July 8th, 2010 by Reed Allmand 
Mark Brunell, an 18 year veteran quarterback of the NFL, is filing Chapter 11 bankruptcy after facing multiple lawsuits because of failed real estate and business loans.
One of those includes a loan to a partnership called Champion LLC, which included Brunell’s former teammates in Jacksonville, Joel Smeenge and Todd Fordham. The three-time Pro Bowler also has a dispute in Jacksonville over a $2.2 million loan for a real estate project.
Brunell, who played for the Jacksonville Jaguars from 1995 to 2003 and won a Super Bowl last season as a backup quarterback with the New Orleans Saints, earned nearly $52 million in his last 10 seasons. But despite his high earnings which include signing bonuses of a combined $14.3 million in 2000 and 2001, and an $8.6 million signing bonus when he was traded to the Washington Redskins in 2004, he like many other less wealthy individuals, have become caught up in the whirlwind that has swept through the real estate industry.
“The timing of the group’s real estate acquisitions at the height of the real estate market, in hindsight, clearly was not good. In the end, we couldn’t and I am no longer able to shoulder this burden.” Three-time Pro Bowl quarterback Mark Brunell…
Brunell and his company were like many others who got sucked into purchasing over-valued real estate property only to be hit with a quickly depreciating asset when the foreclosure and credit crisis hit. And while Brunell’s losses are large compared to a homeowner facing imminent foreclosure, his entanglement with the foreclosure and credit crisis is the same. Fortunately for him, Chapter 11 bankruptcy, may offer him an opportunity to restructure his debt and protect many of his assets, including some of his future income from seizure by creditors.
About Reed Allmand
Allmand's vision is rooted in his own financially precarious childhood in Abilene "My father always had difficulty holding a job and supporting our family, so after my parents divorced when I was 12, my sister and I got jobs to help make ends meet," he recalls. "I remember what it felt like as a child to worry that our car would be repossessed or home foreclosed on."
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