Antonio Cromartie -- Free of Legal Guardian He Forgot He Had

NY Jets star Antonio Cromartie is a grown ass man with 12 kids and until recently ... he was under a guardianship that had never been removed ... all because the necessary paperwork was never filed.

According to legal docs, the 28-year-old football stud was placed under the guardianship of his godmother, Kimberly Thomas, in 2001 ... when he was still a minor. The guardianship was put in place so he could continue to play football at Lincoln High School in Florida after his mother moved out of the county.

Fast forward 11 years and Cromartie was still under that guardianship because neither he nor Thomas filed the paperwork to dismiss the case.

A judge in the case asked for routine paperwork last month, which brought the oversight to the attention of Thomas' lawyer. The lawyer subsequently filed papers to end the guardianship, claiming Thomas hasn't done any "guardian" stuff since Cromartie's high school days.