Blake Sims says he has retired from football

Blake Sims is finished playing football, the former Alabama quarterback said on Friday.

Appearing on Paul Finebaum’s debut on Twitter Spaces, Sims said: “I retired. I retired about two weeks ago. I was playing in the IFL. We fell one game short of the championship.”

Sims played for the Indoor Football League’s Frisco Fighters during the 2022 season.

The Fighters also announced Sims’ retirement via Twitter on Friday.

On July 29, the Quad City Steamwheelers defeated Frisco 48-41 in the IFL postseason semifinals by scoring two touchdowns in the final 53 seconds. The Northern Arizona Wranglers beat the Steamwheelers 47-45 in the league championship game on Saturday.

Sims had a 4-yard run in the semifinal game as TJ Edwards took most of the snaps at quarterback. Sims had thrown for five touchdowns and run for four more in the Fighters’ two regular-season victories over Quad Cities – 68-51 on April 16 and 50-44 on July 9 – as Frisco finished atop the IFL’s Eastern Division with a 15-3 record.

The IFL is a 14-team circuit playing eight-man football on a 50-yard field.

In 16 games for Frisco this season, Sims completed 90-of-136 passes for 1,140 yards with 18 touchdowns and three interceptions, ran for 281 yards and 10 touchdowns on 71 carries, caught three passes for 21 yards and one touchdown and returned six kickoffs for 57 yards.

Sims signed with the IFL’s Spokane Shock in 2020, but the league canceled its season because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Sims played in five games for the Shock in 2021. He completed 23-of-46 passes for 220 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions and ran for 198 yards and six touchdowns on 33 carries.

Sims broke Alabama single-season records for total offense and passing yards in 2014. Sims completed 252-of-391 passes for 3,487 yards with 28 touchdowns and 10 interceptions and ran for 350 yards and seven touchdowns on 83 carries as the Crimson Tide won the SEC championship before losing to Ohio State 42-35 in the Sugar Bowl in a CFP semifinal game.

After leaving Alabama, Sims attended the rookie minicamps of the Green Bay Packers and the Washington Redskins as a tryout player in May 2015, working as a running back for Washington. Neither NFL team offered him a contract.

Sims spent nine days in the Toronto Argonauts’ training camp before being released by the Canadian Football League team in June 2015. Sims joined the Saskatchewan Roughriders’ practice squad on Aug. 4, 2015, and was activated on Sept. 6, only to be released nine days later. He rejoined the Saskatchewan on Oct. 20, 2015, but he did not play in the final three games of the CFL season before being released on Dec. 15, 2015.

In July 2016, Sims signed with the Wollongong Devils of Australia’s National Gridiron League, but the proposed football league never got off the ground.

Sims spent two weeks on the Atlanta Falcons’ practice squad and one on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ practice squad during the 2016 NFL season. Sims went to training camp with Tampa Bay as a running back in 2017, but he was waived as the Bucs’ reduced their preseason roster to the regular-season limit.

In 2019, Sims went on injured reserve with a hamstring problem after not playing in the Birmingham Iron’s first three Alliance of American Football games. The league folded eight weeks into a planned 10-week regular-season.

Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.