Reasons why Lawrence Taylor decided to leave giant to…
Lawrence Taylor and Joe Namath are New York football royalty.
Namath’s addiction to alcohol played out in public during an ESPN broadcast in 2003 when he was interviewed on the New York Jets sideline by Suzy Kolber and pathetically told her on camera he wanted to kiss her right then and there. Kolber brushed aside his uncomfortable advance, and Namath later admitted he was drunk. He says he’s not had alcohol since that humiliating incident and credits it with saving his life, because he was on his way to drinking himself to death.
I still have a fear for what that stuff does to me and what it could do to me,” Namath said in an interview with Graham Designer.
Taylor was in and out of drug rehabilitation centers for his addiction to cocaine during and after his thirteen-year career with the Giants. A second positive test that resulted in a four-game suspension to begin the 1988 season was when he hit rock bottom during his playing days, but he’s suffered through equally low moments in his life after football.
Joe Namath. Broadway Joe.
Namath and Taylor are fighting off the demons built by their stage names. Addicts are never cured. They are always in recovery and take their sobriety one day at a time. Namath and Taylor have that in common, in addition to being the most iconic players in New York football history.
Taylor could be loud and obnoxious in the locker room, but it was all in good fun, and he was popular with his teammates, even if he scared the crap out of many of them. It was after he left the locker room that he got himself in trouble doing business with degenerate drug dealers who were happy to accommodate his needs and take his money. “I know Lawrence Taylor the man,” Harry Carson said. “I know he’s a sweetheart of a guy if you get to know him. I still say I’m glad I’m not him.”
