Sometimes I wonder what would happen if NFL football players would pursue bodybuilding instead of football. There are some true freaks of nature playing professional sports. I never made it to the NFL as a football player, but even at the collegiate level I saw several thoroughbreds walking through the locker room. Look at our current and defending 2x Mr. Olympia, Phil Heath. He was a former college basketball player at the University of Denver. Sure, he was a well put together kid, but nobody could have ever guessed he had the genetics and desire to be a bodybuilding superstar. Even Ronnie Coleman played football at Grambling before joining the police force and eventually becoming a legend in our sport. So what if America’s freakiest specimens decided to forgo millions of dollars in football and pursue the sport of bodybuilding? Would we see the first 400lb contest ready bodybuilder?
First let’s take a look at why this would never happen. No physical mutant with size, speed, strength, and athletic talent would ever pursue bodybuilding over professional football. The shittiest player in the NFL makes more on salary alone than all the prize money Phil Heath has won in his 2 Mr. Olympia’s combined. Think about that for a second, bodybuilding’s #1 makes less money than the NFL’s worst. And Phil Heath makes a lot of money, what about bodybuilding’s 15th best bodybuilder in the world Hidetada Yamagishi. I can’t say what he makes, because I don’t know, but considering he competes at the Europa shows quite frequently which pay out $10,000 to the winner; that equivalent in the NFL would make about $10 million a year if not more. So it’s not money that’s driving this hypothetical question.
Next, let’s factor in who are the best and most freaky athletes in the world? Black guys. No black guy in America or any other part of the world grows up aspiring to be up on stage in a man thong, with oil all over his body, posing next to other guys – minus Kai Greene he was born to do it. It’s just not cool to be a bodybuilder, regardless of color. And really, it isn’t cool to be a bodybuilder no matter what country you live in, well maybe India. Besides there, everywhere we go people think we’re weird. But I digress, we all love it!
My biggest pet peeve in bodybuilding is the marketing of the brand across all demographics. I honestly question if the youth of America knows who Phil Heath or Jay Cutler is. I highly doubt it, because I see all kinds of LeBron and RGIII jerseys around town, but I rarely see a Gifted Athletics T-shirt (besides the one I sport to the gym) or Cutler Athletics T-shirt. I will admit and much to my chagrin, but I have seen quite a few Flag Nor Fail cut offs at my local Power House. Nonetheless, when the IFBB has a Bud Light sponsorship the way the NFL does, I will bow down!
And when it comes to diet, football and bodybuilding is literally night and day. I had teammates at Florida State University who would eat donuts for breakfast, burgers and fries for lunch, and huge pasta plates for dinner and would stand 6ft tall and weigh 250+lb with baseball sized abs protruding from their stomachs. Some bodybuilders smell a carb and they gain 3lb of water weight. It’s bullshit I know, happens to me too.
A football players training isn’t like a bodybuilder either. They’re doing explosive lifting in the weight room, plyometrics, speed training, and agility drills with their strength and conditioning coaches. I remember how happy I was when I could finally design my own training routines after college football because I could incorporate some arm training. Imagine if pro football players actually devoted the time and attention to detail that bodybuilders do to their workouts and training, skies the limit.
And I’d be remiss if I didn’t comment on performance enhancing drugs. Are there drugs in professional football? 100% without question, but to even think that the sophistication that bodybuilders, either local or on the IFBB stage, have in comparison to NFL football players is quite laughable. A pro football player is concerned with beating 
a drug test – period! You fail a drug test that’s a 4 game suspension. A single game check for the worst player in the NFL is approximately $15,000 per game (after taxes) x 4 games a month; yeah you do the math. We’ve all read the clearance times on the drugs chart. That leaves football players about 6 or 7 hormones and exotic compounds out there to play with. Compare that to the Mr. Olympia line up and you are talking in the neighborhood of 50 different drug options and probably 5000 different combinations and protocols to make the cocktail just picture perfect. So it’s really hard to say that football players or any athletes are just as dirty as professional bodybuilders.
With all that pessimism, I still love to imagine the, ‘what if,’ factor. The world’s best aren’t even competing in the sport we all know and love. It makes me dream about the future of bodybuilding and all its possibilities. Just when you think the sport had hit its genetic max with freaks like Ronnie and Jay, there are hundreds more out there who never even knew the sport existed!
So who do I think was the NFL’s most freakiest of freaks – past or present? For my money I’m going with Bo Jackson of the L.A. Raiders. He played at 6’1’’ and 235lb and it has always been rumored that he didn’t even seriously train. A country boy from Alabama, Bo was such a gifted athlete that he won a Heisman Trophy at the University of Auburn, started in the outfield for the Kansas City Royals in Major League Baseball, and ran the fastest hand timed 40 yard dash ever recorded at the NFL Combine with a time of 4.12 seconds. With his height he could have easily packed on another 50 to 60lb of pure muscle and dominated in the Lee Haney era. Bo definitely didn’t know bodybuilding.
So when you’re watching the NFL playoffs on TV this year, ask yourself this question: who missed out on being Mr. Olympia?
Until next time, as always bodybuilding and football fans follow me on Twitter @MattMeinrod
