Bengals QB Joe Flacco Not Thinking About Retirement Ahead of Year 19
Joe Flacco isn’t thinking about retirement.
The 41-year-old quarterback just signed a one-year deal to return to the Cincinnati Bengals, the team that he started six games for last season. While Flacco is the oldest active quarterback in the NFL — Aaron Rodgers is still contemplating his return — he said it’s a “year-by-year” approach and that he hasn’t reached the stage yet where he’s seriously considering retirement.
“It’s mostly a year-by-year approach,” said Flacco in a one-on-one interview with R.org. “But I mean listen, everybody that I talked to asked me how much more you got in you. It’s not like I haven’t had to think about it a little bit. I do my best to keep my body in shape, and I don’t know if there’s ever going to come a time where I feel like I can’t do it. But obviously that’s not true, and I’m going to have to come to the realization. But honestly, playing football is what I’ve done now for the majority of my life, and it is a part of me. When I was in my first and second and third year, I never said, ‘Oh, am I going to play next year?’ I never really asked myself that question. And I really still haven’t gotten there.”
Flacco entered the NFL as a first-round draft pick of the Baltimore Ravens in 2008. It didn’t take long for him to solidify himself as not only the franchise quarterback but one of the better quarterbacks in the league. The Delaware alum led the Ravens to the AFC Championship Game in his rookie season, and by his fifth season, he was already a Super Bowl champion.
Full Commitment
The veteran quarterback continued to hammer home that he’s still committed to playing football as he prepares for his 19th season.
“Football is what I do, and I’m just going to continue to do it until maybe all of a sudden, some weird feeling pops up that signals that I don’t maybe want to do it anymore,” said Flacco.
“My kids are getting a little bit closer to high school, and at some point I’m going to want to be around to watch them. But even that’s a couple years away, and I don’t know if I’m very good at predicting the future. It’s kind of tough to think about that far in advance.”
Flacco had a productive season in 2025. After starting out the year as the Cleveland Browns’ starting quarterback, he was traded to the Bengals to sub in as the starter due to Joe Burrow’s injury. Although he went 1-5 as the starter, his numbers were among the best in the league, throwing 13 touchdowns against four interceptions for a 91.0 passer rating.
He will enter the 2026 season as a potential backup once again to Burrow, with fellow veteran quarterback Josh Johnson also on the Bengals’ roster. However, considering Burrows’ injury history, who missed nine games last season and seven games during the 2023 season, there’s a reasonable chance Flacco once again steps into the starting role.
Weighing His Options
One of the biggest things Flacco was looking for in free agency was an opportunity to start. However, the options were limited, which led to Flacco re-signing with the Bengals.
“I think it’s always the initial thing,” said Flacco. “But I think there’s other situations that are good, and I feel comfortable with where that may not be the case. I wish I had an opportunity to say yes or no and they all came with a starting tag behind it. But that’s not always the case. There’s a plan, and I’m not necessarily in full control of that plan, but I have to trust a certain process of it.
“And, yeah, that is the number one priority,” Flacco continued to say of wanting to start and wanting to win. “But it doesn’t necessarily always lead to what you want and maybe some of those opportunities really aren’t as good as they may seem. I got to be careful when I’m making those decisions.”
Flacco opened up about why he was always open to a return to Cincinnati, even though he won’t be the starting quarterback there.
“I said from the beginning when I left there, I could see a world where I ended up signing back here,” said Flacco. “I really like the organization and mainly the coaches and the teammates that I was able to play with there. I think when you make those connections, it gives you a little soft spot for an organization like that, but just like we talked about it, ideally you like to go play somewhere. But if there isn’t one of those opportunities that present itself, then that is a place that I feel very at home at and comfortable with.”
Feeling Fresh
The former Super Bowl MVP is among the most accomplished quarterbacks in NFL history, ranking 14th in passing yards all time. When asked how he feels at age 41 compared to earlier in his career, Flacco said it’s just “different” but that he still feels good as he prepares for his age-41 season.
“It’s just different,” said Flacco. “I think when you’re young, you have all the energy in the world, and you have nothing to go off of, besides just being green and kind of taking every moment for what it is and just trying to be in the moment, but really struggling to do so. As you get older, you gain perspective on certain things. You’ve been through so much that you’ve had, that you have experience in terms of dealing with certain feelings towards different things. You go through the dog days of grinding and saying this NFL season is long, the years are long.
“Then you kind of go through a maturing process where you realize where you kind of come back to your 12-year-old self, and you’re like, Holy s***, I play in the NFL,'” Flacco continued to say. “I’ve been able to do it for 10 to 11 years, I gotta hold on to this. I gotta find a way to take care of my body and continue to do it. At some point you kind of realize when you were a little kid as to how cool this thing is. And man, I’m pretty good at it. Why wouldn’t I want to do this as long as possible? I think being able to hold on and play as long as I was, as long as I did in the beginning part of my career, has helped me have that perspective and driven me to play the last six or seven years.”
As mentioned before, Flacco is the oldest quarterback in the NFL. However, last season, he matched up against a quarterback even older than him in 42-year-old Aaron Rodgers. Rodgers and Flacco dueled on Thursday Night Football, with the Bengals quarterback coming out on top.
He isn’t the only quarterback to play at an older age with guys like Tom Brady. He played until age 45, while Peyton Manning played until 39. Both had long, successful careers themselves. Flacco said he never sought advice from any of those guys when it came to longevity.
“I have not, it’s interesting. I’m so bad when it comes to reaching out to people and asking for things,” said Flacco. “I still have room to grow there. I haven’t talked to those guys about it, but what I’ll say is that — especially because he was a little bit ahead of me — he (Brady) set the standard. He let you know that he showed you the possibilities to a whole other level. He’s done something, he did something, he did a lot of things that nobody’s ever done, and his passion and his drive to just continue to play the game was incredible.
“I think what you realize is it’s very mental,” Flacco continued to say. “It’s making that decision that something’s important to you, and then you find a way to make sure you can do it. But no, I haven’t had a chance to actually ask Tom questions about that. But just in terms of setting an example, you can actually see and almost reach out and touch, he did an unbelievable job at that.”
Idolizing Brady, Manning
Flacco said that he looked up to Joe Montana, but it was Brady and Manning that he really looked up to considering they were the top guys from the time that he was a teenager.
“It’s interesting, I always liked watching other positions probably more,” said Flacco. “I always counted myself as a Montana guy, I always liked Joe Montana. But I really didn’t get to see Joe play that much like Peyton and Tom. I think Tom came into the league eight years before me. So college career and from the time I was like 14 or 15 years old, it was Tom Brady and Peyton Manning. Ultimately those two guys are probably what has driven the guys that are my age to be what they are.”
When asked if he ever received any advice from Brady or Manning, Flacco said he did not. It’s worth noting that Flacco matched up multiple times against Brady and Manning in the playoffs, defeating both of them in the postseason. Flacco actually defeated both Brady and Manning during the 2012 postseason on his way to winning the Super Bowl.
“No, man,” said Flacco on ever receiving advice from Brady and Manning. “When we were battling and I was in Baltimore, I don’t know if anybody wanted to hand us any advice because we were one of those teams that could jump up and get you at any moment — and we did. I don’t think they were huge on offering that out. And like I said, I wasn’t seeking it. Maybe if I really pressed them on it, maybe. But I don’t know. I don’t know if they would have given it all away.”
When asked what his remaining career objectives are, Flacco said it’s what he’s always done — play football, win games, throw for a lot of yards, and throw for touchdowns.
“I’d like to do everything I’ve wanted to do,” said Flacco. “I want to go out there and win football games. I want to throw a bunch of yards, and I want to throw for touchdowns. I want to do all of it. But ultimately it always comes back down to winning football games.”