LeGarrette Blount Has Officially Retired

Three-time Super Bowl champ and 2016's leading touchdown rusher, LeGarrette Blount has officially retired from the NFL per his IG.

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A post shared by LeGarrette Blount (@l_blount29)

Talk about picking your spot to get your name back in the mix;  the announcement comes on Blount's 34th birthday. 

Absolute genius move by someone who's been out of the game for two seasons to get a lil' extra love on his b-day. He's only had about 700 days since his last game to make this decision lolz.

The b-day boy, better known as Blount Force Trauma, last played for the Detroit Lions in 2018 under former Patriots defensive coordinator and now former Lions coach, Matt Patricia. 

Blount would never be confused with a Hall of Famer, but after going undrafted in 2010 (thanks in part to missing most of his senior season for clocking a Boise State player in face after his Oregon Duck's 2009 season opener) LG had himself a hell of a career.

via GIPHY

In nine seasons with five teams (Tampa, New England, Pittsburgh, New England again, Philly and Detriot) Blount ran for 6,306 yards and scored 56 touchdowns; 58 if you included receiving (dozahhh). CBS Sports put out an interesting graphic comparing his numbers to some other "bigger name" backs. 

In his second to last season, Blount won his third Super Bowl with the Eagles; against his former team, the New England Patriots. Blount scored his only career Super Bowl touchdown in that game, which must've been extra sweet since he wanted to come back to Foxboro, but Bill had other plans.

via: CBS Sports

"I called Bill up and said 'I want to be here. I know y'all want me to be here,'" Blount said on the CBS Sports Fantasy Football Today podcast. "I'm like 'Let's figure this out.' He calls me back, says 'You played well for us...we love you, we appreciate you, but you averaged the lowest yards per carry in your career. You averaged 3.9 a carry.'

"I said 'Bill, you gave me the ball 300 times. How am I supposed to average 4.5 yards per carry on 300 carries? Bro, I'm going to have to average a 20 or 30-yard run every day to keep that average up.' There were games where he was giving me 20 carries and I'm having 70 yards. That's just the way the game goes. 

Since this a Patriots centered publication I'm now going to focus on those better days. LG played for the Patriots from 2013; 2014-16 and helped the Patriots win two Super Bowls will racking up nearly 3,000 of his career yards and 34 touchdowns.  He was voted the 80th best player in the league after the 2016 season.

In September of 2016 when Tom Brady was serving his deflategate suspension, LG picked up the load big time by rushing for 298 yards and 3 touchdowns en route to AFC Offensive Player of the Month.  (Feels really weird and full circle to be blogging about a player who I wrote about in the first year of DOL retiring) 

In the 2010's there weren't many backs with his type of power and postseason resume; although you could argue the best run of his career came during his rookie year in Tampa Bay where he broke the 1,000 yard mark on a 10-6 team that just missed the playoffs.

In 11 playoff games Blount rushed for 600 yards and scored 11 touchdowns. Most importantly, his teams went 10-1 in those game, as I'll say it again, the dude won three rings.

LeGarrette killed more Colts in his career than broken legs.  I watched him rush for 27.6% of those playoff yards (166) and 4 touchdowns vs Indy in the 2013 AFC Divisional Round from the literal last row of Gillette Stadium during a rainstorm after a day-shift delivering pizzas.

While I don't have any pics/vids of LG's monster day I do have this in my camera roll from the game.

via GIPHY

LG was a fan favorite in New England and absolute wrecking ball in the backfield, but some of LG's best runs came on kickoff returns during his first season in Foxboro. It was so awesome to see such a bruising back who looked like he could be a D end returning kickoffs. Against the Bills in 2013, Blount racked up 145 kickoff return (and 180 rushing) yards.

180 rushing yards and 100+ kickoff return yards in the same game: Gale Sayers, Adrian Peterson, and LeGarrette Blount.

— Football Perspective (@fbgchase) December 30, 2013

Bill Belichick on LeGarrette Blount, who set a franchise record w/334 yards from scrimmage: "Clearly he was the best player on the field."

— Field Yates (@FieldYates) December 30, 2013

After signing with Pittsburgh following the 2013 season, LG smoked his way out of the Steel City and found his way back in New England. If Jonas Gray's alarm goes off after his four touchdown game against the Colts, who knows how differently the rest of LG's career plays out?

That butterfly effect rabbit hole is for another day, but for now it's about wishing LeGarrette well in retirement and I suppose a Happy Birthday too! Thanks for all those awesome runs and your contributions to two Patriot Super Bowl winning teams. I really hope we don't see the LG type of running back go extinct because he sure was awesome to watch.  Congrats on a great career, LeGarrette.