Off Center: A Memoir of Addiction, Recovery, and Redemption in Professional Football

Randy Grimes quickly learned one important truth as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ top draft pick: play through pain, or get cut.

This is just part of being a pro athlete, he told himself.

Growing up in Tyler, Texas, Grimes’s life was very much on center. A childhood spent in church on Sundays and on the gridiron all week turned into a football scholarship to Baylor, marriage to his college sweetheart, and a coveted NFL roster spot.

When the Bucs’ starting center began piling up brutal hits, he determined to do anything to stay in the game. If the pills prescribed by the team doctors could help, Grimes would take them.

All in a day’s work, he told himself.

Even before Grimes left the NFL, his life began slipping off center. Eventually, he lost almost everything he owned, the respect of his children, and very nearly his life, before tumbling out of the car and crawling on hands and knees into a treatment center—literally—into a life-changing miracle.

Off Center is Randy Grimes’s riveting story of having it all, playing the sport he loved, losing almost everything, and ultimately finding redemption and hope. Witness the addiction trap that binds millions and claims thousands of lives each year—and the steps Grimes took to reclaim his life and guide others.

Today Grimes and his wife, Lydia, stage drug and alcohol interventions for professional athletes, celebrities, business leaders, and everyday Americans to find recovery from addiction.

Recovery has become his playbook. His treatment center colleagues are his team. And those with addiction are his community.

Above all, Grimes wants people to know: Even when the world seems to be yours, there is room to fall. And even when that world seems to slip away, there is hope.

Randy Grimes is a ten-year veteran of the NFL, an addiction interventionist, and the founder of Professional Athletes in Recovery. He has partnered with the NFL Player Care Foundation, After the Impact Fund, Gridiron Greats, Motorsports Safety Group, Jockey Guild, and the Baseball Assistance Team to bring further awareness and treatment services to professional athletes, their families, and others.

Grimes is a regular contributor to national media on the topics of addiction, recovery, and support for families affected by substance abuse. He has been featured in The New York Times, ESPN, CNN, Fox Sports, Fox News, MSNBC, SiriusXM Sports, and on the cover of Recovery Today magazine.

Connect with him at RandyGrimesSpeaks.com or ProAthletesInRecovery.org.