Vince Wilfork said Wednesday in an interview with ESPN Radio's Russillo Show that he is still undecided if he will play in 2017 or retire.
"What retirement is, I want to make sure I'm 100 percent committed to whatever I'm going to do," the free-agent defensive tackle said. "I'm not saying that I'm going to retire, and I'm not going to say that I'm retired."
Wilfork, a five-time Pro Bowl selection, played the past two seasons for the Houston Texans after playing his first 11 seasons with the Patriots.
Texans general manager Rick Smith said last month that he believes Wilfork will retire and that he hasn't talked to him since the past season.
Wilfork said Wednesday that he approves of the Texans' decision to trade up in the draft in order to select quarterback Deshaun Watson, saying "the city loves it. The team loves it.
"I think it was an awesome move because you have a player that brings in a leadership quality and [is] very competitive and a winner, a winner attitude," he said. "He played in a winning system so he knows what it takes to win. Just from his background, you can tell he's a young humble kid, that his dream has finally come true to be the best athlete he can be. Now he has that opportunity."
However, the 35-year-old Wilfork said that a team's quarterback situation would have no impact on whether he'd want to play in 2017.
"In my situation, nobody's going to dictate anything that I do with playing or not playing but myself. There's no team, there's no money. It ain't none of that," he said.
"I'm going to make the decision what I want to do, and it's going to be strictly off of what do I want to do. I can play with rookies and I can play with 10-year vets. That don't bother me."