“That’s why you won’t be seeing any more ‘Michael Sams’ anytime soon,” he insists. “No one wants to be the guy who f---s up the chemistry on his team.”
After the appalling video of Ray Rice viciously assaulting his fiancée became public, his team’s locker room was in a frenzy of speculation.
But everybody agreed on one thing: There was no way that the NFL hierarchy had no knowledge of the video, as NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell publicly claimed.
“The league knows every f---ing thing about us,” one of the team stars bellowed. “Those f---ers got connections everywhere.”
Anonymous claims that the word on the Baltimore Ravens running back was that he had always been a cancer on his team: “Someone who tears his team apart because instead of being a leader, he’s a selfish, arrogant pr--k.”
Violence is a way of life for many NFL players, whether they hail from “the ’hood or the trailer park,” he wrote. Some learn to control it; others, like Rice, can’t change.
“Some, if it wasn’t for the NFL, they wouldn’t be playing football, they’d be in prison,” Anonymous says in the book. “Then you got your lucky few like Aaron Hernandez or Michael Vick who just happen to get both.”
Anonymous says all the league does to address any of the issues — domestic abuse, homophobia, racism — is hold tedious meetings where the men are inundated with statistics and told horror stories of players who screwed up.
The takeaway is usually, “Please, please, don’t f--- up, because then we’ll all look really bad,” he recounts.
As for substance abuse or boozing, Anonymous insists that “the amazing truth is that it’s actually really easy to get away with drinking and doing street drugs as an NFL player.”
Athletes with a drug or alcohol problem are pretty much left to deal with it on their own — although there are not a lot of players with an addiction, he claimed.
The teams once passed out prescriptions for the painkillers Vicodin, Percocet and OxyContin like candy. But the 2011 collective bargaining agreement put an end to that.
One of his angrier accusations is that teams regularly take the last player cut from an opposing team for one thing only: To pick his brain for the enemy’s game plan.
He traded his first team’s plays for the chance to be picked up by its rivals. When it didn’t happen, he felt guilty as hell.
The career backup actually made it onto the field as a starting center when one of his fellow lineman suffered an injury.
Unsurprisingly, he caught football fever all over again. But it faded once the injured player healed and Anonymous returned to the bench.
His team failed to make it into the playoffs, but Anonymous was picked up for another year. When that ends, he’ll look for another team to hire him as a backup and cash their fat checks.
For a man with the stated ambition to be the “Best NFL Backup Ever,” that would be living the dream. And yet he acknowledges hating the sport with every fiber of his being.
“Loathe it. Hate what it does to our bodies,” he spews. “Hate what it does to our minds. . . . Hate what it does to our lives.”
The book goes on sale Jan. 5, with the author confident that he will continue to toil in anonymity.
“You can’t figure out who I am,” he taunts. “Go ahead, try. I dare you. Catch me if you can.”
http://m.nydailynews.com/news/national/nfl-locker-rooms-exposed-new-tell-all-book-article-1.2471646
After the appalling video of Ray Rice viciously assaulting his fiancée became public, his team’s locker room was in a frenzy of speculation.
But everybody agreed on one thing: There was no way that the NFL hierarchy had no knowledge of the video, as NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell publicly claimed.
“The league knows every f---ing thing about us,” one of the team stars bellowed. “Those f---ers got connections everywhere.”
Anonymous claims that the word on the Baltimore Ravens running back was that he had always been a cancer on his team: “Someone who tears his team apart because instead of being a leader, he’s a selfish, arrogant pr--k.”
Violence is a way of life for many NFL players, whether they hail from “the ’hood or the trailer park,” he wrote. Some learn to control it; others, like Rice, can’t change.
“Some, if it wasn’t for the NFL, they wouldn’t be playing football, they’d be in prison,” Anonymous says in the book. “Then you got your lucky few like Aaron Hernandez or Michael Vick who just happen to get both.”
Anonymous says all the league does to address any of the issues — domestic abuse, homophobia, racism — is hold tedious meetings where the men are inundated with statistics and told horror stories of players who screwed up.
The takeaway is usually, “Please, please, don’t f--- up, because then we’ll all look really bad,” he recounts.
As for substance abuse or boozing, Anonymous insists that “the amazing truth is that it’s actually really easy to get away with drinking and doing street drugs as an NFL player.”
Athletes with a drug or alcohol problem are pretty much left to deal with it on their own — although there are not a lot of players with an addiction, he claimed.
The teams once passed out prescriptions for the painkillers Vicodin, Percocet and OxyContin like candy. But the 2011 collective bargaining agreement put an end to that.
One of his angrier accusations is that teams regularly take the last player cut from an opposing team for one thing only: To pick his brain for the enemy’s game plan.
He traded his first team’s plays for the chance to be picked up by its rivals. When it didn’t happen, he felt guilty as hell.
The career backup actually made it onto the field as a starting center when one of his fellow lineman suffered an injury.
Unsurprisingly, he caught football fever all over again. But it faded once the injured player healed and Anonymous returned to the bench.
His team failed to make it into the playoffs, but Anonymous was picked up for another year. When that ends, he’ll look for another team to hire him as a backup and cash their fat checks.
For a man with the stated ambition to be the “Best NFL Backup Ever,” that would be living the dream. And yet he acknowledges hating the sport with every fiber of his being.
“Loathe it. Hate what it does to our bodies,” he spews. “Hate what it does to our minds. . . . Hate what it does to our lives.”
The book goes on sale Jan. 5, with the author confident that he will continue to toil in anonymity.
“You can’t figure out who I am,” he taunts. “Go ahead, try. I dare you. Catch me if you can.”
http://m.nydailynews.com/news/national/nfl-locker-rooms-exposed-new-tell-all-book-article-1.2471646
