Lions' 32-year old former Super Bowl champion announces retirement from NFL

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After a full-circle NFL career, Pat O'Connor is hanging up his helmet for good.

He was officially placed on the reserve/retired list by the Detroit Lions on Thursday, ending his time in the league at the age of 32.

O'Connor entered the NFL as a seventh-round pick of the Lions in the 2017 NFL Draft out of Eastern Michigan.

The 6-foot-4, 300-pound defensive lineman didn't actually make the Lions in that preseason, though. He had to go through a number of tryouts that fall before the Tampa Bay Buccaneers signed him in October.

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He was then cut and re-signed by the Bucs multiple times, but O'Connor eventually found a way to stick around in Tampa Bay.

O'Connor was mostly a depth and special teams piece. He maxed out at six tackles in a season with the Bucs, as well as 1.0 sack in 2020.

He was a part of the Super Bowl champion Buccaneers in 2020, giving him a ring to take with him into retirement.

The Bucs didn't bring O'Connor back after the 2023 season, and that's when he came back to the Lions.

In 2024, he played 12 games and had a career-high 18 tackles to go with a sack.

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O'Connor got eight more games in 2025 and had 10 tackles.

He finishes his NFL career having played 88 games.

O'Connor worked hard to stick around the league on the fringes of rosters for years, and he can go into retirement knowing he made the most of the opportunities he was able to get.