I started as the eighth quarterback at BYU, so this was a remarkable journey.- Steve Young
SANTA CLARA, Calif. — From eighth string to NFL legend, Steve Young brought his remarkable journey to an official end Monday morning, finally — unless Bill Walsh or Young come back and tell us there was another misunderstanding.
"Crazy . . . surreal . . . weird," Young said of his career, although he might have been talking about his months-long, Jordanesque deliberations over retirement. Or was he just referring to Monday's marathon retirement bash?
Years ago Young wanted to give up the professional game before it started; in the end it took him some 250 days to decide to give it up, and then a press conference that lasted half that long to announce it. Monday's Steve Young Retirement Extravaganza — brought to you live on three local TV stations — was three soap operas in length, but not even the biggest cynic could begrudge Young his moment. It was part funeral, part bon voyage, part press conference, part hero worship, part Hall of Fame Induction. Somehow Young wound up serving as M.C. at his own retirement ceremony. Weird.
But talk about timing and closure. Young shuts one chapter of his life just as he opens a new chapter, with a new wife, and baby makes three. What will he do next, he asked? He will start a school, he answered. He will open a law firm for lawyers with high ideals (a very small firm?). He will step up his philanthropy, giving money to people "doing good things in the community." He will aid start-up businesses. He will run his own companies. He will campaign for strong families. He will work for the Salt Lake Olympics. He will be a good husband and a good father.
Is this in one lifetime, or three?
When he set out on his football journey 16 years ago, perhaps even the angst-ridden Young would have approved of where it has led him. At the time, Young was leaving BYU to join the L.A. Express of the now defunct United States Football League. And he hated it. After signing his infamous $40 million contract in L.A., he sank into deep depression, largely because he feared money would change him and his values. He cried all the way home on the return flight to Provo. He sought counseling from school and church leaders. He told his father Grit to give the money back and that he didn't want to play pro football. Grit had to fly from New York to Provo to talk his son through three dark days and then personally escort him to California to report to the Express.
"He was in shock," said his mother, Sherry, at the time. "We were very concerned."
"There was not a happy thing about (the contract)," said Grit. "He was having a great struggle."
All these years later, Young remains fundamentally unchanged, despite the wealth, fame and success. He remains a deep thinker, given to serious introspection, who scrambles through life as if Warren Sapp is chasing him and searches for meaning in everything. In his darkest moments those many years ago, BYU coach LaVell Edwards assured him, "Money isn't bad in itself. You can do a lot of good with it." LDS Church leader Neal A. Maxwell told him, "You can still be a humble and caring person with the money."
By all accounts, Young has accomplished all of the above, which was in evidence at Monday's press conference. On Monday, they came from everywhere to see Young off to retirement — brothers, sisters, parents, BYU buddies, Edwards, Carmen Policy, Eddie DeBartalo, Mike Shanahan, Leigh Steinberg, Tom Holmoe, Harris Barton. Jerry Rice read a poem he wrote for the occasion. Brent Jones told Young stories. Steve Mariucci retired Young's ridiculously tiny shoulder pads — the same ones he wore at BYU 20 years and 25 pounds ago, which he insisted on wearing throughout his pro career ("I don't even think they're legal now," said Mariucci.).
They called Young a role model. They said he will be better at everything else he does in his life than he was at football. They said they loved him. They said he was even better person than a quarterback.
For a man who has played football for 31 of his 38 years, Young didn't arrive at retirement easily, and don't we know it. He has been waffling since last fall. On Monday he waxed poetic and nostalgic about the game: "I love the music they play after the touchdowns. I love playing in Candlestick Park and the ethereal fog that rolls into the stadium. I love pacing the sideline. I love playing Dallas and Green Bay. I love to walk through the tunnel before a game — it always smelled like a landfill. I will miss that . . . "
Only two weeks ago, Young was still vacillating about retirement. As he is wont to do, he sought advice from everyone he knew and overanalyzed it from every angle (although, strangely enough, the C word — concussion — was barely mentioned on Monday). "After one call," says Grit, "I'd think he was going to retire; after another call, I'd think he was going to keep playing." At one point, Young told his father, "Maybe I'll just go out and play relaxed and enjoy it this time." But Grit told him he could never do that. After all, we're talking about a player of such intensity that he used to throw up before and during games. He used to recite the game plan to himself driving alone in his car.
Grit wanted his son to continue his career. His mother, Sherry, who once charged onto a little league football field to scold a kid for tackling her son, was dead set against it, frightened by the string of concussions. For years she has been unable to watch Steve's games on TV; she has gone jogging instead and didn't return to the house until she thought she was ready to face the game again.
"Sundays will be good again," she says. "Now I can have a Saturday without that cloud hanging over my head. I am relieved he's retiring; I told him it was right."
Young's best friend Jim Herrmann was urging him to play for the Broncos as recently as three days ago, but by then it was Young who was saying, "You've got to let go. I've made up my mind."
Herrmann, Grit and Young are certain of one thing: They all believe he is still at the top of his game. "For the record, I know I can still play," said Young. " . . . I leave the game playing my best football."
As Herrmann noted, most observers forget that only two seasons ago Young passed for 4,170 yards and 36 touchdowns, both team records. The 49ers were 3-1 last season when Young was knocked out of the game forever by a concussion. Shanahan, who ranks Young among the top five quarterbacks of all-time, believes Young has the body of a 30-year-old and could still play three or four more years "at the top of his game."
In the end, Young arrived at his retirement decision on his knees a couple of weeks ago. "I studied it out prayerfully," he said. "I feel in my heart it's the right thing, and I can't deny it, and so I retire from the great game of football. This was the time. I count myself a spiritual man. That's the part that settled on me that this is the right thing to do . . . the deciding thing was more inspiration than anything else."
Not that he was completely happy about it. "Retiring at 38 . . . in a way, you know, it sucks," he said. He hadn't even cleaned out his locker on Monday. It was still crammed with books, football pictures, jerseys, shoes and a photo of LDS Church president Gordon B. Hinckley.
The question now is will the young and restless Young of today be happy with himself in another 17 years. When things turned real maudlin on Monday, he said he would like it written on his tombstone someday, "He did this, this, and this, and he played some football."
Don't look for Young to be involved in politics soon — his wife has told him this isn't the time — or to report to the TV booth — "I'm grateful not to work on Sunday," he said. "You'll see me in church more than (in football stadiums)." Young continued, "I am looking forward to intellectual challenges . . . being in conversations where I'm the stupidest guy in the room."
"Whatever he does, he's going to do extremely well," said Edwards. "Listening to him, you can't help but be impressed by his depth and how he expresses himself."
Young left his mark on the game — two MVP awards, the highest-ranked passer in history, a world championship — and along the way he seemed to make a personal connection with fans and reporters. He courted both, and that was part of his charm and popularity. Young was waiting in an airport two weeks ago when an elderly woman next to him looked up from her newspaper and said, "You look like Steve Young."
"A lot of people have told me that," said Young.
"I watched him play a lot," she said. "It's like I know him. I feel like he's my family."
"I'm sure he feels the same way," said Young.
E-MAIL:drob@desnews.com