Daunte Culpepper retires

Former Vikings quarterback Daunte Culpepper announced his retirement today, after a fruitless quest to find a new team:

Culpepper completed 64 percent of his passes in a nine-year career, with 142 touchdowns. He tried to resuscitate his career with the Miami Dolphins in 2006 and the Oakland Raiders last season, struggling in both of those stops, and wasn't in training camp with any teams this year.

"Since I was not given a fair chance to come in and compete for a job, I would rather move on and win in other arenas of life," Culpepper said.

Culpepper has spent the past months hoping for chances with any team, including the Green Bay Packers, saying just last week he'd accept a backup job there behind Aaron Rodgers. The Packers had Culpepper in for a workout before this year's draft, with apparently little contact since.

This is sad, but probably inevitable: Culpepper never managed to recover his pre-injury form. I'd hoped he would be given another chance to come back this season, but clearly it wasn't going to happen.

Update: ESPN, however, says that Culpepper did have some offers, but chose not to take them.