Back in the day when you were a college athlete that hit the mainstream consciousness it was all good. You simply would become a star and that was that.
Unfortunately that was a long time ago.
With the advent of new age media and the social media access young athletes have they are subject to scrutiny like never before.
Take Tyrann Mathieu for example.
LSU is the best team in the college football and will be playing for the National Championship. Mathieu is their “Deion Sanders”.
He has a catchy nickname “The Honey Badger” and he is a talented guy, but with comes the realization that in a world with Basketball Wives, TMZ and Media Take Out as soon as you become “KNOWN”, you become a “TARGET”.
Mathieu like most college athletes has a few lady friends and once again unlike back in the day when that would be all underground, not anymore.
Mathieu ladies went to MediaTakeOut, now they are sending alleged naked pics of him. Doesn’t matter if it is him or not, it is the fact that young athletes have to understand from the beginning people will turn on you, if it benefits them.
People won’t their 15 minutes of fame and are willing to bring you down to get it. I am less sympathetic to professional athletes they should know better, but for younger athletes I think they are more trusting and they shouldn’t be.
Doesn’t matter if you are Mathieu, RG3, Andrew Luck or whoever.
As my uncle once told me when I was very young. Always keep your eyes open and your wallet in your front pocket.
My advice is very simple, don’t be the next contestant on that MediaTakeOut Screen.