By Mark Eckel, Player Engagement Insider
Matt Birk didn’t have a plan.
He knew one day his NFL career would end and he would move onto other things, he just didn’t know what.
“I’m probably a bad example,’’ Birk said. “When I was playing I was just focused on that opportunity. I wasn’t thinking about the future. I had a good education to fall back on, so I’d be able to find my way once I was done.
“They tell you to start thinking about what you’re going to do at the end of your career, the first day you step in. But I don’t know. I just wanted to make sure whenever I walked away from my NFL career I gave it everything I had.’’
Birk did that, and then some.
He was a 1998 sixth-round pick of the Minnesota Vikings out of Harvard, a school known more for lawyers and U.S. Presidents than football players. Birk became a six-time Pro Bowl center and played 15 years, ending his career with the Super Bowl champion Baltimore Ravens, retiring after the 2012 season.
Off the field Birk was just as successful, winning the NFL’s Walter Payton Man of the Year Award in 2004 and the NFL’s Ed Block Courage Award in 2006.
Now, he’s in his second year as the NFL’s Director of Football Development, a job he says “just came about.’’ Because, again there was no plan.
“I really didn’t know what I was going to do. I knew my career was coming to a close. I thought it might be over in year eight or year nine,’’ Birk said. “So when it was over, I knew the one thing I wanted to do was write a book. I felt so fortunate. One of the best things for me was playing football for so long you live at such a gut level. I mean every day you’re talking to coaches and they’re teaching you about life. I had all this wisdom I wanted to share with the average person.
“So I retired; I wrote the book and I hadn’t figured out the next step.’’
Birk’s book, “All-Pro Wisdom: The 7 Choices That Lead to Greatness’’ came out in 2014, just around the time it all started to come together for him. It began with a call from NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell.
“I went to New York; took the Commissioner up on his offer to come up and tour the offices,’’ Birk said. “He asked me to be an appeals judge for on-the-field discipline. So I did that for a year. Then (about a year later) I got another call from him on a Tuesday and he asked me to meet him in Florida, Friday. He said he wanted me to think about coming on board. I said, ‘why not.’
“I’m a believer that things happen for a reason. Sure, it’s good to have a plan. But there’s the plan and then there’s what happens.’’
What’s happened for Birk, who still remembers the day he signed with the Vikings in 1998, received a $54,000 bonus, bought a used pick-up truck and paid off his student loans and “thought I hit the lottery,’’ is the satisfaction of doing a job that you love.
“I love staying involved with the game,’’ Birk said. “I mean I talk to football people all day. I talk to college coaches. I talk to youth coaches. I talk to NFL coaches. I talk to retired players. I deal with everybody across the football spectrum, or football community.
This is a way for me to give back. In general our job is to grow and develop the pipeline of football people, make sure the game at all levels is strong, secure and getting as many people exposed to the game as possible. For me, it’s not even a job. It really is a labor of love. When you can align your job and your passion you got a good thing going.’’
And it was never planned.