Billy Sims karate kick and the horrible investments he made

Yesterday on Pardon the Interruption they gave a shout out to Detroit Lion Billy Sims and what goes down as one of the greatest/funniest/most amazing plays I’ve ever seen. I’m a bit shocked that I hadn’t seen this video before since this is the type of stuff that I love but I was only 3 years old when Sims displayed his Chun Li Streetfighter-esk kicking abilities so it was a bit before my time. Aside from how awesome the karate kick was I really enjoyed the announcer description of the play: “Oh my goodness…did you see that…he hit Steve Brown with what looked like a kah-ra-tay kick…you think he’s not ready to play football today”. Fast forward this play to last Sunday and imagine that Joe Buck was announcing the game and Arian Foster decides to Daniel Son the Jaguars Aaron Ross. If you thought that his reaction to Randy Moss’s touchdown celebration against the Packers was bad then you haven’t seen nothing yet. I’m pretty sure that he would strike down upon Foster like he just saw him steal money from the Salvation Army red bucket on Christmas Eve. The last thing he would be saying is, “you think he’s not ready to play football today”.

What you probably didn’t know about Billy Sims is that his business acumen is about as horrible as that karate kick was awesome. Like many athletes he made some “bad investments” after he retired, promptly lost millions, and filed for bankruptcy. What were these bad investments you might ask? According to the all mighty Wiki: “There was a dinette manufacturer, a mini-supermarket, a nightclub, a chain of eyeglass stores, a pipe-fitting company, an apartment complex, a brass company, a car parts manufacturer, a company that made adhesive sealer for car paint and a small chain of catfish restaurants. He also invested in a radio station, a dry cleaner, and a water purifying business.” Wow, that’s more random than seeing Rik Smits sitting on a dirt bike inside his house. I’m all for being an entrepreneur and trying to make your money work for you but come on. What about being an NFL running back makes you think that you can run a successful chain of eyeglass stores or become a dinette manufacturer?