Warren Sapp Nonsensically "Explained" Why He Has A Problem With Timmy Jernigan Wearing #99 In His Honor

LBS-  Sapp also seemed to accuse Jernigan of “making it personal” and inviting unfair comparisons between the two.

“I’m not just trying to hold up my standard,” Sapp said. “I’m only the fifth defensive tackle first ballot Hall of Famer in NFL history — the ones before me were Bob Lilly, Merlin Olson, Mean Joe Greene and Randy White. I am in a company of five, so when you talk about me, you better bring the other four with me because that is the standard that I held myself to.

“Joe Cullen, the old D-line coach that was down in Tampa, is in Baltimore now, and I have already had four conversations with him about coming up to Baltimore. So how am I not going to have a conversation with the guy that wants to put a number on his back? That’s not my number. He [Jernigan] put my name in it [the story]. And to put my name in it, makes it personal to me.

“Go out and make a name for yourself for you. Don’t go and use a first ballot defensive tackle that you will now be judged against. Are you kidding me? Who signed up for that?”



I don't know what context these quotes were obtained under, but I get the impression that it was a reporter calmly asking Warren Sapp to explain himself while he stood there getting more and more pissed that he couldn't do so in a logical, semi-articulate way. It's like engaging in a sports argument when you are drunk, getting proven wrong within two seconds, and then refusing to admit defeat while digging yourself deeper and deeper into a hole of stupidity. In my eyes that's what Warren Sapp did here, because he just rambled on and on about a topic and I still genuinely have no idea why it makes him so upset.

Is it possible that Warren Sapp just doesn't know what the word "tribute" means? If he does understand that it has a completely different meaning than "comparison" then he certainly fooled me. We are talking about a guy wearing a number - that is accessible to literally every defensive lineman in the league - and somehow Sapp is on the subject of the Hall Of Fame credentials of him and his peers? Claiming a guy that wanted to honor his accomplishments through a small gesture that means next to nothing is "making it personal"? Did Warren Sapp just imply that he is too good of a player for any other future player to decide to model himself after? Someone get the guy another set of hookers to get his mind off something that he's already spent entirely too much time getting senselessly worked up about. I'm not even sure that Timmy Jernigan has discussed this decision publicly and Warren Sapp is about to put his fist through the wall out of pure frustration. What a truly bizarre dynamic this story has undertaken.