Immediately after the Super Bowl bankruptcy against the Philadelphia Eagles, Rob Gronkowski caused a stir:”The tight end confirmed that he was thinking about a premature end to his career. These plans have obviously been around for some time.
ESPN reporter Jeff Darlington reports at least. Gronkowski has been playing with the idea of resigning for a while now that the idea was not born out of frustration over the Super Bowl bankruptcy.
Also, Gronk had already been thinking about the end of his career weeks before he suffered a concussion in the AFC Championship Game against Jacksonville. According to Darlington, the idea of ending his career prematurely is therefore “very serious. He will definitely consider that.”
This assessment fits in with Gronkowski’s reaction immediately after the Super Bowl. Asked by a reporter whether the premature end of his career could be an option, he suggested that the idea was already in the air:”I don’t know where you got this information from. But I will definitely worry about my future. and then we’ll see where I stand.”
The 28-year-old would enter the penultimate year of his patriot contract in 2018 and charge New England’s salary cap with $10.9 million. If he were indeed to opt for early retirement, he would forego at least 17 million dollars in Base Salary and around 1.4 million dollars in management bonus payments over the next two years.