Quinn Pitcock, the almost 300-pound defensive tackle attempting a comeback with the Seattle Seahawks following a bout of depression-induced (and self-diagnosed) videogame addiction, has survived the first round of cuts with his NFL team and racked up four tackles in the Seahawk’s first three preseason games.
Pitcock also opened up to the Dayton Daily News (he attended Ohio State University) about his trouble with videogames, labeling Call of Duty as his game of choice. Pitcock indicated that on a “typical day,” he would wake up at 3 PM and then play until 6 or 7 AM the next day.
Playing as Randy the Random 1, Pitcock said, “First-person shooter games were my thing. I was ranked at one point 55th in the world.”
He added, “But it just consumed me. It’s a world I shouldn’t have been into.”
While he has since eliminated the Xbox 360 from his home and hasn’t played in three months, Pitcock, who called games "his drug of choice," detailed the downward spiral he was once in, saying:
I signed up for a success school, going down to Texas for a weekend. But I had played so many video games right before my trip and wasn’t ready and had no sleep. I called off my flight and trip, and stayed in the next couple weeks. I was calling off a lot of different things for video games. ... That’s when I knew it was a problem.
He was apparently a victim of game rage as well, as Pitcock said there were five “broken or burned or cracked” game discs hanging on his apartment wall. “I got so mad at myself for playing again and broke ’em. But then a couple days later, I’d go out and buy a new one,” he explained.
Since acknowledging his problem in the media, Pitcock says he is amazed at how well his story has been received and that at least a few people had reached out to him for advice.
Seattle makes final cuts this Saturday.
Comments
Re: Pitcock Sheds More Light on His Trouble with Videogames
Oh man no. 55 in Call of Duty thats bloody impressive. I know a guy who played a crapload of COD4 and MW2. He was in the top 150 in COD 4, and 100 something in MW2 before the leaderboard hackers.
I used to play with him very often, he told me he worked in a porn shop and that's why he had so much time to play MW2. He played almost twice as many days as I did, and I played a helluva lot....
Re: Pitcock Sheds More Light on His Trouble with Videogames
geez. I hope he doesn't have the same anger problem with his kids, if he has any.
wait a minute, does that count as a massacre of dozens of virtual lives? and does anyone remember something about virtual people getting the same protection as real people regarding life under some kind of law?
岩「hey Glenn Beck, I heard you oppose Net Neutrality, so we blocked your site.」
岩「…I can see why Hasselbeck's worried about fake guns killing fake people. afterall, she's a fake journalist on a fake news channel」