NFL Insider Says There's a "Good Chance" Rob Gronkowski Retires After 2018 Season

Though he’s only 29, Patriots tight end Rob Gronkowski may be done playing NFL football before his 41-year-old teammate Tom Brady.

Gronkowski, who floated the idea of retirement after New England lost the Super Bowl to the Eagles and also reportedly threatened it to nix an offseason trade, is reportedly thinking about hanging up his cleats after this season.

While speaking to Boston’s WEEI, Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk said he thinks there’s a “good chance” Gronkowski retires after this season because playing is no longer earning him the money it should.

“I think there’s a good chance he just walks away after this year unless the Patriots are willing to rip up the last year of that contract and give him some form of security that is not tied to being healthy and producing on the field,” Florio said

Gronkowski, who has missed three games already due to injuries and only has one touchdown in the year, will almost certainly not hit performance incentives which were written into his contract before this season. That may cost him up to $3.3 million.

“I think if the Patriots had won the Super Bowl he would have retired,” Florio said. “And I think after this season, which has been very disappointing for him … He has an uphill climb to hit those numbers. Last year he hit all of them.”

Tom E. Curran of NBC Sports Boston said the team, not Gronkowski, may also want this to be his final year as a member of the Patriots.

“Certainly, when you look at the arch of Gronk’s time here, this is probably the stretch run of Rob Gronkowski as a New England Patriot. These final games and then the postseason,” Curran said. “I am not saying he’s done at his own volition. I am saying this is his final period of time as a Patriot. He’s on the books for $11.7 million. They tried to get out from under it last year, weren’t able to do it with that $11.7 million. To no fault of Gronk’s, his body, his ankle, back, he hasn’t been able to bring them the reward. They are not going to be interested in, after not getting $11.7 in cap hit out of him, going up to $12 million in cap hit next year for the final season of his contract.”

At the very least, the situation appears to be fluid.

“Once an athlete opens that door, it never really closes,” Albert Breer of Sports Illustrated said Sunday on Boston sports talk station The Sports Hub. “I think that’s kind of where Gronk is right now. He’s taking things on a year-to-year basis.”