There is something really sad about an uneducated person who refuses to seek out help.

Such is the case with many sports figures. They earn huge amounts of money—millions. Yet, after a few years, too many of them end up broke, a result of their own ignorance.

You have heard the old proverb: A fool and his money are soon departed.

Many of these sports figures are plucked up from uneducated backgrounds. They have friends and family in their pockets. They don’t know how to invest. They spend it as it comes in.

Recently I read a sad article about former boxer, Riddick Bowe. The guy is now going to flea markets to sell his autograph and to try to pawn off his old boxing gloves, pictures, etc.

Keep in mind that when he retired, Riddick Bowe was worth $15,000,000. Where on earth did all that money go? I’ll be honest with you. If he had 15 billion dollars, he would still be broke.

When a person has that type of money, the goal is to find a way to invest it and keep it. But that takes either education or sense or the smarts to hire an honest investment expert who can lead you in the right direction.

Apparently Riddick Bowe and many like him have none of those things.

Riddick Bowe sat on a folding chair behind a card table that straddled two parking spaces, labeled in chalk as Nos. 264 and 265. Most people sauntered past, holding bargains in a bag or grilled meat on a stick, not recognizing the large man who waited for someone to come see him.

“The champ is here!” Darren Antola, who set up the autograph session, called out, like a carnival barker. “He beat Evander Holyfield two out of three times!”

Bowe, now 40 years old, [and reportedly punch drunk] has not thought about the possibility of completing his education and getting a trade school certificate or even a college degree. This sad man cannot think beyond boxing:

“What would I do without boxing? That’s the question, isn’t it?” he asked during a quiet moment under the canopy where he sat. He searched for the answer inside his head, which his own lawyers once argued was damaged from all the blows it absorbed.

“Boxing’s all I know,” he said finally. “At 40, what else am I going to do?”

Of course he did once join the Marine Corps Reserves but he quit a few days later. This is a man who is directionless and pitiful. I recall when he was married. His wife had left him and moved to North Carolina. He went there and tried to force her and his five children back home to Maryland. He ended up spending 18 months in jail.

Well now he is remarried and he is a sad case. The classic case of the broken, worn out, punch drunk former boxer who—in the end, has no money, no true hope and no plans.

Sad, indeed.

SOURCE

Hat tip to Greg for story lead