Veteran QB Chad Pennington said Thursday that he will take the 2011 season off and work for FOX Sports after tearing his ACL in March.

Pennington spoke in front of more than 150 fans at a banquet in Charleston. According to the report in the Charleston Daily Mail, Pennington said he wants to get healthy and "evaluate things and see where I am physically."

Pennington, who turns 35 on June 26, threw two passes last season before hurting his shoulder and being placed on injured reserve. In March, he tore his ACL in a pickup basketball game.

"(Playing basketball) was a dumb decision," he said. "I wasn't training real hard at the time because I was doing some shoulder rehab, and my legs weren't ready to play basketball, so it was just dumb."

Pennington is the league's only two-time Comeback Player of the Year. He has had four shoulder surgeries in his 11 seasons. His last full season came in 2008, when Pennington led the Dolphins to first place in the AFC East by throwing 19 TD passes and just seven interceptions.

"I planned to make a fourth comeback, but it doesn't make sense to try to rehab a shoulder injury a fourth time on top of an ACL injury," he said. "I'm at a point of my career where I haven't been patient before, I'm going to be patient now."

Pennington told the paper he will work with Sam Rosen as an analyst for FOX Sports.

The way we see it

The injury-plagued Pennington returned under center last season when Chad Henne was struggling, and the Dolphins won't have that insurance in 2011. Considering the slim chances that Pennington would have been ready for the start of 2011, they likely planned to add a veteran quarterback regardless to compete with Henne.

Pennington is well spoken and many have said that he should go into coaching at some point. He should bring good insight as a game commentator and it will be interesting to see if he decides to continue with TV work or try to play again in 2012.