Chris Borland

I don't really trust the NFL.

The host of 'Face The Nation,' Bob Schieffer, was an important figure in my childhood years. Every Sunday in the fall, he occupied my family's time after church and before the NFL pregame shows.

The reality is that it's just the nature of the game. It's the nature of playing offensive line, defensive line, and linebackers, where your responsibilities as a player involve those little hits that are going to accumulate. You can't take that out of the game.

Football is inherently dangerous, and that will never change.

I can't predict the future of football. I don't think it'll go the way of boxing because it's a team sport. It's built into our education systems, the flagship for a lot of universities' fundraising campaigns. So no, I don't think it'll go away.

About 10 percent of the time, I miss 3 to 5 percent of the game. I look back, and I'm happy that I played. I'm not wistful. You miss big games. I miss the locker room camaraderie. Sometimes I miss the lifestyle.

The 49ers drafted me assuming I wanted to play more than one year. At the time, I did, too. Things changed. They didn't deserve to be undercut. And I didn't want that to happen.

People think that athletes have it great, and we do in a lot of regard, but universities make a hell of a lot of money off of players. You don't get a free education: you work full-time year round for five years for an education you could pay for three times over if you just got your market value.