“Maybe I handled myself a little wrong" - When Rob Gronkowski opened up on rejecting Lions trade in 2018

TE Rob Gronkowski is a future Hall of Famer who played for 11 seasons during his NFL career and won four Super Bowls. With a résumé boasting 9,286 yards from 621 receptions and 92 TDs, he was a truly elite TE. However, Gronk’s loyalty lay in playing for the New England Patriots, that was until he was "almost traded" to the Detroit Lions in 2018.

This was not long after the Super Bowl loss to the Philadelphia Eagles but Gronkowski escaped the predicament. Gronkowski retired instead, which threw a spanner in the works for the Patriots.

Speaking on “The Season with Peter Schrager” in 2023, Gronk discussed the situation:

“It was kind of like mayhem a little bit,” Gronkowski said. “Maybe I handled myself a little wrong. Maybe if I could go back, I would’ve done it differently.”

The retirement decision led to some speculation that he didn’t want to play for former Lions QB Matthew Stafford. Gronk went into more detail recently, as he told former Patriots teammate Julian Edelman on an episode of the "Dudes on Dudes" podcast last month:

“I have nothing against him. That wasn’t because of Matthew Stafford. I was kind of being a very big a***ole that year in the offseason. Bill called me like 80 times, and I didn’t answer one of them. Next thing you know, I get a text from my agent: ‘Hey, you’re traded to the Lions.’ I was like, ‘I knew that was gonna happen because I wasn’t answering Bill’s calls.’”

Rob Gronkowski's retirement method to escape a trade

Rob Gronkowski went into more detail with Edelman on the ingenious plan to prevent his trade:

“So then I was like, ‘Hey, Drew, you can’t trade a guy that just retired.’ So then, Drew hit up the Patriots organization: ‘Hey, Rob just retired. We’re sorry. You can’t trade him.’”

The trade news was about to break the internet, but Gronkowski ensured that his trade was called off, and then the news of Gronk’s retirement took over. Gronk eventually came back to the Patriots' setup, and they went on to win another Super Bowl in 2019, beating the LA Rams to clinch the last title of the Patriots’ dynasty era.

Although Rob Gronkowski initially refused to leave the Patriots at any cost, he eventually followed Tom Brady to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, winning his fourth Super Bowl before retiring in 2022.