After the NFL: Ex-Pros Get Entrepreneurial

Five former NFL players sit around a table talking about the moment they knew. “My knee stopped working. I couldn’t bend my leg anymore,” says Dedrick Roper, an ex-linebacker for the Philadelphia Eagles whose last game was in the 2007 preseason. Doctors drained his knee and saw floating cartilage, the sign of a tear. Roper spent eight months rehabbing. “I was in probably the best shape of my life,” he says. “Last day of training, I started running, and my knee just blew up.”

The story was much the same for Mark Clayton, a former wide receiver with the Baltimore Ravens and St. Louis Rams, and Moses Moreno, a quarterback for the Chicago Bears and San Diego Chargers: injury, rehab, reinjury, the end. Ryan McNeil, a one-time Pro Bowl defensive back who played for six teams over 10 years, decided to retire when only bad teams were calling with offers. A failed physical closed the door for Babatunde Oshinowo, a defensive tackle who made the roster for the Bears and the Cleveland Browns.