T.O. vs. T.G.September 30, 2009
Terrell Owens for once held his tongue. And now he is being scrutinized by one man. Tim Graham. According to his bio, Graham joined ESPN.com in 2008 he’s covered the Dolphins, Bills and now covers the NFC East. He is an award-winning NHL and boxing writer, and he now works for ESPN so his credentials speak for themselves.
I do have to wonder about Mr. Graham though, he’s been going in on Terrell Owens over the past few days. I count six articles on Owens and he may be writing one as we speak right now on Mr. Owens. I mean that’s six articles in four days for a man who has only caught 5 passes for 98 yards and 1 Td in three games so far this season.
Why is this man all up in T.O. ‘s grill? That is because T.O. put a muzzle on himself this past Sunday. Reporters baited T.O. into starting his mid-season rant of “it’s everyone else’s fault but mine”. T.O. didn’t even come close to budging. I mean duh, does it look like we are half way through the season yet? And plus, this is his first year with the Bills. T.O. is always a model citizen in his first year with a club. It’s always in year two or three that he is just a little to honest for a team, owner, quarterback, and city’s liking.
I was going to have you read the transcript from the press conference, but I figured seeing and hearing would be better. Watch this, then I’ll continue.
Now, I’ve read a ton of responses. A lot from a lot of different websites, and I’m not going to take it “there” but there is a fine line drawn in the sand of those who think Owens handled this the right way and others who think he handled it wrong. It’s funny because both sides have a lot in common with one another, but like I said, I am not going to go there.
I’ll just offer up my thoughts. I’m proud of the way T.O. handled it. The questions were loaded. I’m not a huge T.O. fan. I like Randy Moss better, but I like T.O.’s game. I think Owens does bring a lot of media backlash and early team exits onto himself. But last Sunday was un-called for.
I mean is T.O. supposed to be happy and smiling after a loss. Not only a loss, but he was a non-factor in the game. He dropped a ball, which is typical, but a few were under thrown and two over thrown. He had five of Trent Edwards’ 35 passes thrown his way. There are few people in the league that can cover T.O., but I don’t think Jabari Greer or Tracy Porter can cover him even with Darren Sharper over the top. With all that said, I’d be pissed too if I was T.O. and he was rightfully so. It’s sad no one ever puts this into practice but it actually works: “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.” T.O. wanted to take this route but the NFL demanded he speak to reporters after dodging them after the first two games. I mean you saw the video above, whether you think he was a jerk or not or if the reporters were asking loaded questions or not, what T.O. didn’t do was go off on his teammates, coaches and most importantly his quarterback, which I applaud him.
Two people that were not happy with T.O.’s answers were NBC analysts, Tony Dungy and Rodney Harrison. Dungy was quoted as saying,
“You really don’t want that,” Dungy said of Owens’ snide demeanor. “But I think you know that’s what you get with Terrell Owens. When things aren’t going well, you’re going to get stuff like that. That’s hard to coach.”
As much as I admire and respect Coach Dungy, I have to disagree. This isn’t Tom Brady or Peyton Manning rocking shades and having an attitude with reporters. It’s Terrell Owens. I mean it’s a situation where you’d rather have him parry reporters than cause locker room division right? Also, I don’t see how Coach Dungy didn’t think the reporter’s questions were not loaded.
Soon after Coach Dungy was done, Rodney Harrison jumped in the mix.
“He’s just a clown, a straight up clown. He’s more concerned with individual stats as opposed to the team’s success. Just a clown.”
While it can be argued that Owens is more concerned with individual success than team success in most cases it cannot be argued here. Where in this conversation did he say me, or they’re not throwing me the ball etc. He simply declined not to answer the questions. Harrison needs to fall back. He could have called Owens something far worse than a clown, but still for a pseudo-analyst to be calling players names is not acceptable.
In fairness, I have to tell what Owens said in response to Harrison via Twitter.
- “I could less about Rodney Harrison! Anybody tht using steroids, yes STEROIDS rodney, is a cheater & cheated the game!”
- “Is tht Y u used steroids b/c u were worried about ur stats or ws it b/c u were losing it? Lol! U’re a loser & a cheater? Got any steroid …”
- “Hey rodney! Send me sum steroids 2 the Bills facility next week!”
The steroids comments are regarding Harrison’s four-game suspension to start 2007 for violating the NFL’s policy on performance-enhancing substances. Harrison admitted to obtaining HGH, but insisted he never took steroids.
Now onto this Tim Graham cat. I’ve read some of his writing, and while I wouldn’t call myself a fan, the guy is a pretty damn good writer. I have no clue what is deal is lately though. He is T.O.’s personal Media Takeout, TMZ, World Star Hip-hop you name it. I wouldn’t be surprised if Graham didn’t blog about T.O. only leaving a 15% tip at a restaurant instead of 20%.
What got me going on Graham was his post yesterday, T.O. wallowing in his own martyrdom , where he essentially went in on T.O. for being in his words “condescending” and “patronizing”. I get it. Graham is apart of the media, and they do this for a living. They need good quotes in order to print/post interesting and relevant stories. But c’mon, there’s no way he can’t say those questions T.O. was asked were not loaded questions. I mean even Tim Hasselbeck, Trey Wingo and Trent Dilfer on NFL Live thought the questions were loaded. Sure Owens fired back tweets at Rodney Harrison, I’m sure he would have done the same if one of the reporters disrespected him and called him a clown at the press conference. Yes, Owens went on 2 Live Stews and gave them responses, but the 2 Live Stews didn’t ask T.O. loaded questions. There was no way T.O. could have answered those questions without making Trent Edwards look like a lousy quarterback, thus being vilified by the media as he always is which I’ve stated earlier, he most of the time brings upon himself. So no, Mr. Graham, T.O. didn’t “create” an incident for himself to say the media is twisting his quotes. It was actually created for him by Dick Jauron and his coaching staff’s play calling, Trent Edwards “bad day”, NFL PR forcing Owens to speak to reporters and over the top Buffalo media for asking loaded questions. This time it really wasn’t T.O.’s fault.
Graham stated that the Buffalo media isn’t like the New York or Philadelphia media. He is exactly right, NYC and Philly media are much more sophisticated in riling T.O. up and getting the “selfish” quotes out of him. Maybe that’s why Sunday’s reporters are in small market Buffalo and not big market NYC or Philly.
That’s all I got,
Ricky Writer
