Former NFL quarterback Philip Rivers plans on remaining on the high school sideline in the future and not returning to his former job.

In a Fox News story this week, Rich Eisen reported that one of the top rumors he heard at last week’s NFL combine was that Rivers, now the head coach at St. Michael Catholic in Fairhope, Ala., contacted both the Miami Dolphins and San Francisco 49ers prior to the playoffs last season.

Rivers told AL.com on Tuesday that was not the case.

“I heard from a couple of teams just kind of checking in,” he said. “I didn’t contact anyone, and I’m not going anywhere. I think maybe some teams, with some guys going down, may have been just looking for a contingency plan, but nothing came of it.”

He said he did not hear from the Dolphins.

Rivers, who retired in 2020 following 17 seasons in the NFL, said he thinks “the ship has sailed” for any possible NFL comeback.

“I think in my mind in the last couple of years if a team had needed me, I might have had six or eight games left in me, but I’m not going into this fall thinking the same,” he said. “I think it’s done.”

Rivers ended his career by starting 252 consecutive games and was ranked fifth in completions, passing yards and touchdown passes in NFL history when he retired. He was named to eight Pro Bowls.

He has spent the last two years as head coach at St. Michael, a Class 4A school in Alabama. He has led the Cardinals to an 11-8 record during that time. The team had won just five varsity games in its four years of existence prior to that.

“It’s still trending in the right direction,” Rivers said of the St. Michael program. “It doesn’t happen overnight. You keep working at it. The students are working. The coaches are working.

“There are two schools of thought on it. You either find a way to win one year or you build something that is sustainable long term, which is what we are after. … Playing the long game route is what we are about because it’s about more than football for us.”

Rivers said his team will skip a traditional spring practice this year for the second straight season, an option the AHSAA provides to have an extra week of work in the summer. He said St. Michael will play Spanish Fort in a fall jamboree at Spanish Fort on Aug. 17 before opening the season Aug. 24 at Gulf Shores.

“I talked to (Spanish Fort coach) Chase (Smith), and it just made sense,” Rivers said. “It should be a decent crowd. They are close. It’s probably a little more than we can handle right now, but it will be good for us. I think it will get us ready for the season quicker than playing someone who might not be as tough. I would imagine it would be somewhat comparable to playing Athens last year.”

Rivers also hinted there has been progress in building the Cardinals an on-campus stadium in the near future. St. Michael has played its home games at Fairhope Municipal Stadium since the school opened.

“That will be exciting,” he said. “I know people are eager to get it going.”