The National Football League (NFL) player Mark Brunell has reportedly filed for bankruptcy after racking up debt problems totalling $24.8 million.
Brunell, who formerly played for the Jacksonville Jaguars and is now a quarterback for the New York Jets, revealed that he filed for bankruptcy back in June. Despite earning around $50 million in his career so far, the US player has blown nearly all of his money on investments including nine businesses and projects.
One of the companies Brunell invested in along with his former teammates Todd Fordham and Joel Smeenge was Champion LLC, in which the quarterback invested $11 million.
The company had to borrow $2 million in order to buy a number of high-end Jacksonville properties so that condos could be built on them. The Jacksonville Jaguars teammates were guarantors of the loan, so had to cover repayments with their own money when the property bubble burst and the company began to founder. Brunell lost his entire $11 million investment, and he and his wife are now facing a lawsuit for defaulting on the loan.
In total, Brunell is the subject of six lawsuits over his debt problems, and he has already had to sell his $9.5 million home to pay what he owes.
Commenting on Brunell’s unfortunate financial situation was Michael Huyghue, the commissioner of the United Football League, who told Action News Jax:
“Athletes are at the highest end of the risk spectrum. When you think about what they do for a living, the risks they take with their bodies and their lives to go and play the game, so they are more inclined to want to agree to the most high risk investments.
“The consequences when they are wrong can be really debilitating.”