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With the Super Bowl over and the NFL Draft still a ways out, we here at Acme Packing Company often find ourselves searching for off-season topics along the peripheral boundaries of the NFL. Well, we found one. Here we find ourselves catching up with Javon Walker - the once-talented Packers wide receiver-turned-fountain of douche. What's he up to these days, you ask? If the picture in this article by the Tallahassee Democrat is any indication, the answer is bench-pressing a Honda Civic.
According to them, a swole Javon Walker now lives in Houston where, in between competing in amateur bodybuilding competitions, he spends his time working for a supplement company, investing in real estate, and even running a small chain of frozen yogurt stores. Now, whether you believe bodybuilding - the only sport that turns an even blinder eye to PED use than the NFL - to be "healthy" is up to you, but give Walker some credit. Football players spend their entire lives trying to stay in shape, and although Walker didn't play that long, you'd understand if the guy just wanted to play some Call of Duty and eat cheetos on the couch now that he's retired.
And look, I get that Walker was never all that likeable. But in an age where most profiles of former players read like a repair checklist on a 73' Volkswagen, it's refreshing to see a player transition into retirement with what looks like the majority of his physical and mental capabilities still intact. It also looks like Walker has managed his money well - protein powder ain't cheap y'know. I suppose that's easy when you've got a Raiders contract sitting in the bank, but we've seen former players blow far more than Walker ever earned.
If anything, Walker's second career at least looks to be going smoother than his first one. If you recall, Walker's playing days started out with immense promise - cresting with 89 catches for 1,382 yards and 12 TD's in 2004 - but they fizzled out in a wave of holdouts, injuries, and Brett Favre running him out of Green Bay in one of the more underrated railroad jobs in NFL history. In retrospect, the irony of Favre essentially labeling Walker a diva is all kinds of thick. But that was then.
Now 36 years old, Walker doesn't have stadiums full of cheering fans, but he does seem to have attained the one thing even the most successful athletes struggle finding after their playing days are over - happiness.