The last time San Francisco 49ers legend Jerry Rice caught a football during a regular-season NFL game was in 2004. 14 years later, if you were to ask the 55-year-old former receiver if he could still play the game, his answer would be "yes."
"I still feel like today, if I wanted to come back to football and play football, I could do it, at the age of 55," Rice said during an interview for ESPN The Magazine's Body Issue. "I'm one of those guys that I still believe that if I wanted to, I could come back, catch over 80 balls and really be productive on the field. ... I think I'm still explosive, and I think I still can beat up on some defenses."
Rice, who is considered to be the greatest receiver to play the game, is the NFL's all-time leader in receptions (1,549), receiving yards (22,895), all-purpose yards (23,546), and touchdown catches (197).
He was in attendance during a 49ers training camp practice last August and even showed he could still run routes with the younger receivers on the team.
"I went out and I practiced with the [49ers] football team last year," Rice said. "The young guys could not believe that after playing a game for 20 years, and being out of the game for 15 years or something, my body knew what to do -- that I could run routes, that I could catch the ball, that I can beat them off the line of scrimmage and do all those things. I think that really impressed them. But because I never got out of shape, my body just knew what to do the second I put on those football shoes."
During the interview for the magazine, Rice discusses what he did to stay in shape during his playing days and what he still does today. You can read the ESPN feature on Rice here.
