Seattle Seahawks’ Richard Sherman Defends Himself After Postgame Rant: I’m Not a Villain
The cornerback, whose team is headed to the Super Bowl, went off on opponent Michael Crabtree in a Fox Sports interview with a visibly stunned Erin Andrews.
Seattle Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman is defending himself after giving a heated interview Sunday night during which he went off on San Francisco 49ers wide receiver Michael Crabtree.
The game ended with Seattle winning 23-17, sealing their appearance in the Feb. 2 Super Bowl against the Denver Broncos. The final play of the game involved a pass intended for Crabtree, but Sherman tipped the ball to teammate Malcolm Smith for the interception in the end zone. After the game, Sherman talked to Fox Sports’ Erin Andrews, who asked him about the final play.
PHOTOS: Hollywood’s Best Football Movies
“Well I’m the best corner in the game!” Sherman yelled. “When you try me with a sorry receiver like Crabtree that’s the result you’re going to get. Don’t you ever talk about me.”
Andrews, who was visibly stunned, then asked whom he was talking about, to which Sherman yelled “Crabtree!”
“Don’t you open your mouth about the best,” Sherman yelled. “Or I’m gonna shut it for you real quick. LOB.”
Andrews then quickly threw back to game commentator Joe Buck. Dan Bell, vp communications at Fox Sports, told The Hollywood Reporter that the interview was cut short as a “precautionary measure” over concerns of possible profanity, adding that network execs thought Andrews handled the interview “very well.”
Meanwhile, Sherman also called Crabtree a “mediocre receiver” in a news conference after the game.
Sherman, who regularly writes for the Sports Illustrated blog The MMQB, on Monday wrote a column for the site explaining what happened.
After the game, “I ran over to Crabtree to shake his hand, but he ignored me,” Sherman wrote. “I patted him, stuck out my hand and said, ‘Good game, good game.’ That’s when he shoved my face, and that’s when I went off.”
PHOTOS: Hollywood’s Biggest Fantasy Football Fans
Sherman also went on to criticize Crabtree again.
“Erin Andrews interviewed me after the game and I yelled what was obvious: If you put a subpar player across from a great one, most of the time you’re going to get one result,” he wrote. “As far as Crabtree being a top-20 NFL receiver, you’d have a hard time making that argument to me. … But that’s not why I don’t like the man. It goes back to something he said to me this offseason in Arizona, but you’d have to ask him about that. A lot of what I said to Andrews was adrenaline talking and some of that was Crabtree. I just don’t like him.”
Last season, Sherman also went off on Tom Brady after a Seattle victory over the New England Patriots, but on Monday he wrote that this is not typical behavior.
“It was loud, it was in the moment, and it was just a small part of the person I am,” he wrote. “I don’t want to be a villain because I’m not a villainous person. When I say I’m the best cornerback in football, it’s with a caveat: There isn’t a great defensive backfield in the NFL that doesn’t have a great front seven. Everything begins with pressure up front, and that’s what we get from our pass rushers every Sunday. To those who would call me a thug or worse because I show passion on a football field — don’t judge a person’s character by what they do between the lines. Judge a man by what he does off the field, what he does for his community, what he does for his family.”
He added that he’s gotten numerous texts from friends and family supporting his comments in his interview, while many Twitter users were “less supportive.”
Photo Credit: AP Photo/Ted S. Warren
Source: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/seattle-seahawks-richard-sherman-defends-672478
___________________________________________________________________________________
NFL Conference Championship Games Soar
Blowing last year’s matchups out of the water, the AFC game averages 51.3 million viewers for CBS and the NFC crushes it for Fox with 55.9 million.
Sunday’s football games proved a predictably massive draw for viewers. The AFC and NFC championship games, which decided the pairing for the 2014 Super Bowl, brought in big ratings for CBS and Fox, respectively.
The first game of the day, Denver’s victory over New England, averaged 51.3 million viewers on CBS. That’s the highest average for a CBS-aired AFC championship in 32 years and is behind only 2011’s 54.9 million-strong AFC showdown between Pittsburgh and the New York Jets as the conference’s best showing in recent history.
PHOTOS: Hollywood’s NFL Connections [4]
Compared to the early game last year, the NFC championship game between San Francisco and Atlanta, the game was up 22 percent from 42 million viewers. And looking at the 2013 AFC championship, which aired in the later window, the game was up 8 percent from 47.7 million viewers.
Fox’s NFC championship game between Seattle and San Francisco proved an even bigger draw, thanks in no small part to the smaller margin of victory for the Seahawks. The game averaged 55.9 million viewers, an NFC best for Fox since 1995 — not counting games that went into overtime — and was up 33 percent from the NFC championship last year.
Seattle and Denver will now play one another on Feb. 2 in New York at Super Bowl XLVIII. Fox will air the game.
Photo Credit: AP Photo-Marcio Jose Sanchezb – The Seattle Seahawks and the San Francisco 49ers Source: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/tv-ratings-nfl-conference-championship-672506
