Nobody would blame Tyreek Hill if he ended up hanging up his cleats in 2025. The Miami Dolphins’ star wide receiver suffered a gruesome injury earlier this season that left his leg mangled and looking like he had just been in a massive car accident.
Hill is 31, and he’s had a decorated NFL career. He won a Super Bowl with the Kansas City Chiefs in 2020 and has made the All-Pro team five times.
Nicknamed “Cheetah”, he’s one of the best to do it in this era, but he recently insinuated on Terron Armstead’s podcast that his football future is up in the air. He loves football, but the game is demanding. There’s absolutely a decision to be made, but right now, he wants to live in the here and now.
“I’m happy with the career that I’ve had. I love playing football. I love it, but it takes a lot. It takes a lot on you mentally, it takes a lot on you physically,” he said, as relayed by the Associated Press via ESPN.
“I’m at the point now where I need to have a conversation with mom, family, everybody. Wherever my mind is at the time, the decision will be made, but I know right now, I haven’t had time to live in the moment.”
Tyreek Hill not ready to make a decision about his NFL future
Hill relayed that when he suffered the injury, in Week 4 against the New York Jets, all he could do was laugh.
“When I got tackled, I immediately tried to get up … I’d seen that my leg was crooked,” Hill said. “I immediately started laughing because I’ve been able to play this game for 10 years, really my entire life, and I’ve been blessed with great talents and great gifts. The amount of support I get from my family, it’s amazing. So I really wasn’t even thinking about the injury. I was thinking about the great times I’ve had playing this game.”
That sounds like a player who is still in love with the game, but that injury was brutal. It required surgery to repair damage to his left knee, which ultimately also included a torn ACL.
Recovery for an ACL for NFL players could be anywhere from nine months to a year, or more, and some never get back to being the players that they were. Hill, more than many in the NFL, relies on his quick-twitch athleticism and speed at just 5-foot-10 and 191 pounds.
If he loses that because of the injury, NFL football may not be as gratifying moving forward. Right now, though, Hill is not worrying about that.
“I just want to be in this moment with my family,” he explained. “I don’t want to make any rash decisions.”
If Hill does hang ’em up, he’ll have accumulated 11,363 yards and 83 receiving touchdowns over his career with another 819 yards and seven touchdowns on the ground.
He was drafted in the fifth round of the 2016 NFL Draft by the Chiefs and was traded to the Dolphins in March 2022 for five total draft picks, including a 2022 first, second and fourth round pick.
