Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela…
…and[intlink id=”60″ type=”category”] Ryan Clark[/intlink]?
When did the Pittsburgh Steelers’ safety become a champion of the oppressed? Did I miss a memo? It seems like every time I turn around, Clark is flapping his gums about this, that, or the other thing. And it’s getting increasingly annoying.
Oppressed, it should be noted, as in paid obscene amounts of money to play a game. Considering he signed a four year $14 million dollar contract last summer, I’m at a loss to understand why he’s so angry. Then again, Clark, who is basically Robin to Troy Polamalu‘s Batman, still feels underpaid as evidenced by this tweet:
Then we had an incident yesterday afternoon where Clark nearly came to blows with Joe Bendel of 970 ESPN radio here in Pittsburgh. Clark evidently didn’t like some of the questions Bendel was asking in regards to the new CBA (Clark is one of the Steelers’ player reps) and gave him the old *Talk To The Hand* routine. Really? I thought only drunk hootchies down in Southside did that. Anyway, Bendel took exception and things escalated until Steelers media coordinators arrived to separate the two.
A couple weeks ago, Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice commented on the Hines Ward DUI and Clark was quick to pick a twit-fight. As loathe as I am to defend a Ratbird, it should be noted Rice’s uncle (who was basically his surrogate father) was killed by a drunk driver. Hence I completely understand his desire to comment on the situation. Last I checked Hines was a big boy, he doesn’t need teammates tweeting his battles for him.
Between these incidents as well as the fact he’s constantly popping up on ESPN to pontificate on behalf of the players, I’m quickly growing tired of Clark’s attitude. He’s beginning to remind me of Charles Barkley, who never met a microphone he didn’t feel compelled to speak into. If the players want Clark representing their views, well, considering half of them sign their contracts in crayon, I suppose they could do worse. However, I would humbly ask, no BEG, the various media outlets to please stop feeding the media whore.