The NFL regular season began with rumors of Andrew Whitworth coming out of retirement, and the NFL season is now ending with rumors of Andrew Whitworth coming out of retirement.
After spending the season as an analyst for Amazon Prime’s coverage of Thursday Night Football, Whitworth hasn’t closed the door on a comeback. According to Whitworth’s colleague Al Michaels, not only is the door open for a possible NFL return, but the 41-year-old retired offensive lineman is fielding calls from teams.
Al Michaels says Andrew Whitworth is taking calls from NFL teams, "the Bengals probably" pic.twitter.com/SUGrn8ohji
— Brandon Contes (@BrandonContes) December 30, 2022
“I was talking to Andrew Whitworth – part of our crew – last night, who’s been a great left tackle, retired of course. There are teams that are calling Andrew right now, the Bengals probably,” Michaels said with a chuckle during the final Thursday Night Football game of the season.
“And we were talking about, he said ‘If I could play left tackle, I would sort of think about it,’ that’s what he said,” Michaels continued, drawing surprise out of his broadcast partner Kirk Herbstreit. “I don’t want to put him on the spot here. But he said, ‘Right tackle, I couldn’t do it.’”
Is Whitworth taking calls from the Bengals? And will he now blast Michaels for spreading unretirement rumors the same way he did to Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk four months ago?
Shortly before the season kicked off, Dallas Cowboys tackle Tyron Smith suffered a severe leg injury. The next day, Whitworth was on Amazon’s Thursday Night Football preseason broadcast and said, “It’s been a busy day of answering calls,” alluding to the Cowboys’ interest in luring him out of retirement. Florio then wrote, “Andrew Whitworth says Cowboys reached out after Tyron Smith’s injury,” which prompted the retired offensive lineman to blast the report, claiming Pro Football Talk “got another story wrong and failed to take any responsibility.”
Based on Whitworth’s on-air comments in August, it was reasonable to conclude he took calls from the Cowboys. But that didn’t stop him from slandering Florio and Pro Football Talk. At least Florio was basing his report off comments Whitworth made on the record. Michaels, however, was basing his conclusion that Whitworth took calls from the Bengals on a conversation they had off-air.
