Dolphins CB Byron Jones Not Retiring Despite Tweets, Likely To Be June-1 Cut

Dolphins CB Byron Jones posted a series of tweets on Saturday about the injuries he’s dealt with over the course of his NFL career and how they’ve impacted him. 

It was an honor and privilege to play in the NFL but it came at a regrettable cost I did not foresee. In my opinion, no amount of professional success or financial gain is worth avoidable chronic pain and disabilities. Godspeed to the draft class of 2023.

— Byron Jones (@TheByronJones) February 25, 2023

Jones talked about his career in the past tense, which led to some speculation that he could be retiring from the NFL. 

However, Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald reports that Jones is not retiring and doesn’t have a pending lawsuit either. 

Jackson adds that the Dolphins are likely to designate Jones as a post-June 1 release at some point this offseason, but nothing is finalized yet in terms of the team’s plans. 

Jones stands to make a base salary of $13,500,000 for the 2023 season. Designating him as a post-June 1 release would create $13,600,000 of cap space while leaving Miami with $4,751,000 of dead money.

Jones, 30, is a former first-round pick out of Connecticut by the Cowboys in the 2015 NFL Draft. He played out the final year of his four-year, $8.601 million rookie contract, but the Cowboys elected to pick up his fifth-year option in 2019 which cost them $6,266,000, and he entered free agency the following offseason. 

The Dolphins signed Jones to a five-year, $82.5 million contract that included $57 million guaranteed back in March of 2020. He was entering the final year of his deal and was set to earn a base salary of $14,375,000 in 2022.

In 2021, Jones appeared in 16 games and recorded 59 total tackles, no tackles for loss, no interceptions, one forced fumble, and 10 pass defenses.