When Joe Montana and Emmitt Smith speak, you better believe Johnny Manziel is listening. He just might not appreciate what they have to say.
When asked of their opinions on Johnny Football , both Joe and Emmitt, in separate interviews with various outlets agreed: Manziel’s hard-partying lifestyle will ultimately lead to a shortened NFL career.
“That lifestyle is going to be…a short career lifestyle if he continues that,” Smith told hosts Shan & RJ during an interview on 105.3 The Fan . And while Emmitt was once a young player with a lot of money himself, he quickly learned that lifestyle had negative side effects when it came to the public eye:
“First, let’s recognize [that] Johnny is young. I was young and dumb myself at one point in time. But maturity itself, and maturing as a professional athlete, is something that is required of every pro football player. I think right now Johnny Manziel is going to get a glimpse of what negative press can do for you. A lot of people think negative press is good press, or any press is good press. It’s not.”
He also understands that the kind of partying Manziel reportedly does is unsustainable if he hopes to maintain a productive career in the NFL:
“Hopefully he’s not doing anything to hurt himself outside of drinking, which is going to harm his body and harm his performance anyway. At the end of the day, he’s going to have to learn to manage those things.”
Meanwhile, former 49ers quarterback Joe Montana echoed similar thoughts, even invoking the wisdom of his former coach Bill Walsh when asked about Johnny Football on NFL Total Access :
“I go back to an old saying Bill Walsh told me after we won our first Super Bowl,” Montana said. “I was going everywhere and trying to do everything. He called me in and said, ‘I want to tell you one thing, I understand what you’re doing, we may never get back to another Super Bowl. Just remember this, the less people see you, the more they want to see you.’
The hall of fame quarterback continued:
“And so basically he was saying, ‘It’s OK to do some things but try to cut it back and don’t forget about football.’ Because that’s what got you there and that is what’s going to keep you there. So you have to make sure you spend the time on football as much as getting out and about.”
What do you think? Will his hard-partying lifestyle cost Johnny Football a prolific NFL career?
