His career may have ended with a whimper, but at least it is ending in the right place. Nnamdi Asomugha has returned to the Oakland Raiders where he had his greatest success and will retire wearing the black and silver.
Asomugha joined the NFL after being drafted in the first round (31st Overall) by Oakland in 2003. By 2005, he took over the starting job at Left Cornerback where he would emerge a year later as one of the top players in the league. Opposing offences threw to his side of the field sparingly, and in 2006 he was named the MVP of the team. His play continued to improve to where he was named to three consecutive Pro Bowls (2008, 2009 & 2010) and was named a First Team All Pro twice (2008 & 2010).
After a three year period where he was arguably the least thrown to Cornerback in the National Football League, Asomugha became a free agent and was signed by the Philadelphia Eagles on a five year deal worth sixty million dollars. The Eagles had put a lot of effort into building their team that offseason and Asomugha was expected to be a huge part of that. Unfortunately, the collection of stars failed to gel and many underperformed, including Asomugha, who was still playing at a high level, but not at the All-Pro status he had in Oakland.
After failing to restructure his contract with Philadelphia, Asomugha was signed by the San Francisco 49ers but had an ineffective year and was waived by the team last month. With four dominant years and a couple of average ones, Nnamdi Asomugha is probably not going to make the Hall of Fame, but his career is one worth taking a look at and should have made larger headlines than it did.
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