Top 10 Times Athletes Ruined Their Careers Off The Field
Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for the Top 10 Times Athletes Ruined Their Careers Off the Field. For this list, we’ll be looking at the most notable cases where sportspeople got embroiled in controversy in their daily lives —not while competing — destroying their reputation or legacies. We won’t be including folks who used performance enhancing substances, as that’s technically on the pitch. Which athlete’s off-field antics shocked you the most? Let us know below!
#10: Ryan Lochte
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While Michael Phelps was getting all the attention for his dominance, Lochte was right behind him, carving out his own legacy. But then, the 2016 Summer Olympics happened in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He, along with three other members of the USA Swimming team, announced they were robbed. However, inconsistencies in Lochte’s story soon emerged. In the end, it turned out he had lied. They’d actually gotten drunk and vandalized the bathroom at a gas station. Afterward, they were confronted to pay for the destruction. Lochte was barred from competing for 10 months, and he was dropped by sponsors, while the other athletes received a 4-month suspension. This incident, plus a doping scandal in 2018, resulted in Lochte struggling to return to his former glory.
#9: Greg Hardy
Hardy was living the dream as a Carolina Panthers’s defensive end, receiving praise from all sides of the NFL for his amazing work. But during the off-season in 2014, the wheels came off his rise to stardom when he was accused of assaulting his then girlfriend. Hardy was initially found guilty of assault, but the case was ultimately dismissed on appeal because his former partner largely went quiet. Needless to say, people were far from happy that he was still in the league after this. After attempting a football comeback with the Dallas Cowboys in 2015, Hardy switched sports and began an MMA career.
#8: Johnny Manziel
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You expect someone nicknamed “Johnny Football” to do big things in the NFL, but this athlete’s personal life and excessive amounts of partying got in the way. While he had some run-ins with the police in his college days, the quarterback was drafted by the Cleveland Browns in 2014. But Manziel's excessive behavior off the field continued. In 2015, he was pulled over for a fight in the car with his partner. While he had been drinking, the officers believed he was under the legal limit, and nothing came of the incident. But subsequent dishonest behavior, combined with a domestic violence charge, led to Cleveland cutting him in 2016. Though the case was dropped in 2017 after Manziel agreed to counseling, there’s really no coming back from something like that.
#7: Aaron Hernandez
Being an All-American when he was in Florida, people had high expectations of Hernandez when he signed with the New England Patriots. And he was on course to be one of the best tight ends around, despite being caught in various unlawful situations over the years. But then, in 2013, Hernandez was taken into custody for ending Odin Lloyd’s life, resulting in the Patriots to cut ties with him. In 2015, he received a life sentence without parole. Then, in 2017, Hernandez stood trial for the 2012 deaths of Daniel Jorge Correia de Abreu and Safiro Teixeira Furtado, though he was deemed innocent. However, he passed away in jail just a few days later, having taken his own life.
#6: Lamar Odom
Described as a team player with a great attitude, Odom was part of the dominant LA Lakers for part of the 2000s, and became even more well-known after his marriage to Khloé Kardashian. However, the former basketball star had run into substance use issues throughout his career. Soon, they became impossible to ignore. In 2013, he got a DUI. And in 2015, things reached a boiling point, as he was found in Nevada, out cold. Odom had taken several illicit substances, fell into a coma, and suffered numerous strokes, among other things. Thankfully, he recovered and got clean, later admitting that his addiction cut his basketball career short.
#5: Michael Vick
This Atlanta Falcons quarterback was making waves and looked set to have a legendary career in the NFL. That changed drastically in 2007, when a disturbing story emerged. One of his properties in Virginia was found to have hosted dog fighting. He and some others had been leading this ring and engaging in animal mistreatment since all the way back in 2001. One NFL suspension and guilty plea later, he began serving jail time. Upon release, he began playing for the Philadelphia Eagles in 2009. But as you can imagine, his reputation never really recovered from the horrific scandal.
#4: Ray Rice
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After signing a hefty 5-year contract and winning the Super Bowl with the Baltimore Ravens, life was pretty good for this running back. Well, at least that’s what it looked like on the surface. In 2014, he and his partner, Janay Palmer, were visiting New Jersey’s Revel Casino. The two got into an intense dispute, which culminated in him assaulting her. Much of it was caught on tape. But since the athlete took part in a Pretrial intervention program, the case was ultimately thrown out. When he was later suspended indefinitely and released by his team, the NFL star sued the Ravens for back pay. The case was settled out of court in 2015. Rice hasn’t played pro football since.
#3: Tonya Harding
She was the first American woman to nail a triple Axel in a professional ice skating competition. Yet Harding’s career took an infamous nosedive in 1994. Nancy Kerrigan, a competitor of hers, was violently struck on the knees, and left injured. It was subsequently revealed that Harding’s ex Jeff Gillooly and her bodyguard Shawn Eckardt had planned the affair, getting two men to carry out their plan. Still, Harding, who maintained her innocence, was controversially added to the USA team for the 1994 Winter Olympics, alongside Kerrigan. Later on, Harding admitted to obstructing justice. In addition to receiving probation time and a substantial fine, she was permanently barred from practicing the sport competitively.
#2: Oscar Pistorius
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There was a time when Pistorius was among the most famous Paralympic sprinters around. All that changed after he attacked who he thought was a criminal in his home. The victim was actually his partner, Reeva Steenkamp. The South African sprinter was set to spend five years in jail as a result. The original conviction was then overturned in favor of a more serious charge. Though his prison term this time around was a year longer, prosecutors still didn’t believe that was enough, and appealed once more. They were successful in 2017, as Pistorius’ sentence was more than doubled, to 13 years and five months.
#1: O.J. Simpson
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The world watched as Simpson ran away from the police in a Ford Bronco and was then acquitted of the slaying of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman in 1994. Yet in 1997, he found himself losing a civil case and was deemed responsible for their passing, with the combined penalty being $33.5 million. His acting and broadcasting career were effectively over at this point. After all that, you might expect him to keep a low profile. But he didn’t. In 2008, he was in court for his role in a Las Vegas robbery, and was handed a 33 year prison sentence, being granted parole in 2017. He’s been free since 2021, though his name remains synonymous with scandal.
