On our nationwide day of giving thanks, Shaquil Barrett had good cause to be upset.
The 2-time Tremendous Bowl successful linebacker wished to return out of retirement and play out the rest of the 2024 NFL season.
However the Miami Dolphins, who solely maintain his rights, declined to maneuver the 32-year-old from the reserve/retired listing and onto the lively roster forward of the league’s 4 p.m. ET deadline Thursday.
Cris Tiller / USA TODAY NETWORK by way of Imagn Photos
What’s worse: the Dolphins wouldn’t launch Barrett both, making him unable to signal with a brand new staff this season, the Miami Herald studies.
And the cherry on high? In accordance with league guidelines, a participant can not retire after which change into a free agent on the finish of the season.
In impact, which means the Dolphins will nonetheless maintain the two-time Professional Bowler’s rights in 2025.
If the franchise decides it doesn’t need him then, come this time subsequent yr, Barrett will likely be sitting in the identical spot he’s now: watching the Turkey Bowl from the sofa.
It’s a authorized and technical maelstrom, however the story behind the devolution is a way more linear one.
In March 2024, Barrett, then 31, signed a one-year contract price $9 million to hitch the Dolphins.
Just some months later, because the Florida summer time crawled ahead, Barrett had a change of coronary heart and introduced he was retiring from the league, efficient instantly.
The Dolphins had been, understandably, shocked.
Hardly a month after the retirement announcement, Barrett joined the “Up and Adams Show” hosted by Kay Adams and teased the “perfect, perfect scenario that would bring him out of retirement.”
Although Barrett maintained how completely satisfied he was together with his newfound leisure time — and guaranteed the present’s host that he wouldn’t converse his excellent state of affairs aloud for concern of placing a cease to any behind-the-curtain magic earlier than the magic had even begun to brew — it took Adams all of two minutes and thrifty-eight seconds to coax it out of him.
The linebacker would return, he stated, if the Tampa Bay Buccaneers — with whom he performed for 5 years and gained a Tremendous Bowl with in 2021 — would take him again.
The Bucs had minimize Barrett, who ranked fifth in franchise historical past with 45 sacks and had shattered the staff’s single-season report within the class in 2019, earlier this yr.
“I wouldn’t [return] for any other scenario, or any other team, or anything like that,” Barrett stated on the time. “I’ve got a lot of history down there.”
Paradoxically, the Dolphins staff that claimed it doesn’t need him — or maybe thought it doesn’t want him — gave up 30 factors and almost 400 yards to the Jordan Love-led Packers throughout the nightcap of a Thanksgiving triple-header.
Barrett might be grateful he was a minimum of spared from that onslaught.
