Determined Society with Shawn French | Adversity & Mindset - How To Tackle What's Next with Eric Wood

Episode Date: May 22, 2023

Eric Wood is a former NFL center for the Buffalo Bills where he was an immediate starter, 2 time Walter Payton Man of the Year nominee, and a pro bowler. Eric was selected in the 1st round of the 2009 NFL Draft by the Bills, a monumental achievement for someone who entered college with only one scholarship offer. Making the playoffs in 2017 and ending the Bills’ playoff drought serves as one of Eric’s most memorable moments from his NFL career, and making the Pro Bowl has become one of his proudest professional accomplishments. Eric played his entire 9-season NFL career for the Bills before an unexpected spinal injury ultimately ended his on-field career in 2018. With much left to offer the sport, Eric stayed involved in football as a commentator for the Buffalo Bill’s Radio Network, something he still does to this day. Eric also spent some time as a sports columnist for the Athletic, and also has called games for FOX, ESPN, ACC Network and CBS. He has also appeared on the Jim Rome Show, NFL Network, The Herd with Colin Cowherd, and the Rich Eisen Show to provide analysis. Key Points: Family Tackling What's Next Eric's NFL Journey The High's & Low's The Injury that forced his retirement Social Media and its impact on athletes Relationships with teammates Athlete development Focusing on what is important The Roadmap Issues with travel Baseball and travel Basketball Dangers of early sport specialization Hiring Eric to speak to your company or team And....much much more Connect with Eric: Instagram- https://www.instagram.com/ewood70/ Website- https://ericwoodmedia.com/ Connect with Shawn: Instagram- https://www.instagram.com/theshawnfrench/ Website- https://theshawnfrench.com/   Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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opinion and i think that's going to lead to and i shouldn't even say think it already has led to stress fractures in certain areas just from over exertion on certain areas and and look you know travel baseball travel basketball i live in louisville kentucky there's over 6 000 baseball players in this city. There might be 20 that end up getting a college scholarship. But everyone's selling that dream. And now everyone's got to do it because everyone else is doing it. Well, your family's going to be different.

What is up, everybody? Welcome back to another episode of the show, The Determined Society. I have with me today, guys, an NFL vet, a nine-year NFL vet for the Buffalo Bills. He was a center. He is a Bill's sportscaster now. He is an author of a book, Tackle What's Next and a podcast of What's Next with Eric Wood. I have with me an amazing sports-minded guy.

But the one thing that I really love about this gentleman that I've been following him for about a year now, and I got to tell you, before we started recording, we were talking about how we appreciate both of each other's patience because we've been trying to line this up for about a year. The one thing that struck me about Eric is his love for his family. You can tell it how he in his post with social media, how much he loves his wife and his children. And for me, I really related to that. So, you know, without further ado, let's welcome Eric Wood to the show. What's up, buddy?

Hey, what's going on, Sean? I appreciate those words. And yeah, I mean, early on in my journey on social media, I actually shied away from ever posting about my family. I almost protected them. You know, I kept my Instagram private. I felt like, okay, Twitter's, my sports talk. Instagram will be more family pictures and whatnot. and I'll keep it private.

And then it hit me, if I'm going to make an impact through social media, if I'm going to use social media to try and impact others in a positive way, why not try to make it cool to be a dad and a husband and try to be the best that we can. And, you know, we're so far from perfect. We all are. Trust. Yeah. And I'm as far as well.

But hey, why don't we show taking our little girls out on dates, our little guys out on play dates and whatnot, dating our wives on a consistent basis? It's like, let's make that cool as opposed to, you know, the memes, the jiffs. And look, I love a good, funny Instagram post. If anybody, I'm like, let me just inject a little positivity out there as well. You know, I'm with that, man, because when I started this, I just wanted to, just like you inject some positivity and some real life leadership into the ethers, right? Whoever was following my page at the time, I think it was like maybe 800 people. and it's grown to 57,000 now is my main goal was to lead people down a path where they could get better.

And I didn't want this to be a satire page. I didn't want this to be a conspiracy page. I didn't want to get into any of that. Actually, I poke a lot of fun at that stuff, right? In a lot of my episodes, I'll include a little satire. You might hear it here today. Who knows? But the biggest thing, like your point is let's show these.

people that were actually human beings, right, with feelings. And we have wives and we have children. And the coolest part about, you know, being a human being is the connections and the family members and friends that you have. Why not show it, right? But I can tell you, there's times, man, there's times where I'll put stuff out there. And to your point, wanted to protect your family is I've had random people get on my post and say, ooh, I love a man. And I love a man. in uniform and it was it was my nine year old son and so at that point it's like right away i feel violated and i'm like man i'm not protecting my family and then the other thing that happens i don't know if you've had this a lot of fake pages you know um it hasn't happened since i've been verified

but before that dude they would make two to three fake pages of me a week and right there on the front was my kids and my wife. And so that's the risk we take. But to your point, the biggest compliment that I get other than my show and the guests that I have on like yourself is I show my real life. Right. Yeah. And I'm the same way. And the way I try to protect them and I actually got this from my wife is, you know, no school logos. You know, I don't want people to know where our kids go to school. People around town are going to know that that's fine. But, you know, I just don't want to promote that out there. The one goofy thing that happened with me was, and I didn't see it, a professional photographer friend of ours,

was following another professional photographer, and she noticed that her pictures were being used by somebody else to promote her own brand, and they were using our family. So they're using our family photos to promote their brand. One, like they took them, that's a lie. And then two, like they're just using my platform, essentially and my few kids and beautiful wife to promote themselves. So that was the only issue we've had with it. But to your point, with all the bad and the internet is just full of, you get the whole spectrum of people out there. But it's amazing. My audience has gone from so many 25 to 65 year old males that follow sports, kind of that ESPN audience,

we talk about all the time when I was working for the network. And now there's, there's so many, there's probably a majority of women that comment on all my stuff. And, you know, I don't, I don't take value in comments and likes, but I try to appeal to those people because part of my brand is a social media platform. And so it's amazing how many women that appeals to and then that broadens your audience. Well, you're handsome. All right. So, you know, I like your stuff.

That's why I like your stuff, because you're handsome. So, you know, it's funny that you mentioned that because it leads into something that, you know, I heard on the burn with Ben Newman with you. When you come into the league in draft day, right, you have a couple options. You know, and we talked about, you talked about this. You could focus on the things that really, really matter. And like you did, was getting, earning that second contract early, right? Or you can focus on being a social media brand.

And to your point, you know, Tom Brady didn't start his TB12 until he had five championships. So he came in with that resume of success. You know, at what point did you realize, like, okay, now it's time for me to shift into building this social media brand because, one, I'm ready to or I've already, you know, had, you know, the level of success to support what I'm doing now. You know, times have changed. I entered the league in 2009. Twitter came out, I believe, or it got hot in 2010. So, yeah, Facebook goes around. No one was worried about building a Facebook platform when Twitter came about that gave you a voice.

but we weren't worried about building a platform at all. My page, my account got over 100,000 followers because at one point, the bills released their injury report, and they accidentally put my last name, Wood, as my injury. And so I tweeted, I retweeted it before anyone else saw it, because I saw it first, because it tagged me, and I said, this seems like an odd injury, and I don't think this is accurate. Well, then just that one tweet got me a much bigger audience than maybe a lot of other offensive of linemen at the league at the time.

Yeah. I wasn't worried about it at all, but I do realize times have changed. These guys that are coming out of college now into the NFL, they've had social media since maybe they were even in junior high. So they're used to this world. They're used to that affirmation that comes from social media. We weren't used to that, so it didn't appeal to us as much. My thing is this.

Yes, you might get paid to make a social media post. It can help your brand. It can help with investments. It can help with life after football based upon the platform. you can get from social media. But if that's what you're worried about, you're going to be out of the NFL quickly. I always say the more you're worried about things outside the NFL,

the quicker you're going to get outside the NFL. It is a all-in business. There's very few that have transcendental talent. And you saw this in baseball, and I see it in football. If you're not all in, you're going to get passed up by the guys that truly wanted. And so I'm always weary about the guys that are maybe too active on social media. I appreciate the guys nowadays that hire it out. You know, hire it out.

Okay, I'll use Josh Allen as an example. Huge social media following. Rarely post, most of them are paid ads. And then last year, he started doing these pregame hype videos. They're all, it's all done for him. Sure. That's ever coming from him is if one of his teammates tag him or if a buddy tags him, a lot of times he'll repost it. And that's it. But Josh has got an enormous following because he is who he is. He's a down-to-earth, genuine dude who plays his tail off every Sunday, and people want to follow a guy like that. And that's the thing. It's an example that people set. They can feel that excellence just through a TV screen. Right. Right. It's like this dude right here is the deal.

And, you know, and, you know, Josh Allen's a dude. I mean, like straight up dude. And I think that's an important thing to to really, I guess, separate, right? Because some athletes, like, you know, to your point, are just sitting there on their phones and social media. They're the ones posting. They're going live. I see it with these college football players constantly. And particularly my alma mater. And if the people that are listening and watching this, just dig a little deeper.

You know where I went to school. You could find it. Right. I see it a lot. And it's just a focus, right? It's like when they decide to enter the transfer portal, when they decide to enter the draft, it's this big elaborate post and it's like what are we worried about here are we worried are we really worried about what's next for you are you worried about what you're going to create on social media

right and i tell these guys and i did performance coaching for a college for a season and it's amazing as i talk to their coaches they would often say they're more worried about what people are saying on social media after their game than what we tell them the next day because that's where getting all their feedback is to social media. And this isn't picking at this current generation of college athletes. If I was exposed to the same things when they were in junior high, I'm sure I would be the exact same way. It's surrounding them at this point with people that can give them sound advice. And what I would always tell them, and for anybody listening out there, because I understand we're not talking to a group of collegiate athletes out there that are aspiring to be

NFL players or MLB players or NBA players, there may be some, but the majority are not going to be those people. I always tell people, you use social media. Don't let social media use you. And so you can be whoever you want to be on social media. You can promote whatever you want to promote. But the second that you start filling your cup up personally because of the feedback that you get from social media, now it's using you. If you're mindlessly scrolling and wasting time and no productivity throughout your day, then it's using you. If you're not paying for a product, you are the product. They are using you and they're trying to use you. Now, if you're intentional about it, you can use the platform to A, spread a good message. You could raise money for philanthropic purposes. You can also

create a platform, but that platform doesn't need to come from spending five hours a day on social media. It can simply come from being a beast in whatever field you're in, whether that's sales, whether that's being the top neurosurgeon out there like a Dr. Aman who is a buddy and has a tremendous following now or a beast on a field or a court. That's how you get your following. And that's what people want to follow and pay for as well. People aren't lining up to stroke big checks to people that are constantly promoting things, that are constantly doing things.

They want a Josh Allen. They want a Tom Brady who seems not as easy to attain. You know, I think it's a great point because nowadays you see somebody always holding up something. Like I see these college baseball players holding up a different product every day. It's like, okay, it's cool. Like I remember being in college. And again, to your point, brother, like if we were playing college football or college

baseball right now, we're growing up in a different culture, different era, right? We may be subject to that because I can remember sitting on my couch in college, right, in Baton Rouge, schools paid for, but like, I had no money. Right. Like my friends wanted to go out Wanted to go get food I had to call mommy and daddy like hey I'm broke You know like I like so I understand it now

Like I get it But it's also still very Um agitating to me that it's gone that way It's like you know It used to be when I was at LSU playing baseball It was like the only thing you had to worry about it It was a big thing trust me

Was winning a national championship But there was no Facebook Like, dude, we played when there was no, I don't think there was, I don't recall it. Facebook came like two years after I graduated. So I haven't, maybe there was MySpace, but I didn't mess with it. I don't know. I just, I think it's different times, man. Yeah, I heard this recently.

And Facebook came about when I was in college, but prior to Facebook coming about, the only thing you were worried about is there someone had a Polaroid camera and if they printed them out and made doubles. And I'm also telling guys nowadays, like, this is a different era. This is a different era. You can be exposed at any situation because of this phone. It can be text messages that you send. You think they're innocent. Boom.

All of a sudden, now it's blown up and anything can be taken out of context. And then obviously the cameras on the phone can get you in trouble at any point. And your reputation, I always say it takes four seconds to create an impression and four years to change it. If the first thing that someone sees is you parting at a bar, it's going to take you four years to change that. If it's, you know, God forbid these cases of these guys that get on video and violence against women, that's, that's you for the rest of your life. That's irreparable. Yes. And so just understand this is a different day and age.

And anything you do is going to be amplified and posted. No, absolutely. And, you know, I want to touch on athlete development. And, you know, it can be a multi-prong sport, you know, situation. But how do you see athlete development now compared to when we were growing up? Yeah, it's just getting way too specialized, in my opinion. And I think that's going to lead to, and I shouldn't even say think, it already has led to stress fractures in certain areas just from over-exertion on certain areas. And look, you know, travel baseball, travel basketball.

I live in Louisville, Kentucky. There's over 6,000 travel baseball players in this city. There might be 20 that end up getting a college scholarship. But everyone's selling that dream. And now everyone's got to do it because everyone else is doing it. Well, your family is going to be different. I hope you. Yeah.

And we pride ourselves on being different. And we say that all the time. Woods are different. I don't care what everyone else is doing. We're different. But nowadays, people are specializing way too early. If you would have made me choose as a. freshman in high school one sport out of chose basketball i ended up growing a few inches but growing

many more inches wider and then it was a first round draft pick and football when you're allowing these kids or forcing these kids to choose one sport too early you're often limiting them in their development what they could become and all the sports it all translates the skill sets that you learn in basketball translate to the football field you know the movements in baseball the bending the power the torque, all of that converts to other sports, and we're really stripping our kids of it, and we're going to get them burn out. I wasn't a starter on our high school football team until I was a senior. And most people would say, wow, you know, you miss a lot of great opportunities.

You could have went to a bigger college, this and that. I'm like, look, I didn't take unnecessary hits, which happened every year in a football field. And I also wasn't burnt out. I got to college and I was excited. I also didn't have a ton of bad habits either because I didn't have that many reps to even gain that many habits. So I came into college like a sponge as opposed to some of these people that were playing spring ball, then seven on seven in the summer. Then they're doing fall camp. Look, they get to college.

They're burn out. Football's not special to them anymore. I can speak on this from experience, not not football. Well, I did have a short sit on the football field. That shit hurt too much, bro. Like, I'm going to tell you right now. I specialize too soon. You got to be a little sick to understand that like, yes, I might like this dude up,

but it's going to hurt me too. Oh, man. I listen, I specialize way too soon. I mean, and that was me. Like, that was my choice, right? I wasn't this great athlete. You know, I was the kid that was getting seasoned PE because I couldn't do a pull-up. I couldn't run a mile or a super lap, what they call it.

Mr. Dorn was my PE teacher. And he told my parents, your son will never amount to anything. as an athlete. And I said, my response was, when my parents told me, I was like, well, we haven't had the baseball unit yet. What's he know? As soon as we had the baseball unit, obviously, I was, then I was an athlete. Right. But I tried playing football my freshman year in high school. And I had these visions like, oh, I'm going to sack quarterbacks. I want to play, you know, defensive in. I'm just going to light these dudes up. No. Like, the moment you put on pads in a helmet, just having the pads in the helmet on hurt. Like you have to grow those muscles in order to hold that helmet up.

I just remember our running back, his name was Damien Wilkinson stud. And we're in practice. And I shoot through one of the gaps. And next thing, I know I'm on my butt. I didn't even know what hit me. Well, it was the running back. And right then I'm like, no, no, no. I'm going to get hurt doing this. I don't like it. I'm not going to do this anymore. So I think really it hurt. me athletically and development wise because as you say, once I got to junior college, I was praying for rainouts. I mean, I played travel ball from the time I was 13, right? Because the little league was bad.

I mean, it got bad. You know, once you got up to the big field, it was time to go play competitive baseball. I wanted to develop. I was doing lessons. I was playing travel ball, right? And we'd play like 60 games. And I was a catcher.

Like, dude, you throw me behind the dish for, for three games in a day. And if you, if you take me out that third game, I'm trying to fight you. Right. Like I'm like, why am I sitting? Did I do something wrong? No, you need a break. I'm like, break. I don't need a break.

You know, but looking back at it, you know, it's a long drawn out description of what I'm going through right now. But like, I was burned out by the time I got to junior college. And then came the injuries. Then came the blood clock. lot, right? Then, you know, came the, you know, I blew out my arm at LSU and I had to have surgery my first year there. It took me two years to get back on the field. The point sometimes, and I was sitting behind, and it is mental health awareness month, you know, funny that we're talking about this. I remember catching bullpins in the fall, crying. It's like, I just don't want to be here.

Like, I'm worthless. I'm not good anymore. So there's a lot of danger involved in that. You know, and it was hard for me to get through. Right. Yeah, I can't imagine. I've been there, too, dealing with injuries. And then you don't feel like yourself. And so it gets you in a dark place, especially, and I'm the exact same way. I'm assuming that's how you were as an 18 and 22 year old. That's your identity. You're a baseball player. You went to LSU, top school in the country, to be a baseball player. And when you're not doing it correctly, the way you want to do it, now that puts you in a dark place. because that was your identity.

My first four years in the NFL, I do the Joe Thaisman leg break, my rookie year. Yep. Second year, do a high ankle sprain on that broken leg, which took me out for two weeks. Third year, ACL, PCL, lateral meniscus, full offseason rehab again. Fourth year, MCL sprain, missed two games.

That's my first four years in the league. And I'm sitting there as a first round draft pick thinking, am I a bust? I know when I am playing, I'm playing okay. I'm not playing up to my standard because my entire offseason is rehab, not trying to get better. It's just trying to get back on the field. Yeah.

But I'm sitting there thinking, I might be one of those busts. Like then the bill assigned me to a contract extension. I play 52 straight games, which is the most for any active center in the NFL. I took a very playing time incentive-based contract understanding that, look, if I'm on the field, I deserve to be top three paid in the league. If I'm not, then I don't. That's fine. I'm good with that.

I'll pick the risk and I took all of it because I got lucky and ended up staying on the field. But you put yourself in a position during those times to really examine a lot of things. 2012 was when I did my fourth year in the NFL. That's when I did the MCL sprain. And I changed the way I trained. This wasn't the reason, but I ended up getting baptized that year. I married my wife that year. There was a lot of things that were that were big happening in 20.

12 and part of it was man I got I got to go in a different direction because what I'm doing right now is not working yeah I mean I think we've all had that point right where you know we have to really evaluate and be introspective is it my faith is it my work ethic what is it my mindset because a lot of times your mindset I mean that could deter you and put you in a very dark place to begin with and for me what happened is I was just not getting it anymore. Like I would compare myself. The moment I walked on campus at LSU, I mean, dude, I belong there. But then in my own mind, I'm looking at, oh, that guy just won the cultural series last year. I'm like, what's up, bro? I know you are. Like, I felt less than

when I was there to do the same thing as them. If I didn't belong there, I wouldn't have been there. Right. So I think there's for me, you know, and a lot of that has to do with programming as, you know, in childhood, right? I was always told that if I failed there or if or if I didn't make it to the major leagues I was a bust because I didn't have any other skills my dad looking straight in the eye it's like one of those moments where you're you know the scariest thing as a 13 year old is working on a car with your dad and he asked for like a socket wrench and you hand them like a hammer and it's just all over right like you're just cooked yeah um school they're teaching us like long division that you'll never use yeah i don't ask

me to do that still to this day right and uh Um, you know, so, you know, for me getting there, it was in the back of my mind, like, bro, if you fail, you're done, you're cooked. You're never going to be anything. And, you know, a lot of that's on me at some point, right? As I grew up and I matured into an adult, having a child, you know, now three and a husband is I have to control the narrative a little bit. Those, those limiting beliefs are always going to be there. But what am I going to do with them, right? How do I take my skills? which back in the day, maybe my skills weren't going to translate to anything, right? Maybe my dad was right. So to me being mad at him, maybe he was right. Because now my order skills are taking me somewhere, right? My ability to make relationship with people

has led me to an amazing sales career, right? Always top of my organizations. Right. But back then, I was just thinking, man, I just sucked. And to your point, like when you say, what if I am a bust, like to this day, to this day, and this is the hardest thing me to admit. I look at myself as a bust on the baseball field and that is tough to deal with.

And I'll tell you why. I am not treated the same as some of those prolific athletes at LSU. People I played with sometimes don't even like respond to me. And it, it sucks, man. But it is what it is. It is what it is. And it's what you do with that. Like, just like you said, it's what you do with that comment. from your dad. It's what you do with all the adversity that comes your way in life. That's what defines you. It's not it's not your career at LSU. If you would have gone on and had a fine major league career, maybe you don't have the drive to now be the top of your companies and in transition from another industry and do it again and be in the top 10 again. Yes, I do my research before I come on these things. And when you do have a podcast that impacts so many, you likely don't have.

have any of these things if you don't have the mindset to say, hey, I, yes, that's fine. My baseball career did not work out how I wanted to. My career ended in the NFL, not how I wanted it to. And that's fine. What am I going to do with that now? That's what defines you. Now, I appreciate that. And thank you for, you know, acknowledging and doing background.

Not a lot of guests do that. They, you know, they come on with a self-serving, not all of them, but some of them. I know. I'm almost a shame now that I have a book because prior to having a book, when people would ask me to come on a podcast, you know, they'd say, well, what can I promote? I said, man, I'm just here for you. I'm here to serve you. Yeah. Whatever you want. I'm an open book. Yeah. But now that I have a book, it's like, well, what can I promote? Well, you could, you could push the book, which you already did in the intro. We don't have to do it. Yeah, we're going to, yeah, and we'll put a link in the show notes where they can go buy

the book. But I like it because I'm looking at it right in the background, tackle what's next. That's a very great title. You know, the copy of my book is titled, You know, Unstoppable, The High Performance Mindset is a book about how I built my sales career. I really enjoy because I look at that title, I'm like, tackle what's next. Your career ended, and we can get into that. Your career ended in a way that you didn't want it to. In fact, it was a surprise. It was like, wait a second, what?

You know, so you and your own life had to tackle what's next when you weren't ready. So I love the metaphor there, you know, in the book. But, you know, why don't you tell the audience that may not know how your career into it? Because to me, it's a very interesting story. Yeah, I'll tell that story a second. On the tackle, often people will say, well, you played offensive line. Shouldn't it be block what's next?

I'm like, no, no, no. It's just a football pun. It is what it is. But you know, you're not trying to block what's next. Peanut Gallery. And pancake what's next or any other O-lineisms aren't going to work nearly as well as is tackling what's next. next in life. But, you know, I entered the league as a first round draft pick, but I only got

one scholarship to the University of Louisville. So I was beyond hype to be a first round draft pick. Get drafted the Buffalo Bills. Couldn't have spotted Buffalo on a map if you, if you gave me about six tries, but ended up playing nine years for the Buffalo Bills. I mentioned the injuries I had earlier in my career. Then I go on a long run, broke my other leg in 2016, a Monday night football, which is a fun flight back through the night from Seattle, back to Buffalo. But I come back from that. And in 2017, everyone thinks the bills are tanking. We have Sean McDermin and Brandon Bean, the current head coach of the bills,

current GM of the bills. But this is their first year. And they trade away our top three draft picks from the previous three drafts. And so everyone assumes that the Buffalo Bills are tanking. They're going to gear up for one of those big quarterbacks the next year. Mayfield, Darnold, Allen, Jackson, and Rosen. They're going to gear up for one of those five. and the bills are tanking.

Well, we are assured by the organization that we are truly, in fact, not tanking. They just didn't have our type of DNA, the DNA they're looking for. Long story short, in that season, we go on the worst three-game stretch in team history in weeks 10 through 12. That's tough to do with a team that's been around as long as the Buffalo Bills. But we bounce back and we make the playoffs. We break the longest playoff drought in all the professional sports. I'll never win a Super Bowl as a player, but I can tell you when we celebrate in the locker room,

that breaking that streak, it felt damn good. And so we play in the playoff game. My wife was already back in Louisville with our daughter getting ready to give birth to our son. And I can't fault her for scheduling that in Louisville. We had never made the playoffs. And like I said, everyone assumed we were tanking.

So she's doing all of her doctor visits back in Louisville. And then she's already posted up in Louisville. We lose the Jaguars in the first round. of the playoffs. And what's customary is you go and get an exit physical before you leave. You have to declare any injuries before the off season starts or the NFL's off the hook for all of them. And so I'm in there and I said, look, I'm the only player on the team, one of a few in the NFL that played every single snap this season. Just let me go. Clear me for the Pro Bowl. I'm going to go, drive home and see the birth, my son. They said, Eric, you had some stingers this

year for those unfamiliar, just a nerve pain sensation that run down your arm. When you get hit in the head it's a nerve deal from your neck but my high school buddy's got stingers they're completely fine no big deal i reluctantly get an MRI on my neck and three days later i'm sitting in the delivery room waiting on the birth of my son who would be born 50 minutes after the call that my career has ended and in that moment you have some denial hey you know i'll find a different doctor that'll clear me there's obviously a wave of emotions but now you have your son coming into the world and And that's really all you're worried about. And so it took a little while to digest.

But in the coming days, when you have to break the news to your family that we're not packing up and going to Orlando for the Pro Bowl, my career is over. And I had just signed a contract extension before the season. You know, I had planned on playing 15 years in the NFL. The bills are getting ready to draft their franchise quarterback who ends up being Josh Allen, who's a friend of mine, just came in town, stayed with us for the Derby. I would have loved to play with Josh Allen. I would have loved to be a part of this run that they're on now, but now I'm not. I'm the radio guy calling the games, but how am I going to tackle this next chapter of life? How can I, just like I mentioned to you, use that adversity to now impact others?

How can I, I believe I've heard you say this, how can I use my mess to be my message to impact others? And so that's what tackle what's next is. It's led by a lot of coaching, a lot of advice that I got through the podcast on transitioning in life because there's not a crystal clear blueprint, but there is a blueprint. There is a roadmap that you can follow that many of the most successful people followed while doing it. I'm sure it's very similar from you going from coaching and teaching into sales. It's okay, well, now my days were structured as a teacher. What's my schedule look like now? How am I going to control my mornings?

I'm not rushing to school. I'm not going to practice or workouts before school. Okay, how am I going to manage my mornings? What are my days look like now? What are my gifts? How am I going to use them? You know, who are other people in this industry that I can follow and learn from? There is a roadmap out there and that's detailed in the book.

That's amazing because I can, first of all, I want to ask this question. How did you manage your emotions in that 50 minutes? I mean, was that your first child? Second child. Second child. Okay. So you're about to have a child. You're in the delivery room with your beautiful wife.

You get this call. Did you say anything to her? So we knew, like I had gotten a text message and we knew that some news was coming. Got it. We did not know. We did not assume. My assumption was it was going to be surgery. That was my assumption.

I'm going to have to get another surgery. Oh my gosh. Another offseason with a surgery. you know what, I'll crush it again. Here we go. Yeah. I got the news. I looked at my wife sitting in the hospital bed,

and I didn't cry for about 30-something years until I did some EMDR training last year and it just completely rocked my world. And now I can cry, just hearing a good worship song at church or just looking at my daughter. I could shed some tears. But I looked at my wife. I couldn't speak and I just gave her a thumbs down. And actually, the nurse who's a friend of a friend commented on. on a recent post of mine that was detailing this out.

I had a clip from another podcast I appeared on telling the story. She responded and she said, I was in there and that was beyond emotional. So my wife's crying. There's two nurses in the room. And the other nurse goes to my wife, honey, it's going to be okay.

It won't hurt that bad. And my wife looked at her and said, it's not about the baby. It's funny. Thinking back on it, it wasn't that funny at the time. but all I can give her was a thumbs down. And there was a lot of emotion through that time.

But when the entire time you're trying to wrestle with, okay, if faith and family and friends, if those are truly the most important thing, then when football gets taken away, is it that big of a deal? And yes, it is. That's a career I worked my entire life for. Sure.

You're just wrestling with so much internal emotion of, you know, the guilt. of, you know, I'm so blessed. And, you know, I played longer than I should have, you know, coming from a one scholarship offer going to college. Mm-hmm. Okay, why am I not satisfied with this? And to this day, I still am not.

You know, you intro me and say, this is nine-year veteran Eric Wood. You know, in my mind, it should have been six pro bowls. It should have been 15 years in the league, still playing. Yeah. You know, oftentimes when I do speaking engagements in the fall, I'll say, in my mind, I shouldn't be here. The speech I should be preparing for this week is our locker room speech.

That's in my mind, that's where I'm at. But I get to be here now. God had different plans for my life. And this is not a doom and gloom podcast. So many blessings that came for my career. I mean, financially signing a contract extension before the season, I was the second highest paid center in the league the following year. And I didn't play.

we had just built our dream house in Louisville and now we get to spend all year round and not just a few months a year in this house two beautiful healthy kids born just at the end of my career that I get to enjoy so much more time with them if I would have kept playing and beyond it all I mean I would have truly played to the wheels fell on I loved ball and I didn't take it for granted and I hated the guys who did and I worked my tail off and now that the bills are good, Like at what point would I have said, man, I don't want to do this anymore. Yeah. I mean, you're playing with a rock star and Josh Allen. The head coach and the GM are two of my really good friends. The ownership is incredible in Buffalo. Like, when would I have walked away? And so I just played till the wheels completely fell off.

You know, it's interesting because you said something about, I don't know, maybe 15 minutes ago. Like you said something like, now I'm not a part of it. I'll never win one as a player. You know, it's hard to look at it like this, right? because you are a part of it, right? You're just playing a different role in it, right? And you're still connected with the organization. You're a broadcaster for the Bills Network.

I mean, like, this is a, it's a big deal. You know, and that says a lot about your character that you're still infused in that culture and that organization. But to your point, man, it is hard. It is hard to look at it when you talk about faith, family, and friends is it. That's exactly all that matters. But when we're tested and got, you know, we're, you know, we're, you know, We're put, you know, some adversity on our lap.

And we have to figure out how we're going to navigate that. Like, it's a real thing. Like, yes, faith, family, and friends, that's, that's, that's truly what matters, right? But also our career. It also matters. And, you know, I can remember when my career ended in college. It wasn't, you know, anything like you was just pretty uneventful. It was 18 at bat's my senior year.

And, you know, 22 appearances behind the plate. after I rehab for two years and following out on the field when my coach said I'd never play. You know, I'm like, I'm a failure. Or I could think of I proved them wrong 18 times in the batters box and 22 times behind the dish. He said never. He said never. You know, I walked into that year as a sixth string player. I ended up being the backup.

Is this success? Not in my mind, right? I, to me, like, I'm 44. My career should have ended four years ago. I get that. I get that. The concept's in your book, though, right? And you talk about, you know, how do you implement, right?

There's a roadmap in there. I think the great answer is, and I haven't read your book and I need to get one, I want to read it, is you take the same things that you did as an athlete and you implement them into your adult, big boy life. You know, if you don't have scheduled workouts in the morning, get up and go do them. Right. If you plan your workouts, plan your workday, right? Like all these things that we learn as an athlete is super important for us to move forward in our life and to your point tackle what's next. We have to use those things, man. Because if we don't, then you're not where you're at. Right. Right. And that's detailed in there. I won't spoil at all. But it starts off with examining your gifts. If you're a baseball player, you have to examine your gifts. If you're a pitcher, know your strengths and weaknesses and play to them as you step out of sports, as you make any type of transition in life, okay, what are my, what's my skill set and how can I use it? If you don't understand what your gifts are, ask somebody else, because oftentimes people recognize your gifts more than you can recognize them yourself, especially if you're tougher on

yourself. And it just goes through many different stories, examples, being coachable, any, any type of transition in life, you need to be coachable. And there's life coaches, there's executive coaches, but then there's also your boss, if you're not stepping out as an entrepreneur. There is people that are further along that you can truly learn from. Now when you're in sports, being coachable, that's one of the greatest assets that you can have. If you want to stick around in the NFL, don't repeat mistakes.

As soon as you start repeating mistakes in the NFL, you are gone. I'm not you're just gone. And so there's many of those detailed out. in the book that that's impactful man you know know your gifts right and in a lot of times you see sometimes you have to ask others it's funny because when i decided i wanted to do a podcast that is now a tv show as well is i didn't know what my brand was i didn't know who i was i still hadn't figured it out right and i did something very risky um and acquaintance of mine natalie she goes i want you to post a photo of you on your stories

and I want you to say what's the first word that comes to mind when you see me or when you look at this picture that was scary for me right right um almost it was scarier than flipping the camera around the first time and putting a video out on like social media I'm like like I look back I'm like oh

like wow that was bad um today it's a lot different right I've I've practiced I've I won't say I haven't perfected it by any stretch of imagination but I've worked at it. And it was right after I completed multiple rounds of 75, right? And, excuse me, about more than half of the responses were determined, determined, determined, determination, or coach, or my friends would say, like, funny things like, douchebag, idiot, like, you know, like, well, thanks, guys, that's, you know, text me with

that. this is useless. But no, man. So like, I didn't know. And I sat there and looked at it. I'm like determined. Okay. I can see that. What am I going to do with it? And I sat there and I'm just like struggling with it. Like what do I want out of life? Just like as a whole. What do I want for people? Not from them, but for them. And I was like, I just want to wake up in a determined society where people just get up put their put their best on and go out there and chase their dang dreams i was like determined society i don't like it it's missing something so i put the in front of them like there it is that's the show and but i had to ask right you know yeah because often others

will will realize that for you i like i like the society aspect of it like okay we're in this together we're a group i just think there's power in groups i i i am a firm believer in the Jim Rohn quote, you're the average of the five people you spend the most time. It's overused because it's true. You know, you want your income to go up, surround yourself with five other people whose income is higher and watch their habits rub off on you and you will be then determined. You'll be driven to make more money based upon those habits, what you learn from them. If you want to get in shape, surround yourself with five people that are in better shape than you, and it's going to be very convicting when you go to grab a cheeseburger and they're eating lean

protein and veggies and fruit. It just is what it is. Yeah. You don't get better at anything in life, surround yourself with people that are ahead of you. I don't like to play golf with people that are worse than me. You know, it happens plenty, but I want to get better. I want to learn from people. A lot of times I'm playing with guys that are three other guys that are better than I am.

And I'm learning from them constantly. And so that's how I try to just push everyone along. And look, as an NFL point, player, you're surrounded by other NFL players. So the average of the five people you spend the most time with are going to be five NFL players. I only play with one guy that's currently in the hall fame. There may be others that get voted in. But right now, the only guy I played with that's in the hall fame is Terrell Owens. I had Terrell Owens on my pocket. Yeah, Tio. Now look, I play with him when he was a longtime vet. And, you know, he was matured by that point and all that.

But, man, he treated me so good as a young cat. But I'll say this. I asked him on my podcast. I said, what were your favorite chicken wings in Buffalo? He said, I never had any. I said, T.O., you don't like chicken wings? He said, no, I love chicken wings. I just wasn't there to eat chicken. I was like, there you go.

That's a different mindset. Okay, so there's a difference between just surrounding yourself with five guys in the league and surrounding yourself with a Hall of Famer because T.O. is going to make you feel real bad about your body real quick. He is jacked and leaned. Still? Yes. He is so.

strict about his diet, his sleep, everything in his life is strict. Okay. Well, he's going to make you feel worse about your actions if you're not living up to that standard. Yeah. So surround yourself in the locker room with the Hall of Famers and you'll be driven like them. Surround yourself with the guys that are a bunch of fringe NFL players at party all the

time and that'll rub off on you as well. That's a good point. You know, funny, funny about T.O. I grew up in the San Francisco Bay. So, I mean, big Jerry Rice, Joe Montana guy. And then, you know, I was there for those years. And then, you know, T.O. came in. And it was just like, couldn't beat the Packers, man.

Couldn't beat the Packers. Then when he caught that ball over the middle, and he got slammed in that sheer emotion, like, will stick with me forever. You know, that's truly that guy's heart, you know. And I know, you know, people started saying things about T.O. You know, when he went to Dallas or, you know, later in his nine-er career.

But, I mean, that was a wonderful player. I mean, and an intense and determined individual. And, you know, it's nice seeing guys like that play. Yeah. And some of the antics off the field are influenced by agents, people in his life. You know, this is a guy who grew up with his dad, his grandma raised him. He was an influential young man. And so the people that he surrounded himself with, you know, now he's doing sit-ups in his driveway,

demanding a new contract. Like that's not the guy that I ran into. Yeah. When I played with him in Buffalo. Yeah. I mean, again, you're talking about influence. And that just goes along with the five people that surround you, right? What kind of influence are they bringing over you?

Are they, you know, influencing you to work harder or are they influencing you to do some kind of like weird off the field antics? But no, man, that's a funny story about him. Like, I wasn't there to eat chicken. That's just, I mean, it's such a simple comment. I know. And we recorded for over an hour and that's what sticks out to me. That's the moment that sticks out to me from that podcast because it just hit me. I'm like, yep, you were different. We're different from everyone else from most that I played with. And that's the reason that you're in the Hall of Fame. Yes, God gave you gifts. You also, you have a determination that got you

to the next level. Yeah. What a cool interview to have. I'm sure you, I mean, you interview a lot of cool people, man. I've been blessed, and to me it's the variety. Like I've had everyone from pastors to big time businessmen to MLB, to owner of the bills, to football players, to me, the variety keeps it fun for me. And hopefully the listeners as well, if I sat and told football stories each and every week with former teammates, yeah, we'd probably get a pretty good following from the bills. But that wouldn't, that wouldn't fill me up.

That wouldn't fuel me. I feel like oftentimes when I complete a podcast, that's a one hour coaching session that I just got. And I got to script the interview. I got to script the session to figure it out for me, have a Ben Greenfield who might be at the top of the health and fitness world. But I get to ask him, he's long-winded, maybe five questions in an hour. But I get to ask him questions that benefit a former NFL football player that banged his head into someone 30,000 times that wrecked his body playing. a sport for a living, but I get to craft an interview for that. And so to me, that's what's special about the podcast world. I can dig that, man, because as I sit here talking to you,

I'm learning, right? And I always believe, and I've said this somewhere, recipe, I mean, you know, success is, it leaves clues, right? There's a recipe for it. And my job when I'm interviewing people, besides being a gatekeeper to my audience and having great people on is, you know, what lessons can they teach me and what lessons can my audience learn? While we're sitting here, I literally got a message from one of my listeners, a good buddy and my Brad Johnson. What's up, buddy? He sent a message and it popped up on my computer screen because like an idiot.

I hadn't put the Do Not Disturb on yet. It says, wow, your take on alcohol spot on. I released an episode today and we talked about, I talked with a good train, a good buddy of mine, Josh Marciano about, you know, alcohol. Why is it the only drug? You don't have to explain why you're not using it. You know, you think you have to explain. Like other drugs, you don't have to explain.

And I gave a really good take on it. But like, it's just really cool. Because of how the industry has been marketed throughout U.S. history and originally Ford demonized hemp because they're making bumpers that we're going to get his steel industry, his steel clients. out of business because they were making hemp bumpers that were better than steel bumper. So they demonize hemp. And then they used marijuana to imprison a bunch of African Americans in the South.

And yeah. So now we get to drink alcohol. Yeah. They've lobbied for it. Oh, no. I didn't go that deep. That's good. That's really good.

I mean, that's the, uh, the scholar version. What I said was some longs and lungs of, you know, it's legal. Um, you know, and people. want to be liked. They don't want to have to explain and feel dumb for certain decisions that they're making in their life. And again, it all goes back to your sphere of influence. Like, I want to be around people that say, hey, we're going to go out, you know, to the bar, have some drinks. I'm going to be like, hey, man, I'm going to go work out.

I'm not really drinking right now. I'm going to go work out, but I'll meet you for a post-workout meal. And I want my friends to be like, all right, bro, go to you. I'll see you in about an hour. We'll push back a little bit so you don't miss much. right but but that's not what happens now people like to shame people like because they don't feel good about themselves and they want to they want to make like well who are you eric for making good decisions what what am i am i lazy am i do i not have my priority straight alcohol will do that

you know it's uh i mean it was a much deeper conversation but the whole point of the story is is when your audience can learn a little bit about me and then you and the rest of my guess it's a big win right you know no doubt about it yeah alcohol is an interesting topic i come from a household with two alcoholic former alcoholic parents and it's interesting because you can go okay are they chemically out of balance to be predetermined for alcoholism or is it having a special needs child in the house for 11 years and all the stress and they were going to find some way to cope and it ended up being alcohol you know what i mean it's like yeah It's very interesting how that works.

I always just say alcohol and money both amplify who you are as a person. With money, you give these guys coming into the NFL a lot of money. If they were generous and humble and great beforehand, they're just going to be more of it. They're going to be incredible. If you gave someone who's conceded and lazy and wasteful and addiction issues, if you get money, it's only getting worse. Yeah. Hey, we're going to put them in this great atmosphere.

We have this amazing culture. We're going to give them a bunch of money and it's all going to be better. It's not. I also feel like that with alcohol. You get a joyful, bubbly person. You give them some alcohol and they're going to be the life of the party. You give someone that's pretty dark, pretty violent. Give them some alcohol.

Look out. Yeah, they're going to, they're going to go 120 in their vehicle and hurt somebody or themselves. You know, it's funny because like I look at alcohol. I'm like, you know, I'm a baseball player. I mean, that's what we did. Like, we drank, right? Now I'm looking at it. And it's like, once in a while, I'll go over to a buddy's house down the street and I'll have some beers.

And like the next morning, I always feel guilty about it. It drives a lot of guilt for me. Because I don't, this may trigger some people. And I'm okay with that. And if it triggers them, I want them to really think about it. Should your kids really see you drinking that much? What is it telling them? And not only that, like, am I ready to parent the next day?

Am I going to go get my workout in? Dude, those are all great questions for me to really dive into for me. It makes me lazy, you know? I want my kids to see me like that. No, I'm with you. And those are extremely valid points. We have a thing in my household where I refuse to be hung over, which I rarely get hungover because I'm pretty healthy.

So when I do have some drinks, it doesn't just like wreck me the next morning. Yeah. But my wife's always like, you're super dad anytime you've been drinking because in your mind, you, you like, I will deal with that anxiety if I'm not. If I, if I slept in, if I was a piece of crap the next morning, if I didn't get up, get a workout in, get the sauna, be in my office reading the Bible, like then that anxiety is going to hit because I'm not living to who I am. Yeah.

Yeah. That's very important, you know, for people to really understand that aspect of it. it's not just as simple as like well today's just going to be a cash like no dude like no if you're if it's taking you out of your standard of who you are as a person then really look at it limit it so that way you can be functional the next day right and then ask yourself if you've had five or six but you need to push the seven eight what are you hiding what are you running from right what are you masking and and so for me that that was the take on the alcohol so um but look man I I I appreciate you, dude.

And this has been an amazing conversation. I'm not surprised. It's been a very authentic and, you know, like just, you know, value ad for the audience. With that being said, you mentioned a couple times that you've done, you know, some speaking and some executive coaching. I have a lot of listeners who are entrepreneurs and, you know, some coaches for some sports teams at a higher level. Are they able to book you for certain events like that? And how would they go about doing that? Yeah, absolutely.

go to Ericwoodmedia.com and you can reach out through there. I'd be honored to speak. I enjoy it. I limit the amount of times I do it. So when I do commit, I'm all in. I protect my schedule. I got young kids. I work pretty hard in the fall, doing media work covering football.

But I'll say this. I enjoy using my platform now. And look, if you would ask my wife when I was playing in the NFL, like, what's Eric like to do? And she would say, sit. around with his buddies and talk. I feel about those speaking gigs. I get to talk with people.

I get to pour into people. And for me, it is fulfilling to be able to do that. I've heard it say, you're most powerfully positioned to impact those in a position that you once were. And so for me, especially going back and talking to sports teams, but even in the business world, because there's so many applicable traits between business and sports, us athletes, we admire businessmen and women. And we admire musical artists.

And it's amazing because you play a game with a ball for a living. How many of them admire you as well? If you can communicate those transferable traits. Absolutely, man. Absolutely. And what I'll do too is I'll have that info in the show notes. They can go through, click on your website and, you know, book you. And but, dude, man, I just really appreciate you.

And thank you so much for coming on the show. Like I said, before guys, we were, before we were recording. like a year in the making. My schedule, his schedule. We both have, you know, families. And I'm just grateful that we got to do it. And the timing was perfect. And I think the conversation was better now than it would have been a year ago.

So I can live with that. Yeah, no doubt about it. And you know what's what's great about you is as soon as I said, hey, brother, your calendar doesn't work for me. It's all in the evenings. We made it happen the next day. That's the type of dudes we are. We're going to get done.

Yeah. I mean, hey, we're not here. We're not here just for show, right? We're like, if we can make something work, we're going to make it work. And that is a lesson to everybody watching or listening. If you truly want to do something and somebody else comes at you and says, or comes to you and says, hey, this doesn't work for me. Find a way.

If not, you're just somebody else that just likes to talk about things and not do them. There was no shot. I wasn't finding something available to do with you. There's plenty time during the day, right? You know, so here we are and we did it. and amazing episodes so i appreciate you buddy no my man brother appreciate appreciate you your platform what you stand for uh it's an honor to be on appreciate it man we'll stick around for one quick second and uh without being said y'all get out there chase your dreams uh have a plan

and uh don't let up chat soon