A Math Professor and NFL Player Who Says He Was Just Lucky
John Urschel played in the NFL while finishing an MIT math PhD, yet says talent is only a small part of it — his success came from "an enormous amount of hard work" and luck. He even hopes his football fame didn't get him his MIT job.
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A coach's joke made him realize he could reach the NFL
After Urschel's junior season, his position coach pulled him aside, essentially saying, "Don't go thinking about anything crazy, stay another year" — crazy meaning declaring early for the draft. He hadn't been thinking about the NFL at all, but that remark made him realize for the first time: this was something that would happen if he wanted it. Later the coach would say in practice, "They [the league] will like this move." He wasn't running on self-confidence; he was running on other people assuming he belonged at that level.
— John UrschelHe asked his coach about a PhD; the coach thought he already had one
Urschel was doing an MIT math PhD while playing in the NFL, and he says he "didn't cheat," because he asked coach John Harbaugh in advance whether he could go back to school for a degree. The coach replied, "Absolutely, we support players finishing their education," then a minute later added a text: "I thought you already had a degree and a master's." Urschel replied, "But I don't have a PhD." The coach said "Oh, OK," and that was the approval. He deliberately picked courses with no exams that he could pass by reading the textbook — three PhD courses in one semester.
— John UrschelOn planes he pretended his math book was a chess book
During the NFL season almost all his time each day went to football, with film study at night to prepare. Math could only be done in the time others used to relax — say, on team flights, when everyone was watching movies. He says reading a chess book would have been completely fine, but reading a math book was "a little suspicious," and teammates might think he was too distracted, so he'd say, "It's not a math book, it's a chess book," flip it open for them, and they'd say "OK." The real solution was that he finished the textbooks before the semester even started — otherwise it would have been impossible.
— John UrschelThe CTE controversy conveniently gave him cover to retire
The host asked whether the years when CTE (brain damage from repeated head hits) was making NFL headlines happened to coincide with his considering retirement. Urschel said, "It gave me very good cover." But he also says he was worried before that. He was weighing whether to play one more season — the last year of his rookie contract, with the next deal worth at least a million dollars a year, while his first-year base salary was 420,000. He had at one point convinced himself to stay with "there's one year left on the contract, I'll honor it" — the same mindset as when he honored his commitment to Penn State.
— John UrschelLooking back, he doesn't know what he was agonizing over
Urschel says looking back, agonizing over retirement made no sense: the team could cut him at any time, the contract wasn't guaranteed, and an injury would end it. What he actually cared about was math and his newborn child, and both were growing more important, while football ranked third yet was a real burden on the first two — not just his head, but his whole body, whether he'd still be able to walk at 50, to pick up his grandchildren and his daughter. He says, "I needed to retire, focus on math, and go be with my kid."
— John UrschelHe estimates only 4% of Americans like math
The host asked him to guess how many out of 100 Americans like math, and Urschel said that if you define "math" the way the general public understands it, 4% might even be high. The host said that number was a little sad. Urschel's own definition is very broad: math is the quantitative language we all share for reasoning about problems, and engineering, theoretical physics, statistics and theoretical computer science all count as math — not far from doing puzzles, not far from the goal of "understanding something."
— John UrschelHis daughter won't play football; his son has to truly need it
Asked whether his two children should play football, Urschel said his daughter shouldn't — that level of risk he won't accept. For his son, if it looks like something he "really needs to do," he'd allow it. He explains what needing means: football suits young people who have that craving and can benefit from "consensual violence, controlled, agreed-upon aggression" — with rules, not trying to hurt people, essentially a proxy for war. He says it was very good for the combative high schooler he once was. If it were just "because Dad played" or "because all my friends play," he'd have the kid try wrestling or judo first.
— John UrschelHe says he actually had no talent as an NFL player
The host praised him for being good at several hard things at once, and Urschel said talent does play a role, but compared with NFL players he "had no talent" — he admits he has some athletic gifts, like broad shoulders, but in the league that doesn't count. So how did he succeed? "Hard work, an enormous amount of hard work." The source was "wanting to be better." Asked whether his MIT job came from his football fame, he said, "I don't know, I hope not."
— John UrschelIn their own words · checked verbatim
if i was reading a chess book this is totally okay if i'm reading a math book it's maybe a touch dodgy
John Urschel15:35
you're saying it gave you cover it gave me very good cover
John Urschel18:46
they could have fired me whenever they wanted
John Urschel19:49
if we define math based off what they think math is, is 4% too low enough
John Urschel20:52
math is some quantitative language that we all collectively have that we use to reason about problems
John Urschel21:00
if you compare me, let's say, to NFL players, I am not talented
John Urschel29:09
Hard work. Just an incredible amount of hard work.
John Urschel29:09
Did your football reputation help you get that job? I don't know. I hope not.
John Urschel30:09
Figures
| Urschel's heaviest weight in the NFL | 320 pounds | 9:21 |
| Urschel's college bench press record | 405 pounds | 10:21 |
| NFL combine 225-pound bench press reps | 30 reps | 10:21 |
| Urschel's estimate of the share of Americans who like math | 4% | 20:52 |
| PhD courses Urschel took per semester at MIT | 3 | 13:25 |
| Urschel's age at the time of the interview | 34 | 29:09 |
Glossary
- CTE / chronic traumatic encephalopathy
- A degenerative brain disease caused by repeated head impacts, hard to diagnose in life and mostly studied through posthumous brain donation.
- NIL / name, image and likeness
- The rules letting US college athletes profit from their name, image and likeness; not allowed yet when Urschel was playing.
- Cantor's diagonal argument
- The classic mathematical argument proving the real numbers are uncountable and that infinities come in different sizes.
- uncountable
- An infinite set that cannot be put in one-to-one correspondence with the natural numbers, such as all real numbers between 0 and 1.
How to listen
Suited to founders and engineers interested in "doing two hard things at once," especially anyone who wants to know how to fit two full-time jobs into one week and when to give one of them up.
The first two minutes or so of childhood and family background can be skipped; start at 08:16 with the coach's talk.