Back in August, Roddy White received a 6- year, $50 million dollar contract extension from the Atlanta Falcons that came with a stipulation. The Falcons posed the question, “what about your friends”? Although White doesn’t have a history of misconduct, 3 of his childhood buddies from South Carolina do. They lived with White at the time and several remained in the Atlanta area during his first four years. The Atlanta Falcons, not willing to risk $$ or future embarrassment for their organization, had background checks done on them. They weren’t asking Roddy to part ways with his friends, but understand the separation of business and friendship. After the Mike Vick fiasco, can you really blame them? Roddy was slated to receive $18M guaranteed.

For White, the decision to grow up was already in the making.

“We talked about it and it was like, ‘Hey, you’re going to have to do something about this’ and I said, ‘I know,’ ” said White, who has become one of the league’s top deep threats over the past two years and is on his way to his third consecutive 1,000-yard season. “But me and my [fiancé], we had been talking about it already by then. She and I said, ‘Hey, you got to move on from stuff eventually. You got to move on from stuff you used to do. You’re at a different stature now. You’re going to be looked at as not that person you used to be, you’re one of the elite players of this league. You can’t go sneaking around and doing the things you used to do and get away with.’

“Basically, that’s what I did, took that move and just kind of moved them away from me.”

You can read more here. Let me know if you agree or disagree with the actions of the Falcons’ organization?