What Has Chiefs Legend Tony Gonzalez Been Up To?
The Kansas City Chiefs beat the Philadelphia Eagles on February 12, 2023, to win Super Bowl LVII, but one notable Chiefs player who hasn't been on the field for many years is former tight end Tony Gonzalez. Gonzalez retired from the NFL following the 2013 season after playing for the Atlanta Falcons and has been a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame since 2019, a testament to his skill at the sport. Given that NFL players retire at a much earlier age than the general population, Gonzalez hasn't stopped working just because he's no longer playing football professionally; he's just working in a different capacity following his retirement from football.
In the years that have passed since his time as a player, it turns out that Gonzalez has tried on a few different hats. Since he doesn't appear to be among the sports stars still earning millions from their former teams, he's had to find some other outlet for his skills, and he's clearly picked up a few new ones along the way.
Tony Gonzalez got into sportscasting
Like many other former professional athletes, former NFL player Tony Gonzalez moved into sportscasting upon his retirement from the league. He first joined CBS Sports' "The NFL Today" in 2014, and an article from CBS Sports quoted Gonzalez as commenting on his decision, "I just felt really comfortable with CBS and the team. I felt they wanted me to come work — I got that sense more so than all the other places I was looking at." In addition to his position on "The NFL Today," Gonzalez reportedly joined some of CBS Sports' additional programming.
After a few years of working for CBS, Gonzalez moved to Fox's pregame show, "NFL Kickoff," in 2017. He remained in that role — also appearing in other Fox Sports programming during his time at the network — until 2021. At that point, the former tight end reportedly left sports for a different endeavor: acting.
For those who had missed Gonzalez's work as a sportscaster, he became a co-host of Amazon Prime Video's "Thursday Night Football" in 2022, telling Forbes, "Right from the beginning, I knew I wanted to do Thursday Night Football. It was a chance to be part of something new. That's the coolest part."
Tony Gonzalez has also become an actor
Since leaving Fox in 2021, former tight end Tony Gonzalez has begun a more serious acting career for himself too. While he had some cameo roles from earlier years, Gonzalez began to hone his craft as an actor more seriously. He also explained in an interview with ESPN that he always saw himself going into acting, rather than viewing it as an option just because he had retired from the NFL. In fact, shared Gonzalez, he originally had tried to balance the careers, saying, "My plan back then was to be a football player, and then also acting in the offseason in whatever movies I can get. Looking back, it was foolish thinking."
With more time on his hands post-retirement, however, Gonzalez has been able to pursue acting. He has three credited roles as an actor from 2022 alone, including an 8-episode role in the television series "Long Slow Exhale."
Gonzalez has also appeared on television in other capacities, such as on a February 2023 episode of the PBS television series "Finding Your Roots."