Hello, and it certainly isn't how I envision this or plan this, but I'm in a retire.

This is not an easy decision.

Honestly, it's the hardest decision on my life, but it is the right decision for me.

For the last four years or so, I've been in the cycle of injury pain, rehab, injury

and it's been unceasing and relenting both in season, both in and off season, and I felt stuck in it and the only way I see out is to no longer play football.

It's taken my joy of this game away.

And this...

In one of the more shocking happenings in the NFL's recent history, Andrew Luck announces his retirement from the NFL, the Colt Superstar Quarterback, announcing that injuries have taken the love

from the game for him.

So a man who's turning 30 years old on September 12th met with Colt's owner, Jim Urse, earlier Saturday to explain his decision.

And this is Dan Hanzes, the around the NFL podcast presented by Sirius XM, joined by Mark Cecil Chris Wessling and Greg Rosenthal.

And boys, this is an absolute bombshell that changes the complexion of the Colt's obviously, but the AFC and Wess Luck.

Nobody knew this was coming. We were at Patrick Leibons, a shrimp boil in fact, in the middle of a cornhole game and everyone was just dumbfounded and you could say the same thing about everyone else connected to football, Andrew Luck, done at age 29 in the NFL.

And you're recording the show what 36 hours later, you're reacting to so much more than just the news, you're reacting to the reaction, you're reacting to what you should have seen for three years considering the comments he's made.

And just looking, doing the research on what he said over the last few years, this is every bit as much of a mental health issue as a pain issue, as a physical issue, as Jim Urse said in 2017,

it's about the four-inch field between Andrew Luck's ears. And Urse took a lot of crap for that from people who didn't know what they were talking about and assumed they did from the outside looking in, but it looks own words, he is referred to the dark place, not a fun world to live in, scared to my core, a low point, miserable SOB, I withdrew, my life was empty, I have shame, I don't know about my worth as a human.

I'm weathered and less naive, and then at the press conference he said, this is the only way I see out of it, and out of it is the severe depression and identity crisis that he's been going through for three years.

And he said that already a weight had been lifted, and even though the press conference was obviously difficult, that the last week was difficult for him, he told Frank Reich and Urse and Chris Ballard early in the week,

so they knew this was coming, and I think if I'm a Colts fan, that makes me think that it's a little more final, it wasn't something he woke up one day, it was really about a week and a half or almost two week process over when he really decided, and that's he knew when he went out and practiced before the last Colts game, and looked pretty good by the way, moved pretty well, and enjoyed it, that was probably going to be his last time, and that's why he took the moment to enjoy it.

I mean, there's a lot to talk about, but first it's just that the press conference alone alone was just impressive. I don't know, it was like a really unique sports moment that it was hard not to admire Andrew Luck watching that there was a very 2019 feel to the whole thing because the Colts are playing a preseason game against the Bears in their building,

Luck's on the sideline, and his original plan is to tell his teammates after the game in the locker room that he'll be retiring, but during the game, Adam Schaefter of ESPN breaks it on Twitter, which creates a whole weird situation both if you watch the telecast, the announcers for the Colts team, they don't know what to do with that information.

They show luck down at the field. Obviously he's smiling, seems to be good spirits, the players, I guess don't even know, and we'll get to the crowd reaction in a little bit.

...