Epicly Later’d – Gino Iannucci: The Final Episode

I understand why certain athletes retire before time is up. I guess that most of them want to leave the game while they’re on top. But it does kind of suck because you know that there is so much more they are capable of and you begin to think what could have been and what more they could have accomplished. Another championship perhaps? Quite possibly a scoring award. Or how about a couple more illegitimate children. Who knows.

I’m a big tennis fan and one player who I thought embodied cool was Bjorn Borg, the Swede. I think he was so ahead of his time especially with his style. If he is now who he was back in the 70’s, all the Silverlake hipsters would be swinging around a racket instead of biking the streets of Los Angeles. Retiring at only 26 years of age, probably due to too many drugs and boning too many women, he won 11 Grand Slams. Crazy!

Another obvious early retirement was that of MJ. Michael Jordon retired after winning the 1998 NBA Championships and his 6th title. The guy was really on top of the sports world and nobody even came close to his greatness. But he did leave and that left him more time to play golf and do Hanes commercials.

The last one I will mention is Gino. He has no responsibility beyond himself to skate how he wants to skate but he really leaves most spectators wanting more. His retirement is a little ambiguous because he still skates around but it’s uncertain if he will film another part, and if he does, the length is in question as well.

The biggest difference between Gino and the other two athletes mentioned is that when Bjorn and Michael retired, they both actually made a come back and you know what? They were horrible. Not exactly crappy but they weren’t who they were. I know along with most people that if Gino came back and filmed a part, it would be epic no matter what he does.

So considering I wouldn’t exactly call Gino an athlete and more of an artist, a skate artist at least, I should compare him more to the likes of someone like Hattori Hanzo from Quentin Tarantino’s “Kill Bill”. Although a fictional character Hanzo is reminiscent to Gino. Gino is like the old school samurai master who takes a hiatus and comes back to greatness. That’s the kind of success I think Gino should have.