Windy City Gridiron
In the world of Super Man there is Lex Luthor. In Gotham City, Batman has The Joker. The Avengers have Thanos, Loki, Ultron etc. What about in the NFL? With Ndamukong Suh’s retirement announcement, why not take a moment to honor the League’s best villains?
I must begin a piece like this with an emphasis and sense of appreciation for the stark contrast between real life and sport. Especially a sport as naturally violent as American football. Perhaps George Kittle said it best when he was quoted as saying, “Football is a violent sport, and if you don’t kind of go to that dark place to be violent and be physical, you’re not going to last very long.”
Players often talk about the “switch” that must get turned on when stepping onto the field of battle. While that does not excuse any player to commit a flagrant/personal foul on purpose, it’s important to remember we are dealing with human beings amidst mentally, emotionally and physically heightened circumstances.
That said, there have been certain players who seem to push the envelope between intensity and assault. Those that extend the “violence” that players must tap into a bit beyond the whistle. Therefore, it can be easy for a fan of one team to get upset, even vitriolic, toward a player from another team when they do something egregious on the field of play to one of their own. After all, fan stands for fanatic, which is akin to words like militant, extremist, and radical. Heck, there are far too many stories of fans being ruthless towards professional athletes across the globe, even without a penalty involved. Case in point, I have not heard or seen a single dirty play by former Bear David Montgomery, yet some “football fans” had him contemplating suicide after the nastiness he received thanks to fantasy football angst.
Moral of the story. Don’t be that guy.
Now that I am comfortably off my soap-box, there have been plenty of players, past and present, who have gone a bit too far on gameday. Some even in their own locker room or practice field. Players whose reputations precede them and opponents are consciously aware of before and after the whistle. Certainly, there are more examples than I can possibly remember, but in honor of one such player officially retiring from the NFL who turns 40 soon, here are my top 10 villains of the last 40 years:
Top Ten Villains:
10 - Brandon Browner, DB: The forgotten member of the “Legion of Boom” did his part to resemble “The Legion of Doom” throughout his entire career. Pretty sure he still holds the record for most penalized player of all time.
9 - Kevin Greene, LB: A key piece to one of the most underrated LB units of all time, Greene lined up alongside Greg Lloyd and Levon Kirkland and somehow was the meanest of the group. Green accrued thousands of fines and suspensions in his day for malicious acts against...
