Patriots quarterback Tom Brady hopes tight end Rob Gronkowski’s retirement is short lived.
Brady left an interesting Instagram comment on a post about the receivers who have caught the most touchdown passes from Brady. Atop the list was Gronkowski, with 78 touchdown catches.
“I hope 78 isn’t the final number,” Brady wrote.
As we’ve previously noted, it wouldn’t be a shock if Gronkowski decided to end his retirement and return to the field. His agent, Drew Rosenhaus, has said he thinks it could happen.
Plenty of great players have done it before. Jason Witten just unretired after retiring last year. Marshawn Lynch retired in 2016 and then played in both 2017 and 2018. Randy Moss retired for a year and then came back for one last year with the 49ers. Randall Cunningham retired in 1996, came out of retirement in 1997 and was an MVP candidate in 1998. Deion Sanders retired for three years and then unretired. Ricky Williams retired and ended up playing more NFL seasons after he unretired than he had before his first retirement. Brett Favre unretired multiple times.
Gronkowski, from all accounts, is sincere when he says right now that he’s retired. But he could always change his mind. Brady would welcome that.