Rams left tackle Andrew Whitworth is largely expected to retire after winning Super Bowl LVI over the Bengals earlier this month.
Whitworth, 40, just finished his fifth season with Los Angeles after spending the first 11 years of his career with Cincinnati.
But to this point, Whitworth hasn’t made a formal announcement about his future. In a Wednesday interview on the Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz, Whitworth used a line he’s used a few times, “if this is it, which it most likely is.” That prompted Le Batard to ask why Whitworth is utilizing that phrase instead of just announcing his retirement.
“Yeah, you want to give it time,” Whitworth said. “In a couple of weeks, I’ll sit down and make an official decision of some kind. But you’ve got to get enough separation. Matthew and I were talking about it this weekend, it was only really seven days since the game. Technically, we could still be playing a game on Monday night or Sunday night at that time. And you feel like you’re forever from it. But the truth is, now we’re only a week and a half from the game. So, it’s really getting a couple of weeks from the game, making sure you [know] how your body feels, whether you’re wanting to attack another season or not — I think you’ve got to get a little bit of separation.
“Unfortunately, when you have a really long season like we did, you don’t have as much time. But you get as much as you can away from it and see where you’re at.”
Whitworth has been saying that the 2021 season would likely be his final campaign since last June. If he indeed makes the decision to hang up his cleats, Whitworth will finish with 239 career appearances and 235 starts along with 15 postseason starts across his tenures between the Bengals and Rams.
