The Pokemon GO craze is real: people are quitting their jobs over it, getting shot over it, and stumbling on corpses because of it. However, is Niantic Labs’ latest mobile hit also attempting to control the minds of its players? One NFL player certainly seems to think so. As Detroit Lions’ guard, Larry Warford, recently revealed that he uninstalled the app from his smartphone after getting some weird, uncomfortable, and worrying vibes from it.
Speaking to the Detroit Free Press, Warford explained that he concluded the app is not worth playing after walking down the Mill Avenue in Tempe, Arizona, and witnessing 40 or so people on the street staring at their phones and playing Pokemon GO. “Literally, everyone that was on their cell phone walking down that same street was playing Pokemon Go,” stated the athlete, adding that he really didn’t like the sight which he described as “some mind-controlling stuff.” Warford even met an unnamed Lions teammate while walking down the Mill Avenue. Not surprisingly, he was also catching Pokemon. The athlete explained that he was on his way to a nearby restaurant and deleted the app as soon as he got there. Naturally, people with whom he was having lunch were also playing Pokemon GO during their meal, which just reinforced Warford’s conviction that he made the right call when he gave up on the idea of being a Pokemon trainer. “I don’t like it; something’s not right,” said the athlete ominously, adding that there’s no way he is going back to playing the app in the future. The 61-year-old Detroit Lions’ coach Jim Caldwell has also recently commented on the Pokemon GO craze by stating that he has heard of the game but has “absolutely no intention” of spending his time catching virtual pocket monsters.
Larry Warford is far from the first person to claim the mega-popular app is negatively impacting society. In fact, he’s not even the first football player who has had a negative experience of playing Niantic’s hit mobile game. Just last week, Iowa Hawkeyes’ defensive lineman Faith Ekakitie almost got arrested after police officers mistook him for a bank robber. According to the details, Ekakitie failed to respond to their warnings because he was blasting music and playing Pokemon GO.