ALLEN PARK, Mich. –- Andre Roberts thought he’d be an auditor. When he was in college, studying accounting at The Citadel, and playing in the NFL was uncertain at best, that was his plan: to travel around the country studying clients' books and making sure they were compliant with their numbers.

Then the NFL became a reality, so he audited his own plans and has been in the league for the past seven seasons. But finance was never too far from his mind. So a few years ago, he started digging back into money and paying more attention to his investments.

And in that time, a future broker might have started to take shape.

Andre Roberts enjoys returning punts in the fall and getting return on his investments in the offseason. Dennis Wierzbicki/USA TODAY Sports

“I did take a finance class [at The Citadel] looking at charts and stuff, and I thought it was pretty cool,” Roberts said. “About three years ago, I kind of just got into it. Started reading up on terminology and looking at the markets, and I kind of just wanted to get into it because I’m investing now.

“I’m putting some of my money in the markets, so I want to know what’s going on with it. So I kind of just got into it like that and started reading more, started understanding how you can actually make money in [the] short term and long term.”

He began reading and simulating trades on Investopedia to get a feel for what he might be getting into. He read multiple books, attempting to understand the flow of the markets and which way he should dig in with his investments.

In doing so, he discovered the options market –- and he kind of fell in love with the idea of it. So he devoured everything, learning the difference between a call (buy) and a put (sell) option at a set price. He became intrigued by the short-term plays of options versus the hold-for-years games of stocks and mutual funds.

So he started to ask others about it and became connected with LeRoy Walton, a friend of a friend who is based out of Atlanta. Walton mentored Roberts over the span of a four-day visit last offseason where he explained options.

“He didn’t really know the options part of it that well,” said Walton, a self-taught investor. “And I like to teach, and he had passion and eagerness to learn. I kind of felt that from him when I was talking with him on the phone a few times, and I wanted to see his strategies and things like that.

“So he flew into town and we went over a few different things.”

The two struck up a friendship and, eventually, a partnership. They started a corporation called the Long Green Line, named after what they would like to see all of the stocks and options they invest in do –- stay green.

Roberts began trading with “paper money” first, going on websites with fake money and delayed markets by five minutes so he could get a feel for the trading aspect and pacing of options. He had done this earlier with stocks before he got involved in it.

But he found he enjoyed the thrill of the short-term deal with options, so he spends his offseason time trading them. He doesn’t trade at all during the season to remain focused on football, where he has become a productive returner for the Detroit Lions, returning two punts for touchdowns and earning Pro Bowl consideration.

“There’s just not enough time to look at it,” Roberts said. “It’s so fast-paced with options. Most of the time you can’t just buy something and then not look at it. With stocks it’s different, long-term stocks it’s different. You can just buy them and hold them forever, years.

“But options, they decay. They expire. So you kind of have to keep an eye on it. Some things do take a couple days to make their way to green, but it’s just not enough time.”

So the Long Green Line is flat-lined during the season but will pick up again once Detroit’s season concludes. Meanwhile, Roberts is often on his phone, monitoring the markets, looking at trends and trying to strategize for the future. He’ll often talk with Lions teammates Don Muhlbach -– who has taken multiple summer courses at various business schools in the United States –- and University of Pennsylvania graduate Brandon Copeland about the market.

Roberts is also planning on taking the next step toward entering the world of trading. Right now, since he and Walton are not certified, they can only trade their money and created Long Green Line in part to share their own ideas and strategies.

“He knows a lot for someone who has been doing it for that period of time. To know the information, to know the stuff that he does, is very unusual in an individual,” Walton said. “The stuff that he knows will probably take the average person five or six years to really learn what he’s doing unless he’s doing it all day long, every day for the last couple years.

“That’s not how he was. He’s just really into it and picks it up very well.”

He’s also interested in the next step. While Roberts said he doesn’t want to go back to school for his MBA, he is planning on taking the Series 7 exam in the offseason. If Roberts passes the General Securities Representative Examination, he’d be able to take on clients to help them invest their money using his strategies.

He isn’t sure if he ever wants to make this a full-time business -– he has restaurants he is looking at, and football is still his full-time gig –- but he wants to have the option to work with other people’s money down the road.

“Just keep learning,” Roberts said. “Fortunately, I can play football and still study that kind of stuff in the offseason. That’s what I’ll do, and after I play football, we’ll see.”