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Lakewood Times

Lakewood Times

Lakewood Times

    Joe Thomas Canton bound?

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    After 11 Years on the Cleveland Browns, left tackle Joe Thomas decided to call it a career. The Cleveland Brown all-time great explained his reasoning behind retiring citing his body just cannot take on another season in the NFL. The Browns announced Thomas’ decision via Twitter with a video tribute dedicated to Thomas and his excellent career as a Cleveland Brown.

    In an interview with The Thomahawk Show, Thomas explained his decision;

    “As a competitor, you always think that you can do it, but there’s a point in your career … that you get to that crossroad and say, ‘I just can’t do it anymore. I just don’t have it in my body. My mind is good, but my body is not willing.’ And I think that’s where I am.

    I’ve had a number of injuries throughout my career. Obviously, I’ve only had one that has kept me from missing time, but those injuries that you have throughout your career, they add up. Like, I’ve had, during my NFL career, two knee scopes. I had an ACL surgery when I was in college. I had another knee scope when I was in college. So I’ve had four knee surgeries in my career, obviously the elbow surgery, countless ligament tears, muscle tears, arthritis in just about every joint in my body, and you just get to that point where you can’t do it anymore.

    I remember a time during the season last year, where I was standing in front of the media at the podium — this was before I got hurt — and I had Mobic, which is a powerful anti-inflammatory, in my body, I had Tylenol and Vicodin, and I couldn’t stand for more than a minute or two without excruciating bone pain in my knee and my back. It was almost at that point where I was saying to myself, ‘I don’t know how I’m going to make it through the rest of this season.’ Now luckily my elbow snapped before anything happened with the rest of my body, but you just start thinking in you head, like I don’t know how much longer I can do this.”

    Thomas had a Hall of Fame career achieving several Pro Bowl appearances, 10,000 plus consecutive snaps, as well as being a team captain for several years.

    Although it is sad to see such a productive player leave the Browns after many difficult seasons, we will surely see Thomas enshrined in a few years a couple miles down the road in Canton for his standout career.

     

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