Michael Phelps is one the greatest Olympic athletes in history, but we’ll never know how close he came to being an NFL star because his mom wouldn’t let him.

According to Deborah Phelps, her son envied his buddies and was dying to play football when he was growing up. But mother knows best, or more accurately, mom was playing the odds. Deborah continued to steer her son to the pool, and the rest is Olympic medal history.

Via Yahoo Sports:

“When he told me he wanted to play football, I didn’t say, ‘No, you have to swim,” his mother Debbie Phelps said. “I told him, ‘Only a small percentage of varsity football players get a scholarship to a D-I school and an even smaller percentage make the NFL.’ Then I told him, ‘Think about what you have already accomplished in your sport and where you could possibly go.’ I thought the best way of teaching would be to explain his options and help him make the right choice.”

Sure, in hindsight, Michael Phelps turned out to be a pretty good swimmer. But he’s also a 6-foot-4 athletic freak. Are we really going to pretend like he couldn’t have found a way to become an NFL receiver? Imagine Phelps catching passes from a very elite Joe Flacco in front of Ravens fans in his hometown of Baltimore. He could have been the greatest thing to happen to Maryland since Old Bay.

Instead, he just became the most decorated Olympian of all time and a legend in his sport.

(Thanks to Yahoo! Sports for sharing)