Eddie Lacy is a former American football running back who played for the Green Bay Packers and the Seattle Seahawks. Lacy lined up for the University of Alabama, where he posted impressive numbers during his final season with the team. He finished the 2012 season with over 1,300 rushing yards and 17 rushing touchdowns.
The Green Bay Packers selected Lacy in the second round of the 2013 NFL Draft. The bulky yet fleet-footed running back had a stellar couple of seasons with the Packers, averaging over 1000 yards per season. However, weight issues contributed to his decline. He went on to have a disappointing spell with the Seattle Seahawks before leaving the NFL.
It is unlikely that Eddie will make a return to the NFL
After a disastrous third season with the Packers, coach Mike McCarthy stated in his season-ending press conference that Lacy would lose playing time if he failed to keep his weight down. “He’s got a lot of work to do,” McCarthy said. “He cannot play at the weight he played at this year.”
Eddie took the public criticism as motivation, and by the time the next season rolled in, he’d lost 22 pounds. He looked back to his best in the first five games, but a season-ending ankle injury derailed his progress. Unable to stay mobile, Lacy regained the lost weight. “I obviously just got bigger,” Eddie told ESPN.
“All you can do is lay down and eat. What are you supposed to do?” The next season, Eddie left the Packers as a free agent and began searching for another team. The Seattle Seahawks gambled on him and offered him bonuses as motivation for keeping his weight down. The idea worked, but Eddie hated that people turned his weigh-ins into public spectacles.
“I hate that it has to be public,” Lacy told ESPN. “Because it’s like, if you don’t make it, what happens? Clearly you don’t get the money, but whatever. I don’t really care about that. It’s just more the negative things that are going to come.” Eddie left the packers at the end of his one-year contract.
In 2019, Lacy worked out with the Baltimore Ravens, but he didn’t sign a contract with the team. His agent told Roll Tide Wire that it is unlikely that Eddie will return to the NFL. “At this time, I do not anticipate Eddie resuming his NFL career,” he said.
Following news that Tim Tebow is trying to make an NFL comeback, a Twitter fan asked Eddie whether he’s considering a return. The GIF he posted as a reply suggests that an NFL comeback is out of the picture.
Eddie’s Instagram page shows that he spends a lot of time with family. An 11th December 2020 Instagram post suggests that Eddie has something in the works. He posted the following caption alongside post-workout photos:
“It’s dope how u can find happiness in doin something for yourself, on your own merit then u once did for a living when your mind and perspective towards it changes for the better.”
Lacy joined the mental wellness company Amare Global
In November 2021, Eddie announced joining the mental health company Amare Global. “Mental Wellness is something I know all too well,” Lacy tweeted.
On Instagram, Eddie wrote that the past few years had made him realize the importance of mental wellness. He wrote:
“Through yoga, meditation, and proper nutrition, I have learned just how valuable gut health can be to your mental wellness. I have had my own personal struggles, but I have also learned the importance of sleep quality, better mood, and increased energy.”
Lacy wrote that he’d researched Amare global, concluding that they offer superior mental wellness services compared to any other company. Therefore, he’d decided to partner with the company and make it his new career.
“I have decided to not only partner with Amare Global but decided this is my new career, to spread what we are doing here around the world,” Eddie wrote. “Mental Wellness in just as important as Physical Wellness.”
Eddie’s struggles with food started after his family lost its home due to hurricane Katrina
Eddie’s family moved from New Orleans to Beaumont, Texas, to escape Hurricane Katrina. Their house was destroyed and all their property looted. The family moved in with Eddie’s aunt in Baton Rouge for a while, before moving into a trailer in Geismar.
Lacy let his frustrations and anger out on the football pitch, earning him a scholarship with the University of Alabama. Due to the family’s situation, his parents couldn’t afford healthy meals. Lacy rarely ate anything healthy, but there was little he could do about it. He told ESPN:
“Even if we had gone the healthy route, how long could we have sustained it? Maybe a couple of weeks, or maybe a month. Everything we ate, my mom made us eat bread with it because she knew it would fill us up and we would feel less hungry later. She had to feed us, and she did the best she could.”
When he joined Alabama, the rigorous training helped keep his weight in check. When he got to the Packers, however, he found a much more relaxed training regimen. “This is all we have to do?” he asked himself, per ESPN. He admits that he could have done more to stay in shape for the game, but in the end, he lost the fight. Lacy told ESPN:
“Sometimes I wish I was a person with high metabolism who could just eat whatever they want and can’t gain a pound. You’ve got certain teammates who are like, ‘Man, it don’t matter what I eat, I can’t gain weight.’ And I’m like, ‘It don’t matter what kind of diet I’m on, it’s super hard for me to lose weight, and so it’s easy for me to put it back on.”
Internet trolls made it harder for Eddie to deal with his on-field struggles
Over time, Eddie Lacy went from a promising NFL star to an internet meme. Nobody understands the internet’s brutality better than Eddie. Internet sleuths searched through his Twitter account and found college tweets about Lacy’s love for Chinese food. They screenshotted every tweet and made a collage that went viral.
“It sucks,” Eddie said. “It definitely sent me into a funk. I wish I could understand what they get out of it.” People photo-shopped Lacy’s stomach to make it look like he had a Santa Claus physique. He lamented:
“I could pull up my Twitter right now and there would be a fat comment in there somewhere. Like I could tweet, ‘Today is a beautiful day!’ and someone would be like, ‘Oh yeah? You fat.’ I sit there and wonder: ‘What do you get out of that?’”
You would think that the vile would make Eddie quit social media, but it hasn’t. Social media rarely lets things slide, and under every post, you will find someone mocking him for his weight. He knows that every post will come with hate, so he’s learned to get used to the negativity. “The negativity is always there, whether you’re doing good or you’re going through a funk,” he told ESPN.