Alex Mack retiring wasn’t much of a surprise.
The 49ers kept his status relatively in the dark despite knowing which way Mack was leaning. Mack has spent 13 seasons in the NFL and is 36 years old. Considering how there was no answer yet about his future and seeing how he’s been traveling, it became pretty clear he was hanging up his cleats.
What isn’t clear are his specific reasons for calling it career. Mack revealed those reasons to Albert Breer of The MMQB.
“But everybody loses, except one team. The numbers are so stacked against you. And that weighed into the equation. If we had won the Super Bowl, I think I would’ve been really quick to retire. It was, Does my body have another year to give it another go? And I landed on, No, it’s time, it’s time to walk away.”
Valid and kind of expected point. You always have to be concerned with how a players body will hold up at his age with so many years played already. Even coming off of a Pro Bowl season (an alternate), it didn’t prove to Mack enough that he should keep going. So why did Mack take so long to reveal his retirement? The pain of losing the NFC Championship game.
“It hurt. It hurt, that’s for sure. It’s so hard to win a Super Bowl, and I’ve gotten close twice now and it’s been 13 years. It’s such a monumental task that takes talent and luck and timing, it’s just one of those things that’s immensely hard. And every year for 13 years, I did absolutely everything I could to be the best player possible, and I got close twice.”
Mack is totally valid in taking time to recover from the pain of that game. Even Deebo Samuel was visibly upset following that loss. It stung, and when you’re a tenured player like Mack who rarely gets the chance to go that far, you feel it ever so thoroughly. He definitely would’ve relished riding off into the sunset and live the football fairytale finish. It just didn’t work out that way.
The 49ers will certainly feel the loss of Mack as the center position is now vacant without any real adequate replacements. It’s why the Niners didn’t mind Mack taking his time because they knew they needed him back.
But Mack is done.
He will leave the game of football on his own accord after going far in the playoffs while playing at a solid level in his final season.
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