Thanks Kurt Warner

By Seth Wickersham
ESPN The Magazine
January 29, 2010

You have no idea what the NFL is losing in Kurt Warner, who Friday afternoon announced the end of his NFL playing career after 12 seasons.

I’m sad that he’s retiring. You should be, too. We’ll never see another player like him.

Of course, we knew by the end of the 1999 season that we’d never witness another story like him, going from stocking shelves to operating one of the most potent offenses in history, winning league and Super Bowl MVPs. But Warner as a player, as a person, deserves our thanks.

Thanks for the numbers: Four Pro Bowls, two NFL MVP awards, three Super Bowl appearances including one victory and two close losses, and the top three passing games in Super Bowl history. The second-greatest dome quarterback in history behind the Indianapolis Colts’ Peyton Manning, Warner at times reached Jordanesque hot streaks.

In the 2009 season with the Arizona Cardinals, Warner completed 75 percent of his passes in a game four times, including one during which he hit at 92 percent, an NFL record. Few quarterbacks in history were as streaky as Warner, but when he was on, few could match him.

Thanks for the religion. Some athletes give their life to Jesus Christ as a PR move; some are ripe with hypocrisy; some just say offensive things. Warner always expressed his faith without trivializing it or us.

> Read the full story on ESPN.