New England Patriots linebacker Tedy Bruschi, who was an imposing force on NFL offenses and spell-checkers alike, has called it a career. Yeah, it’s a career. Instead of playing for a 14th NFL season this fall, Bruschi announced his retirement this morning at a press conference, which is a good place to do that, because typically lots of people in the press are there.

The 36-year-old inside linebacker was part of all three of the club’s Super Bowl-winning teams and returned from a mild stroke suffered in February 2005 to play eight months later. via.

In hindsight, I really didn’t give Bruschi a lot of credit for being a badass. Maybe because he played on one of the biggest bandwagon teams of the millennium, with one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time. Maybe because he looks like Erik Estrada with a bowl cut. But give credit where it’s due: dude came back from a muthafuggin’ STROKE and played three more years in the NFL. And he was a great guy; he was like the NFL’s Italian-Filipino version of Tim Tebow, except without all the Jesus stuff. Not mentioning God goes a long way these days, especially with prostitutes. I guess getting that tattoo of the nativity scene on my ass was a bad call.