Former QB Palmer talks Cardinals, retirement and bikini on NFL podcast

Carson Palmer walked away from his NFL career without saying many goodbyes.

Since his final days as an Arizona Cardinal, it seems as though he doesn’t regret the timing, and he doesn’t miss the game.

That said, he’s searching for the next chapter in his life.

“I’m not a retiree. I can’t just shut ‘er down and sit on the couch and eat Cheetos,” Palmer said when he joined the Dave Dameshek Football Program podcast this week.

“I don’t look at it as I’m done. I don’t know what’s next. I’m not in a rush to decide what’s next,” he added. “I want to start a new career and do something I’m passionate about just like I was for the last 15 years — I had a lot of passion in playing the game of football — but I’m not going into retirement right now.”

Palmer chatted with Dameshek about the future of the Cardinals, his favorite play and that infamous bikini he wore after losing the quarterback challenge.

Below are a few select quotes from the interview:

On if the Cardinals can be competitive next year: “There’s a lot of talk, the windows are closing. I think they’re keeping that window open for a sustained amount of time. It’s unbelievable to this day in age everybody thinks the window is two years or three years or four years. The window is completely dependent on your salary cap and where you are with the salary and what your quarterback situation is.”

On the Cardinals’ future under first-year coach Steve Wilks: “I’m really excited about the future. They’re replacing a lot and there’s been a lot of turnover on the offensive line, the quarterback position. But they’re getting David Johnson back. There are not a lot of guys in the receiver room right now that have been there or have caught a lot of balls, but I like where they start and that’s with Michael Bidwill. By far the best owner that I ever played for. He’s passionate, he wants to win, he’s willing to do what it takes to win — it doesn’t matter. He’s all in on winning and nothing else matters. Giving Steve Keim an extension to be there through 2022, it’s a brilliant move. Steve’s come in and done a phenomenal job.”

What was his favorite play as a player?: “It wasn’t that spectacular of what I did, it was more what Larry (Fitzgerald) was able to do with the ball. It was in 2015, it was in overtime in a playoff game against Green Bay. Something happened up front, the pocket collapsed, I did a spin move — which I got made fun of a bunch because I’m not a spin-move kind of guy — that’s not my deal. Spin move, I rolled out to the right … I threw it back across the field to Larry and Larry ran, I don’t know, 114 yards down the field and won the game. I guess if there’s one play — again, aside from my very unathletic looking spin move — the play was made by Larry and the tackles he broke and the guys that were blocking downfield.”

On Wilks: “I think every coach wants to … make it their own. (Former coach Bruce Arians) did it a very different way than most. From what I can tell, and I don’t know Coach Wilks, but he seems kind of like he’s going to do it his way no matter what, regardless of the culture that was previously there. But I’m excited about it. I’m excited to not be playing anymore and not be in OTAs right now and practicing football at this time of year, I’m enjoying that part of it. From a distance and watching it, you can’t help but watch it.”

What was his favorite quarterback challenge outfit? “I had some good ones. I dressed up as a flamingo one time, which was good. In 2014 or 2015, at the end of the year, they come out with the Pro Bowl ballots. They had just come out and I had lost the quarterback challenge bet, the bucket drill, which is what sets up the loser having to dress like a fool and look like an idiot. I had been elected to the Pro Bowl, and the next day I show up to the game and they had made like a hula shirt with a coconut shell bikini. I hadn’t been in the tanning salon for a while and I had missed my gym routine … my gym routine was a little bit off so my abs weren’t right. That’s what happened there.”

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