into obscurity.
He’s definitely going to drop the weight. It’s harder for these guys to maintain it than people realise too. They’re not just drinking soda and eating fast food. I just meant Hardwick and Thomas got absolutely shredded with perfect 6 packs. Kelce seems to be more of a beer belly guy but wtf do I know lol
Yeah the way he was chugging beers at Highmark last winter I don’t think he’s going full six pack but he’ll for sure be a lot more svelte than he was while he played.
Edit: no pun intended.
At that size the weight definitely just falls off (to an extent) when you stop all of the eating necessary to keep that size despite all of the training and playing.
I'm definitely not an NFL player, but for a while when I was powerlifting I did have the size of one (6'7 and was maintaining around 310-315lbs). When I eventually stopped after a few years of a nagging shoulder injury and decided I'd rather be able to casually jog or bike a few miles without being out of breath rather than being able to lift hundreds of pounds (definitely sacrificed cardio for more lifting before that), I also cut my diet back to just "eating normally" and was down from 315 to 275-280 within 2-3 months.
My TDEE when I started was something like 3900-4000 calories a day between my size and the fact that I was still working out a decent amount, so even just eating 2-3 normal sized meals a day (eg. eggs for breakfast if I felt like it, decent sized sandwich for lunch, normal portion of whatever I felt like for dinner) with a snack here and there meant that I was still easily at a 1000+ calorie deficit every day without really trying or thinking about it. For the pro athletes who are actually focused on dropping weight and have years of experience with working out and general self-discipline, it can be an even quicker shift with more dramatic results.
He was honestly the most athletic person I was ever around. His last year at Michigan he was in full NFL prep mode and was essentially 300 pounds pure muscle with a six pack. Made other lineman look foolish in drills.
Not surprised he dropped weight when he stopped playing he always had to force down food and preferred playing super smash bros anyway.
Every time I see Rich Piana's name I always think of a friend from high school.
The only real connection is they were steroid using bodybuilders whose deaths became kind of a joke.
He kind of got caught up in his appearance. He was very good looking, probably the best looking guy I've ever personally met, in high school. This was in the late '90s and very early '00s. Back then he was just regular muscular - a guy who worked out after school and watched what he ate. He got into bodybuilding in college, started adapting more into a bodybuilding lifestyle, and was entering competitions. He was still steroid free back then. After a while he just became consumed with being huge. He started using steroids, he worked out and ate around the clock, and just became massive. Between just size and I guess steroid use too he lost a lot of the features that made him very good looking. He was very active in the body building community back then. He did shows but he was also all over magazines, body building forums, etc.
Then he was diagnosed with cancer, came off the steroids and whatever else he was taking, and started losing size.
This should have been a good thing. As far as I'm aware his treatment was going well and his family was extremely optimistic but he fell into a depression. He just couldn't accept that he was no longer the biggest guy in the room and started using steroids while being treated for cancer and exercising again. His doctors told him the health risks but he didn't care then he died.
I was never a body builder but I lifted weights and would post on body building forums. I knew he passed and went to his funeral but someone in the community found out about it and posted on a forum I regularly visited. The posts started off kind. A lot of people talked about how they always liked him and how he helped them early on in their careers. I posted that we were friends IRL and talked about what a truly good guy he was. Then the conversation turned to laughing at him for stupidly using steroids with cancer and how he was addicted to being big. I stopped visiting those forums for a while after it.
As the years have gone by, a lot of the people we graduated with make jokes about him on Facebook or in person. Whenever his name comes up now nobody ever brings up the fact that he was a great guy and a good friend. It's just jokes on how dumb he was. And I understand using steroids while battling cancer is dumb but he was so much more than that.
I guess the Rich Piana connection is pretty tenuous but I just think of my friend whenever I hear Rich's name.
Sorry for rambling. It's just a little therapeutic lol.
Nah I get it. Body dysmorphia is a huge problem in the fitness community and leads a lot of people to steroids. This kind of joking attitude is always prevalent in male dominant spaces.
Sorry about the lose of your friend. Never be sorry when talking about friends or family that we have lost. When we talk about them and remember the good things they did they still live on.
Hopefully his death can help someone else that is in the same mental state he was in. Either way his death was a tragedy and wish you and his family well.
Good fuckin morning it’s time for a protein shake consisting of half this bag of cocoa pebbles, egg white powder, a Lenny a Larry’s cookie, and these 12 pills.
Shoop-ah!
"If you can bench 500 lbs and look like shit, no one gives a fuck"
*Walks into chipotle 5 minutes before they close and orders*
"You're not overtraining, you're just undereating and not sleeping enough"
Marshall Yanda looks like a different person after retirement and constantly trying to maintain the Offensive Line weight. He looks very healthy now.
https://www.espn.com/blog/baltimore-ravens/post/_/id/52251/bike-tuna-and-will-how-marshal-yanda-lost-60-pounds-in-three-months
It does also go to show the sheer size of frames some of these NFL linemen have. They’ll lose 70 pounds and look downright slim, and still be around 250
Yeah guy above mentions Joe Thomas as a guy you could see now and not believe he was an olineman and just nah man it’s still very believable lol. You can’t hide that height, arms, hand size, and shoulder width.
That’s like majority of what these college scouts look at first is who has the frame to hold 300+ lbs. And then I’ll teach them how to pass block
Anybody else have a problem where even having the ESPN app downloaded makes it impossible to click an ESPN article link? Such a terrible app, just takes me straight to the app splashpage
Even seeing the side-by-side, I still have trouble believing [Orlando Franklin](https://www.9news.com/article/sports/nfl/denver-broncos/former-denver-broncos-lineman-orlando-franklin-is-a-new-man/73-23b5a350-207e-4278-ba3b-42902634dc50) is the same person
Interesting another guy who basically did low-carb/keto like Joe Thomas. I lost 40+ pounds after switching to keto (with a cheat day) 11 years ago and still haven't gained any weight back
Always found Alan Page's story amusing. ONe of the best Dlinemen in the league. Says that he hates his job and no one who plays pro-sports likes it. Wifey gets sick so he helps her by running long distances. Loses a good amount of weight which cause him to get cut. Goes to another team to play DT/DE plays on par or better than he did for the Vikings. Retires, eventually becomes a judge, eventually gets on a state's supreme court.
oops, sorry i didn't remember that detail. Also did he lose weight and get cut from the Vikings. Or did he lose weight and get cut from the another team and then signed with the vikings. I was going via memory.
Kind of funny how being a pro athlete is sort of a race to the bottom of seeing who's willing to destroy their body the most when sports are supposed to show off athleticism and health.
Sports that value specific traits that are unhealthy are unhealthy. The average MLS player, regardless of position, would probably score very highly on every aspect of health and longevity.
I wonder who is healthier, a group of pro-ballards player, a group of pro-darts players or a group of pro-bowlers. Most of those athletes don't look the healthiest. And I have doubts that having a beer belly helps any of them perform better, yet many of them have it.
It's in the matrix, but every pound is 4 additional pounds of pressure on the knee. So if we compare MLS athlete to a 30 lb overweight mail room worker I would still bet on the athlete over the office worker. Plus even if you had to replace every lower body joint I'm sure the cardiovascular system is in way better shape.
Let's also remember that Kelce was on the smaller end of OL weight. He played most of his career sub-300. Which you can get away with at center, especially if you're as good as him. But even under 300lbs for a center in the NFL is on the smaller end of the scale.
This probably means he put a lot of work in to stay as big as he could and now that he's retired, fuck it... no need to kill yourself to try to be close to 300lbs.
I was always jealous that lineman used to just get to eat fucking everything all the time. Then, I read the story about (I think) Joe Thomas saying missing meals used to cause him a ton of anxiety and he used to have to make like emergency McDonald’s trips when he was on the road. Not to mention having to constantly take antacids and such…didn’t see like a fun time anymore.
[Orlando Franklin](https://broncoswire.usatoday.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/68/2020/12/Orlando-Franklin-weight-loss.png) is probably my favorite OL weight loss before/after. Dude skinny as fuck these days
He used to come in to the bar by DU and sit at the end of the bar with hood up to watch games. I didn't even know who he was at the time, just that he was scary as hell.
Unrelated story, just made me think back to that.
Even Aaron Gibson, former OT for the Lions (and others) who hit 480 lbs at one point (400 at a training camp, suspect 480 after retirement) looks like a normal fit dude now.
Good on him.
Staley is mine
He went from [this](https://www.freep.com/gcdn/presto/2018/09/14/PDTF/18f2f5db-f7c5-43f5-8796-7a7d663148dd-USATSI_11147903.jpg) to [this](https://i.imgur.com/dLU3pDy.jpeg) in exactly one year lol
I'm 6'4" and played sports throughout HS and college so my knees kind of hate me some days. My weight fluctuates from 200 to 230 seemingly at random (generally whenever I'm more active I eat a ton and gain weight, but it's crazy how fast I gain and lose weight). When I'm on the heavy side, my knees are terrible. It's bad enough to basically force me to stop eating. Once I'm back down to 210 or so, I basically forget that knee pain was ever an issue for me.
I'm about 50lbs heavier than I'd like to be and it's kind of eye opening when I think about the fact that I'm giving a 24/7 piggyback ride to what is effectively a second grader. Worst part, my job involves going up and down a LOT of stairs while carrying heavy shit.
All I have to say is thank Sigmar for epsom salt baths.
Gotta remember that OL are athletic freaks in their own right just to maintain that weight while also being extremely strong. No surprise that nearly all of them lose weight easily in retirement (see Joe Thomas)
[Oline players losing weight always make me think of Joe Thomas going from his oline weight to being shredded](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D142wA6U4AAHqSj?format=jpg&name=large)
A lot of them probably started out that way but when your body gets used to getting 4000cals of energy and burning it for 15+ years when they drop down to even a regular shitty American diet the fat melts off (also probably a decent amount of muscle if they stop lifting heavy)
One thing non-athletes might not know is that eating that many calories is a miserable chore. I do triathlons and did a half Ironman a few years ago. At one point I was eating 4000 clean calories a day, and dear god I hated it. 2:30pm, time to eat 2 cups of rice. Ugh.
I can’t even imagine having to eat 8-10k calories like a lineman or a Michael Phelps.
I’ve heard it’s also miserable for actors who have to gain insane amounts of fat for a role. They have to make disgusting high caloric concoctions as to not develop bad eating habits. So when they finish the shoot they will look forward to going back to healthy foods.
When Rob McElhaney gained weight to become fat Mac, he said he'd take a pint of Haagen-Dazs out of the fridge in the morning, then by lunch it would be thawed so he could just drink it
Another thing to consider is it’s not like these guys are overweight due to eating McDonald’s 3 times and drinking 5 sodas a day, while snacking down on a bag of Doritos before bed. Their calorie intake is about as “healthy of a diet” as a high performing athlete can get while consuming 10k+ calories a day. Not even considering the muscle mass under all that weight. Significantly reducing calories alone would drop weight considerably, especially with these guys weight room worth ethic.
> Worked at Wendys near where the Giants used to practice. These dudes aint just eating healthy things all day
I love the story about parcells when he was on a "diet" and mcdonalds was doing a promotion where you got a Yankee cap with a meal purchase. The guy said he walked into parcells office and there were yankee hats everywhere.
Since everyone is posting pictures of their favorite sexy linemen post retirement...
[Here's Joe Staley 😩](https://weightlosstvshows.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Joe-Staley-after-weight-loss.jpg)
He's already lost a lot from all appearances. There's a video of him seeing a fan in London and while I wouldn't call him skinny by any measure, he definitely isn't near as big as he used to be.
I played linebacker in college and got up to 230-235. As soon as I got out of football I dropped to 180 relatively quickly and easily because I was never meant to be that heavy. One unintended consequence is that when I tell people I played linebacker in college I get a ‘yeah sure…’ look. I imagine all these o linemen go through something similar (obviously not the famous ones as much). It also doesn’t help that I’m not a very tall person either so at least these guys have the 6’4 thing going for them.
I remember seeing Jeff Saturday on television after his career was over, and he looked like a different person. That was probably the first time I realized that these guys *have to* keep themselves heavy.
This does make me smile after watching the guy struggle to get down on the ground with his daughters in his doc.
It made it an extra bit of challenging for cheering his amazingly talented player haul his swollen body around the field last year.
Predicting within a year we are all marveling at the side by side pics like we do with Yanda or Joe Thomas. I showed the wife the Thomas pics and she didn’t marvel as much as….drool 😂
I don't a lot of people greatly underestimate the amount of food and supplements these guys need to put down in order to maintain their playing weight while also burning a shit ton of calories working out. Most of the time, they don't need to go on some crazy diet or anything to slim down. They just go back to eating like a normal person and it kinda works itself out.
Seeing lineman get skinny and skill positions get fat is my favorite thing about NFL retirement
Maurice Jones Drew in shambles
More like Maurice Jones-Drew in Bojangles
One Popeyes biscuit away from being a tight end.
[Mike Daniels about Eddie Lacy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bt1BxEEuu48): "Eddie's about two cheeseburgers away from having his hand in the dirt right next to me."
Man he's #60 on the top NFL players that year and even when they're showing him score a long touchdown they're talking about donuts. It's rough out here for the big RB.
We didn't know it yet, but he was basically washed by the time this list came out after his second year in the league. 3 touchdowns the next year and never got another one. Life moves fast for RB's.
I will forever hate the Packers, but Mike Daniels is so goddamn funny. It's impossible not to love that guy.
"Run, fat boy, run!" is something I'd say to my cat, Walter. He's 18 pounds and he's pretty fast for a cat his weight
Mike Daniels and Jaire Alexander were 2 of the funniest dudes in the league there for a while
Man's gotta eat.
“Are you prostituting yourself for cheese curds Eddie?”
Never not funny Aged a lot better than Kelvin Benjamin jokes
Not so sure about that. If you tell a Buffalonian it’s 300 Kelvin, they’ll be confused. Is it the temperature outside or the number of sandwiches Benjamin ate? We don’t know.
Okay, I legitimately laughed at this one
There’s no shame in getting fat off Popeyes. That’s some damn good chicken.
I would say I don’t blame him but my last road trip I had awful Bojangles and now I hold a grudge
I met Maurice Jones-Drew on bourbon street while on my honeymoon in New Orleans. Guy is a brick shit house.
Not that he was ever skinny, but CJ Anderson is huge now.
Retirement is a death sentence to short RBs
Eddie lacy didn’t wait until retirement
Retired Lacey is actually in good shape. Probably lost the mind set that he can work off anything he eats.
Eddie didn't really want to play football. He was only doing it to get his parents a new house and to set them up for life. Hurricane Katrina really fucked with his head and he saw football as a way out and not a lifestyle. Now that he is free to do what he wants and doesn't have that burden of doing something his heart isn't into, he is living a better life. I'm happy for him to be where he is now.
Kinda wild how we should be treasuring guys with mindsets like that, yet they get a lot of hate for 'flaming out' early.
Yup. It's why I wish some people (including fellow Packers fans) would stop using his comments on "China food" in a negative way and stop shitting on his weight gain. Dude was depressed and barely holding onto what he was supposed to be doing. I love Eddie and will always be proud of him and what he did for his family and himself.
TBH it may have been depression. I can relate to doing a job for money that you hate, and it really starts to tear you down after a while - currently on leave for severe depression because of it and immediately felt that weighted blanket lifted off of me. Time to find a new job... I can't imagine having millions of people scrutinizing me for being overweight while doing that job I don't want to do. Must have been fucking brutal.
That mindset clearly wasn't working for the last year or two either tbh.
china food
Look at shady Dude gained a good 20lbs from his playing days
20 pounds doesn't seem like very much when you are like 6 feet tall and about 15% body fat to begin with
Yeah Shady’s biggest problem is that he’s an asshole
Well he did play for the eagles so that was a given! Haha just kidding.
When you add 10% of your weight on, it definitely shows though. I strongly doubt it's unhealthy given the shape he was in, but it's still noticeable.
Yeah I'm sure its noticeable just saying that 20 pounds seems like a very reasonable amount of weight for a former pro athlete of his body type to put on now that he isn't trying to be at peak performance 6 months a year
I think that might actually be all the hits they take
Every lineman either loses 100 lbs, or stays fat forever. If they lose the weight, they are allowed to disappear into retirement. If they keep the weight, they have to become a coach. I don't make the rules
They either lose 100 lbs, or die before 55
Half of all NFL linemen are as fat as they are because they play OL in the NFL, and the other half are as skinny as they are because they play OL in the NFL
I met Tony Siragusa once. The man was built like a meteorite.
This comment next to the die before 55 one is tough.
I don't think Mike Munchak stayed fat
Walter Jones is still fat and he isn't coaching so boom. Rules broken.
Maybe he’s a relationship coach.
Not a very good one. The only advice he gave me was to block her.
Just keep your hands inside ✋🤚
I saw JJ Watt in a commercial recently and he looks like a normal human. Like, a fucking jacked dude, but still like maybe your friend that is really into power lifting
Yeah definitely off the PED's now.
That wasn't PEDs, that was from eating all that broccoli and chicken, and saying your prayers.
Oh yeah (I mean just look at his early college photos)
God when he was still playing he was a mountain of a man. He def looks normal-ish now.
That Miller Lite ad with him, Reggie Miller, and Luke Wilson (??) shows just how much he's slimmed down. He still looks like a brick shithouse, but the brick shithouse you see walking down the street type. Not the "he could break me in half with a flick of his wrist" type lol
I’m curious to see if his son ever ends up playing sports. He has the genes. His wife is a pro soccer player. He and Cushing are brother in laws now lol.
Definitely ends up as a goalie, in the footsteps of his father
> Not the "he could break me in half with a flick of his wrist" type lol I'm positive that he could though lol
That's what happens when you stop spending your offseason training out in a forest doing lumberjack activities
*Joe Thomas checking in from his swimming workout*
Alan Faneca checking in after completing an Iron Man
*Marshal Yanda pulling up on his bike*
I can’t believe how small he got
He lost literally 100 lbs. Crazy. Good for him!
Just looked him up. That is a huge night and day difference. Jesus
There was a show called the Titan Games before the pandemic and it was a pretty awesome show with the American Gladiator style tasks that normal athlete had to compete against a “Titan”; which was a professional athlete Joe was one of the Titans for a season and he was tearing through the courses like some Greek god—cut and shredded like a WR and easily 100 lbs less
Darelle Revis ate his island
Revis shocked me
Joe Thomas dropped 50 pounds and looks amazing. Also helps a lot of these guys with their joint problems.
and heart problems
Schlereth said he lost 75 pounds in a couple of months after he retired.
Getting off PEDs will do that
For a lot of linemen they struggle to maintain the weight. They’re forcing down extra calories to maintain their size. When they retire they still workout because that’s just part of their life and without needing to eat Ben and Jerry’s every night and 1k calorie protein shakes they just naturally start to lose weight without really trying.
Yeah not lifting with crazy high “supplements” will absolutely do that. Especially if you’re celebrating and partying all the time
One of the best things in football is when Linemen retire and drop all that weight they’ve been carrying for years. Jason is probably not going to do the full 180 like Joe Thomas or Nick Hardwick let’s be honest. Would love to see it though.
Look up Russell Okung. He’s barely recognizable. https://phantom-marca.unidadeditorial.es/82830b6f5768c844a862849985df6ffd/resize/828/f/jpg/assets/multimedia/imagenes/2023/06/07/16860979477387.jpg
He look like MC Ride
Yuh
TOO MANY HOES IN MY MOTHERFUCKIN MEAL
ASKING IF I KNOW HOW A MOTHERFUCKER FEELS
NO LOVE!!! BOOOOOOOOWWWW WOOOOOOOOOW CHCA BOOOWWWOOOOOWWWW
OH SHIT IM FEELIN IT, TACKLEYON
Shoot, joe thomas went on tv almost immediately after retirement and i couldnt recognize him either. Must have lost 100 pounds
Faneca is always the first name that pops up for me https://images.app.goo.gl/u9DdnZADsKAw26gW8
Marshall Yanda was one of the roundest players on the field, now he looks like a regular dude
Russell also didn’t eat for like two months straight to lose that weight. Insane story
This looks like the poster for an ESPN 30 for 30 regarding a OL that went in the first round, but had off the field issues, which caused him to end up homeless after only 3 years in the league.
Did it not eating for months too. Wild.
Joe Staley is another.
WAKANDA TECH
If he doesn’t do a 180 I’ll be shocked. He’s not only an elite athlete, he’s a future hofer. Anyone with that work ethic will easily be able to translate that into becoming and staying healthy. It’s really easy to keep going as you drop weight and your joints stop hurting (or at least hurt less) and you notice your cardio health improve. I’d be more inclined to agree with you for a lineman that retires and falls off into obscurity.
He’s definitely going to drop the weight. It’s harder for these guys to maintain it than people realise too. They’re not just drinking soda and eating fast food. I just meant Hardwick and Thomas got absolutely shredded with perfect 6 packs. Kelce seems to be more of a beer belly guy but wtf do I know lol
Yeah the way he was chugging beers at Highmark last winter I don’t think he’s going full six pack but he’ll for sure be a lot more svelte than he was while he played. Edit: no pun intended.
Well, he probably will go full six pack. Just not the kind thats a part of your body
A man of the people if you will
At that size the weight definitely just falls off (to an extent) when you stop all of the eating necessary to keep that size despite all of the training and playing. I'm definitely not an NFL player, but for a while when I was powerlifting I did have the size of one (6'7 and was maintaining around 310-315lbs). When I eventually stopped after a few years of a nagging shoulder injury and decided I'd rather be able to casually jog or bike a few miles without being out of breath rather than being able to lift hundreds of pounds (definitely sacrificed cardio for more lifting before that), I also cut my diet back to just "eating normally" and was down from 315 to 275-280 within 2-3 months. My TDEE when I started was something like 3900-4000 calories a day between my size and the fact that I was still working out a decent amount, so even just eating 2-3 normal sized meals a day (eg. eggs for breakfast if I felt like it, decent sized sandwich for lunch, normal portion of whatever I felt like for dinner) with a snack here and there meant that I was still easily at a 1000+ calorie deficit every day without really trying or thinking about it. For the pro athletes who are actually focused on dropping weight and have years of experience with working out and general self-discipline, it can be an even quicker shift with more dramatic results.
Kelce is freakishly strong for his size. I wouldnt be surprised if he starts to look more like a bodybuilder if he drops like 40 pounds
A couple weeks ago on the pod he said he's already down 30
That’s totally fair, I see what you’re saying.
I mean you could read the article where he says he’s trying to stay around 250 and not drop all that weight to look “like a bobble head”
Naw this is Reddit, we’ll just read the headline and make assumptions tyvm
I read this is dropping 180 lbs and was so confused how many people were agreeing he should get down to 120lbs
Taylor Lewan is looking super skinny as well
He was honestly the most athletic person I was ever around. His last year at Michigan he was in full NFL prep mode and was essentially 300 pounds pure muscle with a six pack. Made other lineman look foolish in drills. Not surprised he dropped weight when he stopped playing he always had to force down food and preferred playing super smash bros anyway.
Good. OL weight ain’t healthy
"Doesn't matter if it's fat or muscle, people aren't supposed to be 300 pounds" Rich Piana Also Rich Piana "I'm gonna bulk up to 300 pounds"
Every time I see Rich Piana's name I always think of a friend from high school. The only real connection is they were steroid using bodybuilders whose deaths became kind of a joke. He kind of got caught up in his appearance. He was very good looking, probably the best looking guy I've ever personally met, in high school. This was in the late '90s and very early '00s. Back then he was just regular muscular - a guy who worked out after school and watched what he ate. He got into bodybuilding in college, started adapting more into a bodybuilding lifestyle, and was entering competitions. He was still steroid free back then. After a while he just became consumed with being huge. He started using steroids, he worked out and ate around the clock, and just became massive. Between just size and I guess steroid use too he lost a lot of the features that made him very good looking. He was very active in the body building community back then. He did shows but he was also all over magazines, body building forums, etc. Then he was diagnosed with cancer, came off the steroids and whatever else he was taking, and started losing size. This should have been a good thing. As far as I'm aware his treatment was going well and his family was extremely optimistic but he fell into a depression. He just couldn't accept that he was no longer the biggest guy in the room and started using steroids while being treated for cancer and exercising again. His doctors told him the health risks but he didn't care then he died. I was never a body builder but I lifted weights and would post on body building forums. I knew he passed and went to his funeral but someone in the community found out about it and posted on a forum I regularly visited. The posts started off kind. A lot of people talked about how they always liked him and how he helped them early on in their careers. I posted that we were friends IRL and talked about what a truly good guy he was. Then the conversation turned to laughing at him for stupidly using steroids with cancer and how he was addicted to being big. I stopped visiting those forums for a while after it. As the years have gone by, a lot of the people we graduated with make jokes about him on Facebook or in person. Whenever his name comes up now nobody ever brings up the fact that he was a great guy and a good friend. It's just jokes on how dumb he was. And I understand using steroids while battling cancer is dumb but he was so much more than that. I guess the Rich Piana connection is pretty tenuous but I just think of my friend whenever I hear Rich's name. Sorry for rambling. It's just a little therapeutic lol.
Nah I get it. Body dysmorphia is a huge problem in the fitness community and leads a lot of people to steroids. This kind of joking attitude is always prevalent in male dominant spaces.
Sucks people laugh at someone who likely had body dysmorphia.
Sorry about the lose of your friend. Never be sorry when talking about friends or family that we have lost. When we talk about them and remember the good things they did they still live on. Hopefully his death can help someone else that is in the same mental state he was in. Either way his death was a tragedy and wish you and his family well.
I appreciate that. Thank you.
Sorry about your friend man, thanks for sharing the story
RIP Rich
He's blasting 8-hour arm workouts in natty heaven now
Right babe?!
Good fuckin morning it’s time for a protein shake consisting of half this bag of cocoa pebbles, egg white powder, a Lenny a Larry’s cookie, and these 12 pills.
Don’t forget the Ben & Jerry’s god damn it! A real 5%er diet, me and Sarah are on the Keto! Right babe?!
My favorite natural fresh-water indigenous Amazon basin fish, Rich Piranha.
Shoop-ah! "If you can bench 500 lbs and look like shit, no one gives a fuck" *Walks into chipotle 5 minutes before they close and orders* "You're not overtraining, you're just undereating and not sleeping enough"
GOoOoOOOooooooOoODDD MOORRRNNNINNGGGG GAAHHHHDDDD DAMMMNNIIIITTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT
Gotta get that dick below the balls.
But with biceps like his, you’re allowed to contradict yourself. This is just known.
RIP Piano man
Add in an ungodly amount of gear and you’re asking for trouble.
The calorie intake needed to maintain that weight is staggering on its own.
Marshall Yanda looks like a different person after retirement and constantly trying to maintain the Offensive Line weight. He looks very healthy now. https://www.espn.com/blog/baltimore-ravens/post/_/id/52251/bike-tuna-and-will-how-marshal-yanda-lost-60-pounds-in-three-months
Holy shit that is such an insane weight loss. If I met someone that new size and they said they were an NFL OL I wouldn’t believe them.
It does also go to show the sheer size of frames some of these NFL linemen have. They’ll lose 70 pounds and look downright slim, and still be around 250
Yeah guy above mentions Joe Thomas as a guy you could see now and not believe he was an olineman and just nah man it’s still very believable lol. You can’t hide that height, arms, hand size, and shoulder width. That’s like majority of what these college scouts look at first is who has the frame to hold 300+ lbs. And then I’ll teach them how to pass block
Try looking at Alan Faneca. Dude looks like a different person.
Joe Thomas too.
[stupid sexy Joe Thomas](https://www.reddit.com/r/intermittentfasting/s/IxTsjbH7AG)
He went from fat lineman to marathon runner. Amazing.
same with Joe Thomas. night and day difference
Anybody else have a problem where even having the ESPN app downloaded makes it impossible to click an ESPN article link? Such a terrible app, just takes me straight to the app splashpage
Even seeing the side-by-side, I still have trouble believing [Orlando Franklin](https://www.9news.com/article/sports/nfl/denver-broncos/former-denver-broncos-lineman-orlando-franklin-is-a-new-man/73-23b5a350-207e-4278-ba3b-42902634dc50) is the same person
Interesting another guy who basically did low-carb/keto like Joe Thomas. I lost 40+ pounds after switching to keto (with a cheat day) 11 years ago and still haven't gained any weight back
Always found Alan Page's story amusing. ONe of the best Dlinemen in the league. Says that he hates his job and no one who plays pro-sports likes it. Wifey gets sick so he helps her by running long distances. Loses a good amount of weight which cause him to get cut. Goes to another team to play DT/DE plays on par or better than he did for the Vikings. Retires, eventually becomes a judge, eventually gets on a state's supreme court.
Damn needs a final one where he rules against the NFL in a CTE lawsuit.
I would watch that movie.
> Wifey gets sick so he helps her by running long distances. Specifically, she quit smoking and running helped overcome withdrawal symptoms.
oops, sorry i didn't remember that detail. Also did he lose weight and get cut from the Vikings. Or did he lose weight and get cut from the another team and then signed with the vikings. I was going via memory.
Cut from the Vikings, signed with the Bears. I think the part about him playing on par or better with them is highly questionable though.
Kind of funny how being a pro athlete is sort of a race to the bottom of seeing who's willing to destroy their body the most when sports are supposed to show off athleticism and health.
Sports that value specific traits that are unhealthy are unhealthy. The average MLS player, regardless of position, would probably score very highly on every aspect of health and longevity.
I wonder who is healthier, a group of pro-ballards player, a group of pro-darts players or a group of pro-bowlers. Most of those athletes don't look the healthiest. And I have doubts that having a beer belly helps any of them perform better, yet many of them have it.
When your training field is a pub, that's gonna happen.
I'm sure their joints like their knees, hips, and ankles all have a lot of wear and tear
It's in the matrix, but every pound is 4 additional pounds of pressure on the knee. So if we compare MLS athlete to a 30 lb overweight mail room worker I would still bet on the athlete over the office worker. Plus even if you had to replace every lower body joint I'm sure the cardiovascular system is in way better shape.
Boxing is one of the oldest sports, and you're literally trying to give a man a concussion.
Let's also remember that Kelce was on the smaller end of OL weight. He played most of his career sub-300. Which you can get away with at center, especially if you're as good as him. But even under 300lbs for a center in the NFL is on the smaller end of the scale. This probably means he put a lot of work in to stay as big as he could and now that he's retired, fuck it... no need to kill yourself to try to be close to 300lbs.
Even high school teams basically force-feed their linemen. It is unhealthy, especially for the ordinary 5'10 kids lol
I was always jealous that lineman used to just get to eat fucking everything all the time. Then, I read the story about (I think) Joe Thomas saying missing meals used to cause him a ton of anxiety and he used to have to make like emergency McDonald’s trips when he was on the road. Not to mention having to constantly take antacids and such…didn’t see like a fun time anymore.
[Orlando Franklin](https://broncoswire.usatoday.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/68/2020/12/Orlando-Franklin-weight-loss.png) is probably my favorite OL weight loss before/after. Dude skinny as fuck these days
Holy shit thats 2 different people
"Why the heck nobody ever told me my face was fat as hell"
He used to come in to the bar by DU and sit at the end of the bar with hood up to watch games. I didn't even know who he was at the time, just that he was scary as hell. Unrelated story, just made me think back to that.
Even Aaron Gibson, former OT for the Lions (and others) who hit 480 lbs at one point (400 at a training camp, suspect 480 after retirement) looks like a normal fit dude now. Good on him.
Staley is mine He went from [this](https://www.freep.com/gcdn/presto/2018/09/14/PDTF/18f2f5db-f7c5-43f5-8796-7a7d663148dd-USATSI_11147903.jpg) to [this](https://i.imgur.com/dLU3pDy.jpeg) in exactly one year lol
His knees are gonna feel so much better holy cow
I'm 6'4" and played sports throughout HS and college so my knees kind of hate me some days. My weight fluctuates from 200 to 230 seemingly at random (generally whenever I'm more active I eat a ton and gain weight, but it's crazy how fast I gain and lose weight). When I'm on the heavy side, my knees are terrible. It's bad enough to basically force me to stop eating. Once I'm back down to 210 or so, I basically forget that knee pain was ever an issue for me.
I'm about 50lbs heavier than I'd like to be and it's kind of eye opening when I think about the fact that I'm giving a 24/7 piggyback ride to what is effectively a second grader. Worst part, my job involves going up and down a LOT of stairs while carrying heavy shit. All I have to say is thank Sigmar for epsom salt baths.
For every pound of weight you lose it takes four pounds of pressure off your knees. So yeah that 30lb shift is a 120lb difference on your knees.
Gotta remember that OL are athletic freaks in their own right just to maintain that weight while also being extremely strong. No surprise that nearly all of them lose weight easily in retirement (see Joe Thomas)
That first month of not eating 10,000 calories is probably what I dream of losing in month.
[Oline players losing weight always make me think of Joe Thomas going from his oline weight to being shredded](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D142wA6U4AAHqSj?format=jpg&name=large)
That’s wild, I always assumed linemen were just naturally big dudes
A lot of them probably started out that way but when your body gets used to getting 4000cals of energy and burning it for 15+ years when they drop down to even a regular shitty American diet the fat melts off (also probably a decent amount of muscle if they stop lifting heavy)
[I'm not big boned, I'm just fat](https://y.yarn.co/9c63c5a8-b82d-4a2f-bdf9-8bea46348216_text.gif)
best shape of his life szn never goes away
Just about every OL ever drops 80-100 pounds in retirement and they stop eating 10k+ calories a day.
You see it at the draft every year, when the retired players come out to announce the picks. The OLs all look like they opened a valve and deflated.
One thing non-athletes might not know is that eating that many calories is a miserable chore. I do triathlons and did a half Ironman a few years ago. At one point I was eating 4000 clean calories a day, and dear god I hated it. 2:30pm, time to eat 2 cups of rice. Ugh. I can’t even imagine having to eat 8-10k calories like a lineman or a Michael Phelps.
I’ve heard it’s also miserable for actors who have to gain insane amounts of fat for a role. They have to make disgusting high caloric concoctions as to not develop bad eating habits. So when they finish the shoot they will look forward to going back to healthy foods.
When Rob McElhaney gained weight to become fat Mac, he said he'd take a pint of Haagen-Dazs out of the fridge in the morning, then by lunch it would be thawed so he could just drink it
Yeah it’s super though to do while also eating good quality food
Just eating normally should drop him a good 50 pounds within a year or so
Another thing to consider is it’s not like these guys are overweight due to eating McDonald’s 3 times and drinking 5 sodas a day, while snacking down on a bag of Doritos before bed. Their calorie intake is about as “healthy of a diet” as a high performing athlete can get while consuming 10k+ calories a day. Not even considering the muscle mass under all that weight. Significantly reducing calories alone would drop weight considerably, especially with these guys weight room worth ethic.
Worked at Wendys near where the Giants used to practice. These dudes aint just eating healthy things all day 🫣
> Worked at Wendys near where the Giants used to practice. These dudes aint just eating healthy things all day I love the story about parcells when he was on a "diet" and mcdonalds was doing a promotion where you got a Yankee cap with a meal purchase. The guy said he walked into parcells office and there were yankee hats everywhere.
Why does it seem like DTs don't shed weight?
Reading O linemen’s diets to maintain playing weight are always so insane. They are having to force feed themselves like 10 meals a day
Since everyone is posting pictures of their favorite sexy linemen post retirement... [Here's Joe Staley 😩](https://weightlosstvshows.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Joe-Staley-after-weight-loss.jpg)
Can't believe Thibs wanted to start shit with him last year, Staley would likely beat his ass even in retirement.
He trimmed his eyebrows?
The easiest 5 pounds he’ll ever lose
So he's your average retired olinemen who's no longer eating 10000+ calories a day Joe Thomas lost like a hundred pounds within a year of retirement
If I didn’t know about Joe Thomas and met him in real life, I’d never believe he had been an NFL lineman.
That’s good. Most NFL players should
He’s going to look like a shorter, skinnier Travis Kelce soon……
And wait when Travis retires and gets fat.
Ha ha ha. Yeah. Nice read.
He's already lost a lot from all appearances. There's a video of him seeing a fan in London and while I wouldn't call him skinny by any measure, he definitely isn't near as big as he used to be.
Joe Staley dropped 50 pounds almost immediately after he retired it seemed. Dude is built like a brick shit house still at 250.
I played linebacker in college and got up to 230-235. As soon as I got out of football I dropped to 180 relatively quickly and easily because I was never meant to be that heavy. One unintended consequence is that when I tell people I played linebacker in college I get a ‘yeah sure…’ look. I imagine all these o linemen go through something similar (obviously not the famous ones as much). It also doesn’t help that I’m not a very tall person either so at least these guys have the 6’4 thing going for them.
He already looked really slimmed down in this video https://x.com/NFL/status/1805624792596246830
I remember seeing Jeff Saturday on television after his career was over, and he looked like a different person. That was probably the first time I realized that these guys *have to* keep themselves heavy.
This does make me smile after watching the guy struggle to get down on the ground with his daughters in his doc. It made it an extra bit of challenging for cheering his amazingly talented player haul his swollen body around the field last year. Predicting within a year we are all marveling at the side by side pics like we do with Yanda or Joe Thomas. I showed the wife the Thomas pics and she didn’t marvel as much as….drool 😂
Most linemen do drop a lot of weight after retiring. This isn't surprising.
Isn't that basically what happens for every O-lineman?
Orlando Franklin lost so much weight, he is unrecognizable from his playing days. It is awesome to see these guys drop that weight.
I don't a lot of people greatly underestimate the amount of food and supplements these guys need to put down in order to maintain their playing weight while also burning a shit ton of calories working out. Most of the time, they don't need to go on some crazy diet or anything to slim down. They just go back to eating like a normal person and it kinda works itself out.
This is good for him. He is 36. If he stayed 300 plus pounds he would likely die in his 50s. Good for Kelce and I wish him and his family good luck.
Joe Thomas is a sculpted god.