Teddy Bridgewater on retirement from NFL: 'This time it's official' - ESPN

Quarterback Teddy Bridgewater said this time his decision to retire is going to stick.

Bridgewater announced that he is retiring from the NFL for the second time Monday, a day after the Detroit Lions placed him on the reserve/retired list.

«This time it's official,» he wrote in an Instagram post.

A post shared by Teddy Bridgewater (@teddyb_h2o)

Bridgewater, 33, retired after the 2023 season only to return to the Lions late in the following campaign. He served as Baker Mayfield's backup with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2025 and then signed with the Lions in March.

His retirement comes 10 years after he suffered a devastating knee injury on a noncontact play in training camp with the Minnesota Vikings that threatened to end his NFL career just two years after it began and one season after he was selected to the Pro Bowl.

«It's so crazy 10 years ago around this time, I suffered one of the most gruesome knee injuries the game itself, it's players and some doctors had ever seen. Everything football related since 2016 had been fueled by the 'experts' predicting that I would never play football again,» he wrote in his post Monday. «We really showed them by playing 10 more seasons!

»However, this wheel of mine can no longer deal with something so simple as standing around on the turf field. This thing just doesn't recover the same way it did years ago so I rather officially hang it up. It's finally run its course and when the body speaks to me, I have to listen so that I can be in one piece and available for my children as they grow up. The game of football was beyond great to me and owes me nothing at all."

Bridgewater finishes his NFL career with 15,182 yards passing, 75 touchdown passes and 47 interceptions, having started