Late in the 2018 season, Jason Witten’s current employers reported that his former employers reached out to get him back into a football uniform.
The Cowboys denied ESPN’s report and Witten said there was “nothing” to the report, which came after a Week 13 deadline for Witten to come off the reserve/retired list and play in 2018. That’s not to say that the thought of playing again was completely out of Witten’s mind during his first year as a broadcaster.
Witten said he “missed the heck out of playing” and that nothing could replace the feeling, but added that the prospect of a midseason return to the Cowboys was never a serious one.
“It would have been hard to do that. In season, the challenge of that,” Witten said, via Clarence Hill of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. “Those guys did that work. They deserve what they had last year. They put in the time. They were 3-5. They battled back. For me that is where the sense of accomplishment comes from, not catching a pass on 3rd and 7. It’s all the work that goes into that that motivates me that I take gratification from. It’s doing all the work to get there, not just to come in. That wouldn’t have been right to come back in the middle of that even in the midst of wanting to be part of a playoff run or much I see myself pulling for them. That wouldn’t have been a real possibility.”
Witten had his rough patches in the Monday Night Football booth, but is expected back for the 2019 season and said he would never say never about the possibility of going into coaching at some point in the future, but that “I don’t think we are going to” go down the playing road again.
