When former New York Giants linebacker Blake Martinez abruptly announced his retirement at 28 years old last November, it came as a shock to most.
Martinez was one of the NFL’s most prolific tacklers during his short career and tied for the league lead in tackles (144) in 2017 with Buffalo Bills linebacker Preston Brown and Cleveland Browns linebacker Joe Schobert.
Although he had dealt with some injury issues leading up to his retirement, none seemed serious enough to force him out of the league. And they weren’t. Martinez had decided to retire for other reasons.
There was a newfound passion in Martinez’s life and it quickly became very lucrative: Pokémon cards.
Martinez had acquired a rare Pokémon card that he promptly sold for nearly $700,000. That was more than half of his contract with the Las Vegas Raiders at the time, which led to a change in careers.
In just seven months, Martinez has been able to earn more than $5 million by opening and selling his Pokémon cards.
“Every single day when I wake up, my shoulder doesn’t hurt and my back doesn’t hurt anymore,” Martinez said, via CNBC. “When all that hurts are my fingers from opening, like, 1,000 packs of cards per day, I think, ‘I’m going to keep doing this.'”
Martinez plans to open a third warehouse in the near future as his Pokémon card business continues to boom.
