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Former Pro Bowl tight end Darren Waller announced his NFL retirement on Sunday at just 31 years old, and it turns out a scary medical event may have been to blame.
Waller caught 107 passes for 1,196 yards and nine touchdowns for the Las Vegas Raiders in 2020 en route to a Pro Bowl selection. He parlayed that into a three-year, $51 million contract but was traded to the New York Giants for just a third-round pick prior to the 2023 season.
But Waller never seemed to find his footing in New York. He played in just 12 games due to injuries. Though he did catch 52 passes for 552 yards and a touchdown.
Some fans believed that strain on his relationship with Kelsey Plum and the pair’s ensuing divorce led to Waller calling it quits. But he explained Sunday that it was something far more scary.
Darren Waller Shares Details Of Scary Medical Event That Caused Retirement
Waller explained that he got injured in a game against the Jets in 2023. He stayed home whie the Giants traveled to Las Vegas for a game against the Raiders.
While the rest of the team was out of town, he traveled to shoot a music video. But on the way home from that, he began to feel ill.
“I start to feel like this fever coming on,” he said. “And I’m like, I’ve had COVID twice. It kind of whupped me both times. So I’m like, all right, this is gonna be round three, kinda gotta thug it out … but then by the time I pulled into my parking garage at my condo I’m shaking pretty violently. Like, uncontrollably. To where I was like ‘this is a little weird, little different.'”
Waller said he went to lay down and couldn’t breathe, leading to him beginning to lose conciousness. He was the only person in the building.
After some time, Wallers says he calls 9-1-1. But he was struggling to speak clearly.
“I’m like, d—, I’m just dying on this couch and nobody knows. It was a very humbling, very scary event.”
Waller says that paramedics eventually arrived and provided him with oxygen. He spent 3.5 days in the hospital and says he struggled to stand while there.
While he didn’t say what the diagnosis was, Waller said that he didn’t know if he’d have died if he’d have felt great about the trajectory of his life at the time.
That led him to reconsider his career and his marriage.
Thankfully he appears to be healthy now, and hopefully he’s able to find peace going forward.