What do Kurt Warner, Chad Johnson, Dhani Jones, Brian Westbrook and David Akers all have in common? The answer is easy: they are all professional football players. The tougher question is what do each of them plan to do after they retire from the NFL? “Helmets Off,” airing on FSN, attempts to answer this question in their October episode “Out of Their League.”
The show opens up with two-time NFL Super Bowl MVP Kurt Warner throwing around a football in his Arizona Cardinals uniform. Logically, the next segment that should follow is Kurt Warner sitting in makeup with game show host Pat Sajak, right? Obviously. Apparently, Kurt Warner wants to turn toward game show hosting once he retires, thereby pawning the respectability he once had as a player in succumbing to such a mindless profession. Case in point, Vanna White asking him the question that you must get right in order to host “Wheel of Fortune,” “Do you know the entire alphabet?”
The show then brings forth some humor, intentional this time, as Chad Johnson and Dhani Jones take an acting class at Scott Sedita’s acting studio. Johnson, a talented but very cocky wide receiver for the Bengals, walks into the studio thinking acting will be quite simple. After stumbling through saying “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers” using a wide array of emotions, Chad’s ego-inflated head begins to sink. Pretty entertaining. Jones, a linebacker for the Eagles, is presented with a more subtle attitude toward acting and seems likeable but forgettable. In other words, the segment only needed Chad.
Next, Brian Westbrook, a running back for the Philadelphia Eagles, decides that he wants to be involved with the horse business. After years and years of eluding tacklers and receiving millions of dollars for doing so successfully, he wants to then learn how to give a horse an ultrasound. Watching a man stick his whole arm into a horse’s rectal area is far less than satisfying television.
The theme of polarized professions continue once this segments ends as David Akers, a kicker for the Philadelphia Eagles, declares his dream job to be a NASCAR Driver. A star quarterback wants to avoid hits by asking Vanna White if there are any “R’s, a running back wants to walk horses into stables instead of running over people, so why not a kicker driving a car at a speed of 180 miles-per-hour while avoiding other cars, walls and any other problem that could ultimately lead to his untimely death? It all makes sense. The only question left after watching this month’s episode of “Helmets Off” is, is the NFL the right choice for these six athletes? m
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