Last year's drawn All-Ireland final 'broke' Jack McCaffrey and led to him quitting the Dublin panel.
The 27-year-old stepped away from inter-county football with the Sky Blues earlier this year after playing a key role in the side that claimed five-in-a-row.
McCaffrey starred for Dublin in the 1-16 to 1-16 draw with Kerry last September and helped them to a 1-18 to 0-15 win in the replay, making football history in the process.
But the flying wing-back has now opened up about the moment his heart sank after the drawn game.
He told Off The Ball's Bernard Brogan Podcast: "I think if Dessie (Farrell) hadn't have gotten involved I probably would have stepped away earlier.
"Dessie's been an incredible influence on my football career from when I was 12 and once he took over the job I was like right, surely I can give him a year, give it a good go, and wouldn't it be cool to finish what we started all that time ago.
"But something just wasn't right and it probably wasn't right since halfway through the summer last year, when I just felt the fun had gone out of the whole thing really.
"I wasn't looking forward to going to training and I'd spoken in interviews before about the love I had for the group and stuff, and that was always true, but it kind of suddenly wasn't really anymore, just because of changes in my life as opposed to anywhere else.
"And then I think what broke me was the drawn final. You just build up everything for this game and it went quite well on a personal level, and obviously we didn't win and didn't lose thank God.
"But I remember shaking David Moran's hand, I was walking over to the ref, I thought there was extra-time and David Moran just stuck his hand out to shake my hand and I was like, 'we don't have to do this again, do we?"
McCaffrey was working as a junior doctor at Temple Street Children's hospital during Dublin's bid for five-in-a-row.
And the Clontarf club-man revealed that he missed training in the build-up to the replay as he attempted to balance his professional life with the intense demands of inter-county football.
"I had incredible colleagues at Temple Street who really covered my backside on numerous occasions," he explained.
"I was at a clinic on a Thursday afternoon that following week (after the drawn All-Ireland final) and if I had have just said to anyone that I'd got training there would have been no hassle. I was there to learn more than anything at that point and if I'd have said I had training at 7 I would have been told, 'off you go'.
"But I just kept my mouth shut and stayed there until 8 o'clock and I missed training.
"And I was just like, I can't go there. I just turned up and told Jim (Gavin) I got caught at a clinic, didn't train and just rolled into next week and thankfully everything went well.
"But I was so drained by that and then I never really got it back."
McCaffrey made the decision to call it quits after a league game against Tyrone in February - when he found himself falling asleep during a pre-match talk after a series of night shifts at St Luke's Hospital in Kilkenny.
But he is reluctant to say he has retired for good and isn't ruling out a return to football at some stage.
McCaffrey said: "I came on at half-time, hurt my hamstring, got on the bus, rang a friend in New York, booked a flight to New York the following day, left the country, decided to quit football and came back.
"I don't want to say I'm retiring. Gaelic football is a hobby, it's something I love, and nobody would be happier than me if I woke up tomorrow and said I've got a bit of a buzz on, I want to play for Dublin again. It's not there at the moment, that's not to say it won't be there again."
