The Falcoholic
Former 2012 third round pick Mohamed Sanu has officially retired from the NFL. If you’re like me, it may seem odd reading this and thinking to yourself, “I haven’t heard this name in years.” Well…you’d be right.
Sanu hadn’t played on an NFL team since 2022, and the last time he was on a regular season roster was in 2021, but he hadn’t technically retired from the league until Friday when he announced on X that he’d be officially closing this chapter of his career.
Sanu’s ten year career saw him play for six different teams, including a lengthy Atlanta Falcons stint that lasted three and a half years before he was traded to the Patriots in the middle of the 2019 season. During that stint, he helped form one of the most efficient receiving duos in the league with Julio Jones, propelling Atlanta to a top-10 passing offense for each of his full three years. Sanu played a crucial role in Atlanta’s 2016 Super Bowl 51 run and the following year’s playoff run, putting him in the company of the Falcons’ best recent #2 receiving options like Roddy White (in the Julio years), Harry Douglas, and Mike Pritchard. Always a sure handed receiver, Sanu finished with a 71.9 catch percentage, which is one of the highest in team history for any receiver with over 100 targets. He’s 19th all-time in franchise history in catches, 22nd in yardage, and 21st in touchdowns; he’s also top 30 in all those metrics for the Cincinnati Bengals.
What some may not know was that Sanu played quarterback in the early days of his football career. During his time at South Brunswick High School in New Jersey, he played quarterback in a triple-option offense. This type of offense usually means a ton of running plays, but passing implemented sparingly to catch a defense off guard. Sanu carried that arm with him to the pros and was sort of used as a tricky play wizard. Sanu threw eight passes in the NFL and connected on seven of them, finishing his career with a perfect passer rating. Sanu completed two passes in Atlanta, both going for touchdowns to Julio Jones and Matt Ryan, so it’s safe to say he was the team’s Swiss Army knife and the author of some big moments.
After his most productive year in the league, he became somewhat of a journeyman receiver, joining former Panthers quarterback Cam Newton after being traded to New England in 2019, but then being cut before the start of the 2020 regular season, only to be signed and cut again by the 49ers that same year. He would then wrap up his career with short stints on the Lions, the 49ers for the 2nd time, and finally the Miami Dolphins, where he’d fall victim to their final round of 2022 roster cuts. Now after three consecutive years in free agency, Sanu calls it a career, and might I say one hell of a career it was.
