Ultimate journeyman Josh McCown retires after 16 seasons

Josh McCown, who announced his retirement Monday, was an atypical journeyman NFL quarterback, in part because he welcomed the journeyman tag that many peers consider insulting.

"I don't shy away from the journeyman label," he wrote on The Players' Tribune website. "I embrace it, full force."

McCown lived it as much as any quarterback who spent the bulk of his career as a backup.

His 16 NFL seasons were spent with 10 league teams, two of which never deployed him in a game. Some 76 starts were logged, generally in place of injured regulars.

Few reserves endure so long. One selling point for McCown was his willingness to mentor young QBs, most recently for Sam Darnold of the New York Jets last year.

The franchise shelled out a whopping $10 million for McCown on his final deal for one year but considered the cash well-spent for his impact on the first-round draft pick. He accepted the role despite having lodged his most productive season in 2017.

McCown did not quite make it as an active player to age 40, what with a birthday looming on the Fourth of July, but he was the last surviving member of the 2002 draft class.

The first stop out of college was Arizona, and it turned out to be his longest at four seasons. Four other teams kept him at least two years, with Carolina, Chicago, Cleveland and the Jets holding on to McCown for longer than a pot of coffee.

He even took a sabbatical from the NFL in 2010, joining the Hartford Colonials of the United Football League.

The re-entry came with the Bears, and McCown finally carved out a partial season to remember with 13 touchdown passes and a single interception in five starts.

There followed a combined 22 starts over the next three years with the Buccaneers and Browns before he landed with the Jets. A backup gig seemed likely, but he surfaced in the lineup and established career bests in numerous categories even while sitting the final three games with an injury.

McCown will waste little time before launching the next phase of his working life. On Wednesday, he is scheduled to appear on "NFL Live" on ESPN.