A bigger, wiser, and more cautious Joe Burrow emerged Tuesday from one of his relentlessly calculated offseasons.
The beefier Burrow wouldn’t say what he weighs and how much he wants to weigh this season. But, as he always does in a press conference, he carefully weighed his words that always carry a lot of weight as the NFL’s all-time completion percentage leader.
“I’m going to be smart about it. If I need a break, I need a break,” said Burrow after he put his surgically repaired wrist through another offseason practice session. “The wrist maybe is going to hurt sometimes and I’m going to be honest with myself about how my body’s feeling, maybe a little more cautious than I have been in years past.
“That’s kind of been something that’s been on my mind for the last couple of months. I’m getting better at that. It’s always a challenge to not push yourself in that way, but I’m growing and learning every year, trying to be a pro and trying to figure out how to best be available for my team.”
No one challenges his body more than Burrow. Four months ago, the same day the Jake Browning Bengals beat Cleveland in the 2023 finale, an unsurprised Dak Notestine received Burrow’s text:
“What’s the schedule?”
Notestine, the director of performance at Black Sheep Performance in suburban Cincinnati, is Burrow’s trainer who has been with him so long that he has taken him from adolescence to Associated Press Comeback Player of the Year. He knew the annual tweaking and tugging would continue when they sat down for the annual State of Joe. Nutrition fed the discussion.
