Just because Derek Jeter stopped playing baseball, doesn’t mean he isn’t working.
The former Yankees player just took to the web to let fans know what retirement life is all about — and it is has everything to do with an Italian mastiff named Kane.
Taking to The Players Tribune, a sports startup founded by Jeter, the future Hall of Famer opened up about what it is like to raise a puppy.
Derek Jeter’s Italian Mastiff, Kane, when he was only 10 weeks old. https://t.co/vo9jGZolWa pic.twitter.com/s7eskRXyKE
— The Players’ Tribune (@PlayersTribune) November 4, 2015
Jeter received the dog as a gift from his fiancé Hannah Davis (yes, he nonchalantly slipped in the fact he was engaged into the puppy post) last January. While Davis has been surrounded by dogs her entire life, in particular mastiffs, Jeter never was raised with pups. In fact, he was petrified of dogs.
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Remember that movie? The one about the killer dog? I watched it when I was young and, man, it terrified me. After that movie, I was not messing with dogs at all. Big dogs, medium dogs, little dogs — it didn’t matter. I saw them all as threats. I just wasn’t comfortable around animals. My family didn’t have pets when I was growing up and neither did my friends. During my playing career, I was on the road too often for the idea of owning a dog ever to be realistic. So all I had was my imagination — and when I thought of a dog, all I could think about was being attacked by a St. Bernard.
So, when Kane came into his life, it wasn’t exactly an easy transition. Jeter talks about how his anxiety coupled with Kane’s energetic puppy personality made for a nervous dog. “My panicking was probably making him panic,” he writes. But with Kane’s one-year birthday approaching, the two have gotten to know each other better and both have become more relaxed around each other — but there is still much to learn.
“Being a ‘dog owner’ is still new to me,” he writes. “A little challenge is probably good. I guess it’s possible to learn new tricks.”