11Alive- After the game, defensive end Michael Bennett lashed out at a reporter that asked him about the Seahawks' struggling pass rush against quarterback Matt Ryan. He praised Ryan, but when the reporter pursued, Bennett didn't like it.
"There's some (expletive) that happened. He threw the ball really fast. There was some busted stuff going on so obviously you don't know football. He threw the ball pretty fast. He did his thing. We rushed as good as we could. Don't point and say we didn't do what we needed to do, OK? Don't do that. "Don't point (at us) and say we didn't do what we needed to do, OK? Don't do that, OK? Get out of my face now. Don't tell me I didn't do my job, mother (expletive). OK, exactly. Get the (expletive) out of my face. Like I said, get out of my face. Don't play with me. Don't play with me. I just put my heart on the (expletive) field. Don't (expletive) play with me. Get the (expletive) out of my face then. Try me again, see what happens. I ain't one of these mother (expletive) out here. Don't try to tell me what I didn't do mother (expletive). "We lost the game! That's the NFL, you non-playing mother (expletive)! What you do with your life? What you do with your lifetime mother (expletive)? What injury you play through? What adversity you went through?"
In fairness to Michael Bennett, who would have thought that a grown man whose job requires him to ask fairly repetitive questions on a regular basis would have overcome more in life than coming up short against a quarterback with a quick trigger? I know the Seahawks defensive end essentially did the less fatal equivalent of making a "yo momma" joke at the expense of someone whose mother passed away, but how could he have known that non-athletes encounter trials and tribulations that might just be a little more physically and emotionally taxing than facing an above average offensive line? This was simply a case of horrible luck. Just one man that gets compensated seven figures a year to play 16-19 football games happening upon an unfortunate interaction with the only person in the room that's endured more than a single loss in the divisional round of the NFL playoffs. Excuuuuse me if I don't feel comfortable criticizing a player who accidentally questioned the perseverance of a cancer survivor when the Atlanta Falcons offense is only second to a debilitating, oft-terminal disease in terms of adversity. In all seriousness, I can see where Michael Bennett is coming from here. Even though he is a noted loudmouth who prides himself on walking the all-too-thin line between being genuine and jackass, I can respect his competitive spirit manifesting itself through a profanity-laced tirade. Especially when the target is someone who is representative of an occupation in which success has become increasingly defined by disingenuous means. That being said, I think he needed the reality check that results from incidentally questioning the fortitude of someone that tackled a condition that makes the biggest, meanest offensive linemen look like a fucking parking cone. The self important "you weren't born with superior genes so you're not allowed to make clear observations about those that were" mindset has begun to run rampant, so maybe those that default to it needed a little reminder that some people have it worse than getting paid millions to play a sport and having to answer to their sub-par performance afterwards. I don't know much about being a pro athlete, but I do know nothing grounds a person quite like the embarrassment that comes with making disparaging assumptions about a stranger then finding out that stranger bull-rushed the most intimidating of opponents and ultimately sacked cancer's attempt at advancing.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Categories
All
Archives
January 2020
|