The Sports Xchange

New York Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis acknowledged that he considered giving up football after he suffered a serious knee injury during the 2012 season.

“I did think about retiring,” Revis told Sports Illustrated. “I had never been seriously injured before, and I didn’t know how to handle it.”

Revis suffered a torn ACL while playing for the Jets in September 2012 and underwent complex microfracture surgery. He then went to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in a 2013 trade but said he was never fully healthy until last year when he joined the New England Patriots and helped them win the Super Bowl.

Revis credited his uncle, former NFL defensive lineman Sean Gilbert, for sticking with football.

“Most every player is thinking about retirement while he’s playing because (football is) a bona fide grind,” Gilbert told SI. “I told him, ‘You can think that. But you’ve got to get over it.'”

Revis returned to New York during the offseason as a free agent and is ready to play again for the Jets with no immediate thoughts of retirement. He is pictured on the cover of this week’s SI in a re-creation of Joe Namath’s 1965 cover for the magazine.