Panthers receiver Adam Thielen hints at retirement after 2025: ‘Winding down’

Panthers wide receiver Adam Thielen will be back on the field for the 2025 season, but the 35-year-old did suggest that the beginning of the end could be near.

Speaking to reporters at a team community event, Thielen said that he had spoken to his family, and they wanted to see him play another season, but as for the future he didn’t deny that 2025 could be his final year in the NFL. 

“It could be, yeah,” he said last week. “I told you guys at the end of the season — like every year — you look back and you say, ‘Hey, what left do I have to give to this game?’ I talked to my family, and they wanted me to keep playing. So it’ll be the same process.”

The Vikings had signed him as an undrafted free agent in 2013 and worked his way up off the practice squad and into a spot on the 52-man roster. 

Two of his best seasons came during the 2017 and 2018 campaigns when he posted over 1,200 receiving yards and earned a trip to the Pro Bowl both of those years. 

The Vikings released Thielen in 2023, and he ended up signing a deal with the Panthers, for which he recorded 1,014 receiving yards in his first season with Carolina. 

“Not gonna think about that right now. I’m gonna focus on being the best football player I can possibly be, and you have to have that mindset in this league,” said Thielen, who is entering the final year of his contract. “And then once the season’s over — evaluate, see where we’re at, see where the team’s at, see where I’m at individually and as a family and figure it out. But definitely, definitely winding down my career. But excited about this year and what could happen.”