Lions LB working part-time gig on Wall Street

Brandon Copeland isn't your typical NFL linebacker.

Even as he prepares to enter his third season as a member of the Detroit Lions, Copeland maintains a side gig with Weiss Multi-Strategy Advisers.

Copeland, who attended the University of Pennsylvania and graduated from Wharton, spent two summers as an intern at UBS and joined Weiss in March as a spring analyst.

As a result, he's become much more judicious with his money.

"I've literally hoarded money," Copeland said to Michael Rothstein of ESPN. "I'm literally stacking, stacking, stacking. Anything I can get into an account and just let sit, I've got to a point where I have enough, where if football is over today, I have more than enough to take care of me for a while."

He has determined that he will invest about 60 percent of his post-tax salary, save 30 percent, and live off of the remainder.

"Every check gets divided up, not necessarily like that, but I always put a limit on this year, as soon as we get back in April," Copeland said. "Now anything that I have in my account the year previous, I don't touch it. I put it toward investments or whatever, but livingwise I don't touch it. I live off what I make in the spring in terms of OTA checks and all that type of stuff and life off this active season."

Copeland recalls times earlier in his career when he would be thinking about day trading during morning practice squad meetings. He'd often check his phone while in the washroom, debating on whether he should sell a stock he bought earlier.

The 25-year-old's football career may just be beginning, but he has a second profession already lined up.

"Hopefully we'll be able to get him to develop the financial skill set in kind of valuing companies, valuing industries," said Nick Morris, a partner at Weiss. "You tie that into his personality and there is a lot of opportunity for him on Wall Street. Those characteristics, there's a lot of opportunity."