An animal on the field and a party animal in the bar.
Four-time Super Bowl champion Rob Gronkowski opened up on “The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon” about how he believes partying made him a superstar tight end in the NFL.
The Buffalo native first credited his hometown for molding him into the charismatic partier he’s notoriously known as to fans.
“I just had a good time growing up. I’m from Buffalo,” Gronkowski told Fallon. “The Bills Mafia, they’re tailgating. They’re jumping off RVs into tables, breaking open. That’s how I grew up.”
The five-time Pro Bowler told Fallon he would tell everyone makes him a “better player out on the field” if he parties.
Gronkowski said he analyzed how partying made him a better tight end.
“Well, I’m carrying my friends, you know, throughout the bar. I’m holding them up! I’m lifting. I’m curling them! There on my back, I’m jumping up and down! I’m dancing the whole time. Kinda like Austin Butler. I’m gyrating!”
The 33-year-old retired tight end realized all the exhilarating bar workouts “translated to the football field.”
“Yeah, of course it does,” Fallon sarcastically agreed.
With the Super Bowl LVII’s match-up between the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles set, Fallon asked Gronk who he thinks would be crowned champion.
“I would say Philadelphia has been playing more like a team throughout the whole season. I’m gonna go with the Eagles.”
Gronkowski, who retired once in 2019, only to come out of retirement to join his former New England Patriot quarterback Tom Brady on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and win another Super Bowl in 2020, officially retired again in June 2022.
“How close were you to suiting up again this season,” Fallon asked Gronkowski.
The Arizona Wildcats alumni revealed he was “kinda close” to returning to the gridiron during the season, saying he “missed it sometimes.”
“I missed it sometimes, but not really. Then I’d miss it for like an hour, and then I would go workout, and then I’d be like, ‘Nah, I don’t miss it. I don’t even have the energy to work out.”
Gronk revealed he had a couple of phone calls with a few weeks remaining in the season and “took them serious.”
“I took a five day period to see if I really wanted to go back,” Gronkowski wholeheartedly told Fallon, explaining he’s been an athlete his whole life. It was something he had to consider for the opportunity alone.
The 2014 Comeback Player of the Year said he didn’t think about returning once during those five days and graciously informed the teams giving him calls to return that he would not be suiting up.
Gronkowski disclosed that Brady had tried to persuade him to come back to play with the Buccaneers, but he still had to pass.
“He definitely supports me throughout the year, if I’m playing football or not playing football.”