One of the biggest names left on the free agent market is wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins. The former Houston Texans and Arizona Cardinals star was released earlier this offseason and has taken visits to multiple potential landing spots, but has yet to find himself a deal.
But just because he's 31 years old and unsigned midway through the summer, don't start to think he's considering retirement any time soon. Hopkins seems to think that's a long way away.
"I'll retire from football when I'm not a 1k-yard receiver," Hopkins said in a post on the new social media app, Threads. "With that said, I was on pace for 1,400 yards last year — one significant injury in 11 years. I might be playing till I'm 37 the way I feel."
Hopkins collected 64 receptions for 717 yards in nine games with the Cardinals last season. Extrapolated to 17 games, that's just south of 1,355 yards. Not quite 1,400, but pretty damn close. It's worth noting, however, that in 2021 Hopkins had 572 receiving yards in 10 games, which put him in pace for only 972 in a 17-game season.
Still, he has hit at least 1,000 receiving yards in six of the eight years where he has played at least 15 games, and he seems to think he can do it at least seven more times.
The league record for 1,000-plus-yard receiving seasons in a player's age-31 season or later is ... seven, by Jerry Rice. Besides him, only Jimmy Smith, Tim Brown, and Cris Carter hit that mark five or more times. In other words, Hopkins is going to have to buck a whole lot of history to both stay in the league until he's 37 and keep racking up 1,000 yards a year along the way.
