Rob Gronkowski says Joe Burrow tried to recruit him to Bengals, but legendary TE never answered QB’s text

If Rob Gronkowski would have returned a text from Joe Burrow back in 2022, there’s a good chance that he would have ended up spending at least one season with the Cincinnati Bengals before retiring. 

During a recent episode of the “Dudes on Dudes” podcast with Gronk and Julian Edelman, Gronkowski shared a wild story about how Burrow tried to recruit him to the Bengals, but nothing came of it, because Gronk accidentally ignored the quarterback’s text messages. 

So how do you accidentally ignore someone’s text messages? Let’s let Gronk explain. 

“After I retired, everyone was still trying to get me to play,” Gronk said. “When I had to do some media rounds, they were like, ‘Yo, who is the quarterback you would love to play with?’ And I was like, ‘Joe Burrow, because he reminds me of [Tom] Brady and I just love the way that he presents himself in the pocket.’ And that went everywhere.”

Gronkowski’s not kidding about that. Just before the Bengals played in the Super Bowl back in February 2022, Gronk was asked if there was any QB he’d be willing to play with besides Brady and he gave one answer. 

“If I had to pick a quarterback it’d be the young buck Joe Burrow. He’s killing it right now in the game,” Gronk said in 2022. 

Remember, Gronk spent his entire 11-year career catching passes from Brady, so the fact that he mentioned that he’d be willing to catch passes from someone else was a big deal. Apparently, Burrow heard about the fact that Gronk would be willing to play with him, so the Bengals QB sent Gronk a text message. 

“And then I get a text message, ‘Yo Gronk, what’s up man, I saw you talking me about me in the media, it’s Joe Burrow. I’d love for you if you would come to the Cincinnati Bengals,’” Gronk said.  

Gronk wants to play with Burrow and Burrow wants Gronk in Cincinnati, so at that point, it seemed like this was something that might happen. However, nothing came of it, because Gronk never answered Burrow’s texts. 

Apparently Gronk thought someone was pranking him and that’s because he had been pranked back in 2015 when the Patriots drafted Malcom Brown. 

“When Malcom Brown was drafted to the Patriots, I got a text message that night, the night of the draft,” Gronk said. “And it was like, ‘Hey Rob, it’s Malcom Brown, pleasure to be on your team. It’s an honor to be your teammate.’ And I wrote back, ‘Great to have you on.’ And then eventually, that night, called the number and it was NOT Malcom Brown. I got duped. It was just a random fan and they duped me to answer back.”

When Gronk got the text from Burrow, he didn’t actually think it was from Burrow. 

“Fast forward [from the Brown prank in 2015] and I was like, ‘I ain’t ever going to let that shit happen again. I ain’t answering random numbers,’” Gronk said. “I was like, ‘I ain’t getting got again. This is nuts. I ain’t falling for this shit.’”

Gronk eventually ran into Burrow at the “White Party,” which is an annual event thrown by Fanatics founder Michael Rubin, and that’s when the former NFL tight end found out that Burrow did, in fact, shoot him a text. 

“Within 10 seconds, [Burrow] was like, ‘Bro, you never responded to me,’” Gronk said. “And I knew exactly what he was talking about. And I was like, ‘No fricking way that that was actually you, bro.’ I was like, ‘I’m sorry, I apologize man.’ Because I love Joe Burrow. 

Gronk might love Joe Burrow, but he never ended up playing with him. After two seasons with the Buccaneers, Gronk announced his retirement in June 2022 and the white party that Gronk is likely referring to took place in July 2022, so at that point, it was likely that Gronk wasn’t going to be talked into a possible NFL return. Gronk had already come out of retirement once and he clearly had no plans of doing it again.