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{{trope}}
{{quote|''[[Memetic Mutation|I used to be an adventurer like you. Then I took an arrow in the knee.]]''|'''Guards from ''[[The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim]]'''''}}
A
Usually this trope involves an athlete getting an injury, but the career can be anything that requires physical and/or mental ability. Likewise, what causes the disability can be something other than an injury (for example, a disease) -- the important point is that it prevents the character from achieving their goals by causing a disability.
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Very much a [[Truth in Television]].
Compare [[White Dwarf Starlet]] and [[I Coulda Been a Contender]], common results of this trope, and [[Sorry, Billy, But You Just Don't Have Legs]], where the character is disabled to start with instead of becoming so during their career. If the character overcomes the injury, either temporarily or permanently, then they're [[Back in
This is sometimes set up as a twist or a [[The Reveal|reveal]], so beware of spoilers.
{{examples}}
== Anime and Manga ==
* Sometimes Hero Killer Stain, from ''[[My Hero Academia]]'' opts to inflict this upon his targets instead of killing them.
* In ''[[
* In ''[[Battle Angel Alita]]'', Alita's motorball trainer used to be a racer but had to retire after overuse of reflex-boosting drugs damaged his nervous system. Subverted for Jasugun {{spoiler|who knows his brain is dying from being tampered with too much but chooses to die on the track as a champion}}.
* ''[[
* In ''[[Berserk]]'', Gutts' foster father has to retire as an active mercenary after a messy leg injury. Averted for Gutts himself - you would think that losing a hand would end the career of a fighter who specialises in two-handed weapons, but he is stubborn enough to learn to handle the sword using prosthetic hand. (A magnet in the hand helps him maintain the grip.)
* Gerd in ''[[
* When the manga ''[[H 2]]'' begins, baseball players Hiro
* Almost happens to Hayato and Randoll in ''[[
** In Bootsvorz's backstory, a nasty crash at a test drive resulted in losing his left eye and arm, but he returned to racing after gaining a new arm and eye.
** Johji Ohtomo quits CF racing after a crash at the German GP that was indirectly caused by Hayato's Super Asurada 01 crashing into Ohtomo's car and he suffers serious injuries as a result.
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* In ''[[Hajime no Ippo]]'', Nekota was forced to give up boxing {{spoiler|after an illegal punch from his opponent resulted in permanent mid-brain damage and punch-drunk syndrome, although he experienced the symptoms of the latter before the fight (it was from a fight with his friendly rival)}}.
* In the ''[[Case Closed]]'' [[Non-Serial Movie]] ''The Fourteenth Target'', the murderer is revealed to be {{spoiler|a sommelier whose taste buds were destroyed in an accident, taking revenge on the people who ended his career}}.
== Comic Books ==
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* Halfway through ''[[Cars]]'', Lightning discovers that Doc Hudson was actually the Fabulous Hudson Hornet, a legendary racecar. Doc ultimately explains that the only reason he "quit" racing was because he suffered a major crash during a race. By the time he could race again, the racing industry merely brushed him off without a second thought.
* ''[[Million Dollar Baby]]'' has a very heart-wrenching one of these near the end of the movie. {{spoiler|A nasty cheap shot from behind results in Maggie's neck being broken when she lands on a corner stool, resulting in her being paralyzed from the neck down. As boxing was her passion and her life and she will never be able to fight again, Maggie wants to die, and her mentor ultimately makes the decision to give her an assisted suicide}}.
* ''[[
* ''[[Remember the Titans]]'' has the automobile accident that ends the football career of star linebacker Gerry Bertier.
* At the beginning of ''[[Shaolin Soccer]]'' the man who will become the coach to our heroes is a [[Jerkass]] soccer superstar until the teammate he's been lording it over hires people to cripple the star.
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* ''[[Gattaca]]'': the guy whose DNA the protagonist is using used to be an athlete until an undisclosed incident confined him to a wheelchair.
* Joe's knee injury in ''[[Bend It Like Beckham]]'', which was caused by his father pushing him too hard.
* Danny Glover's [[Jaded Washout]] character in ''[[Angels in
* In the original timeline of ''[[Back to The Future]]'', a car accident ends Marty's rock career before it even took off the ground.
* In the live-action ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (film)|Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles]]'', Casey says he used to "play professionally until I got hurt". Presumably he means hockey.
== Literature ==
* A major plot point in ''[[A Separate Peace]]''.
* Happens several times in ''[[
** Stonepelt retires early due to a shoulder injury that didn't heal properly.
** Longtail also retires early when he goes blind from infected scratched eyes.
** The most notable example in the series, though, is Cinderpelt, whose hind leg was permanently damaged when she was hit by a car when she was only an apprentice. She dreamed of being a warrior, but decided to serve her Clan as a medicine cat after it became clear her leg would never heal.
* In ''[[The Curious Case of Benjamin Button]]'', Daisy is forced to retire as a ballet dancer after a hit by a cab breaks her leg.
* ''[[
** Bran gets pushed out of a window and is paralyzed from the waist down, destroying any possibility of his ever being a knight.
** Willas Tyrell, the heir to Highgarden, was a promising knight until his leg got crushed in a tournament.
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== Live-Action TV ==
* A plot point of Danny Messer's backstory in ''[[CSI: NY]]''. He was an aspiring baseball player, but an arm injury forced him to quit. (a storyline incidentally drawn from the actor's real life background).
* ''[[JAG]]'' is centered on a Navy aviator named Harmon Rabb. He was a career fighter pilot, following in his father's footsteps, until he crashed his plane in a night landing on an aircraft carrier due to an undiagnosed vision problem. In order to stay in the Navy, he went to law school and became an attorney with the Navy Judge Advocate General.
* ''[[Space: Above and Beyond]]'' has Lieutenant Colonel T.C. McQueen, who was an elite fighter pilot before he suffered a debilitating head injury in combat. He has enough experience to warrant making him a squadron commander, acting in the role of [[Mission Control]] for his young pilots.
* ''[[White Collar]]'''s Peter Burke was a professional baseball player when he tore his rotator cuff. The injury healed just fine and he was able to play baseball again, though a doctor advised him he could re-injure. Rather than risk losing both his baseball career and the possibility of joining the FBI, Peter opted to quit baseball and simply join the FBI.
* It happens a couple of times on ''[[M*A*S*H (
* In the pilot for ''[[Friday Night Lights (TV series)|Friday Night Lights]]'' Jason is paralyzed in an injury ending his planned career as a football player.
* In an episode of ''[[Bones]]'' where the [[Victim of the Week]] is a professional motorcycle racer, one of the suspects is a parapalegic former racer who the victim had "accidentally" caused to crash in a previous race, causing the paraplegia.
* In ''Blind Justice'' the protagonist is a police officer who is blinded due to an injury he sustains in the line of duty. This would normally end his career but he manages to subvert the trope by suing the police department to get his job back.
* Tony Micelli of ''[[
* ''[[Monk]]'' was able to manage his OCD until his wife's death caused a breakdown that made the condition much worse. This ends his career as a police officer.
* [[
* ''[[Cheers]]'' established this as the reason Sam left baseball...with a twist.
{{quote|
'''Sam:'''I developed an elbow problem.
'''Diane:'''An elbow problem?
'''Sam:'''Yeah. Bent it too much.
''Mimes drinking from a bottle.'' }}
== Newspaper Comics ==
* Lampooned in ''[[The Far Side]]'', where one cartoon claims [[Albert Einstein]] played professional basketball before he hurt his ankle, and as a result, pursued a career in science.
== Video Games ==
* In ''[[The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim]]'', all guards share a pool of random sentences, which any of them can say. One of those is the page quote, making it sound like this is the backstory for every single guard.
* ''[[Dead Island]]'': the back story for Logan, an ex-football star.
* ''[[Jagged Alliance]] 2'' has an Alumni page on the AIM (Association of International Mercenaries) website, where among the retired, KIA and dishonorably discharged there are also those who suffered injury or had failing health.
* In ''[[Resident Evil:
* In ''[[Mass Effect 3]]'', [[Career Killer|Thane's]] terminal illness known as Kepral's Syndrome finally reaches a point where Thane can no longer reliably perform his job as an assassin. However, this doesn't stop him from {{spoiler|intervening to save the salarian Councilor when Kai Leng and Cerberus attacks, though the disease does slow him down to the point that he is badly wounded, and the injury itself will eventually kill him.}}
* In Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops this is given as the backstory for Lieutenant Cunningham of FOX, a CIA sponsored black ops organization, as he used to be a soldier during Vietnam but suffered an injury to his leg that required it to be amputated thus ending his career. During the story he expresses resentment towards the CIA for giving him a desk job after his injury when he used to be a distinguished warrior. A common theme in the overall story of the Metal Gear games is that soldiers are mistreated by their governments, Cunningham being downsized is viewed as another example of this ideal.
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== Western Animation ==
* ''[[Kick Buttowski]]'''s mother Honey Splash ended her career as a speedboat stuntster because she tore her tendanacious ligamental flexor. Kick encourages her to try again years later, but the injury flares up at a plot appropriate moment.
* Bruce from ''[[
* [[Played for Laughs]] in the ''[[
* ''[[Oban Star Racers]]'': Rick Thunderbolt, the original earth team pilot, is seriously injured in his first race, leaving him with a nervous system that freezes up at inopportune moments. After some episodes moping about it he eventually agrees to help train Molly as his replacement.
== Real Life ==
* In one the most well-known examples from the [[
* Lou Gehrig had to retire from baseball due to having amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (which became known as Lou Gehrig's disease.)
* Nancy Kerrigan (figure skating): Her rival Tonya Harding hired someone to whack Kerrigan in the knee with a pipe, hoping to break her leg
* Monica Seles (tennis): Deranged fan of a rival runs onto the court during a match and stabs her in the back of the neck. She got better.
* [[
** [[Professional Wrestling]] has plenty of these: [[Stone Cold Steve Austin]] retired after multiple neck injuries; Darren Drozdov became a quadriplegic due to a ring mishap, and then there are the injuries that weren't only career-ending, but [[Fatal Method Acting|life-ending]].
* [[Matt Smith]] originally wanted to be a professional footballer, but a back injury put an end to his early career. Considering he's now a world-famous actor and plays the lead character in [[Doctor Who|one of the most popular TV shows in history]] (and even got to [[The Cast Showoff|show off]] a little of his football chops in one episode), we're going to go out on a limb and presume he's not too bitter about it.
* Despite winning via unanimous decision in a ten-round match against Luis Melendez of Colombia, Filipino boxer Z Gorres collapsed shortly after the verdict was announced, and was treated for haematoma, later undergoing extensive physical therapy for him to regain the ability to do day-to-day tasks. Said injuries have unfortunately spelled the end of his boxing career.
{{reflist}}
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[[Category:Plot Twist]]
[[Category:Disability Tropes]]
[[Category:
[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}]]
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