Calvin Johnson: My dad talked me into playing my last season
Calvin Johnson's retirement from the NFL after the 2015 season shocked the Detroit Lions, but it could have come a year sooner.
The former superstar receiver revealed that he informed his father of his intention to retire before that campaign, but delayed his plans at his dad's request.
"I told him, I was like, 'Dad, I don't think I can do it no more.' I was like, 'I don't think I can keep coming out there running miles a day.' He was like, 'You think you can get one more?' I thought about it. ... I was like, 'All right, I can do it one more time," Johnson said Saturday at a Detroit-area football camp, according to Dave Birkett of the Detroit Free Press.
Megatron went on to put up 1,214 yards and nine touchdowns while playing in all 16 games. He says he spent the last three weeks of the season stressed out about telling then-head coach Jim Caldwell that he was retiring. But Johnson has no regrets about deciding to end his career after nine years, and he doesn't foresee a comeback.
"I don't (think so), man, cause I get up from the bed sometimes in the morning, I'm just like - I shuffle across the ground cause I can't bend my ankles," Johnson said. "That was my problem when I played, just ankles always stuck or swelled up, I can't flex them. If you can't flex your ankles then you're just running flat-footed all the time."
That should take care of any rumors of a return, which cropped up even last October.