J.C. Tretter announces retirement from football

For many months now, a certain section of Minnesota Vikings fandom has been waiting for the purple to go out and sign former Cleveland Browns center J.C. Tretter to take Garrett Bradbury’s spot in the middle of the offensive line. Today, Tretter put some clarification on his situation and has decided that he won’t be signing with the Vikings.

Or anyone else.

On Thursday morning, Tretter announced his retirement from the National Football League.

Tretter, who also currently serves as the president of the NFLPA, has dealt with knee issues for several years, as detailed in this story from Sports Illustrated. According to the story, the Vikings were on his short list of preferred destinations, but according to Tretter the Vikings “never returned his call.”

In fact, Tretter’s camp made contact with seven teams over the course of the offseason per the Sports Illustrated story and none of them returned their calls, not even to request that he undergo an MRI or any other medical testing.

The story from Sports Illustrated also details that Tretter’s role as the NFLPA president might also have something to do with teams not wanting to bring him in and sign him. I don’t know whether it’s that or the issues with his knees or a combination of the two. Whatever the reasoning is, Tretter has decided to hang up his cleats, though it appears that he’ll remain the NFLPA president for the foreseeable future as he was just elected to a second term for that post.

So, for those that have been on “Tretter Watch” over the past few weeks or months, it appears that they can officially stand down and take a look at other possible backup plans for the Vikings at the center position.