Rivals? I wouldn’t know nothing about that.
The funny thing about rivalries is, just like grudges, they require active thought about a person that is not you. Which leaves me in a bit of a pickle -- because that’s just not in the cards. I don’t care which eleven players are lined up in front of me, regardless of who they are, my job is my job. Of course, as you can tell from the phrasing of the prior sentence, there’s also the less egotistical problem that linebackers don’t really have specific offensive counterparts. Corners and receivers have each other, so to do defensive and offensive lineman. But for a zone-oriented off-ball linebacker, there just isn’t anyone to pinpoint as a natural, positional rival. And without other people bringing my name into stuff –I’ve been mentioned in maybe one article the entire year – I won’t really find myself in any true rivalries.
I will say that I have a few friendly rivalries with teammates. My main function in the defense isn’t to stop the run but, that said, when you have the best running back in the league on your team, there’s some measure of pleasure in bringing him down. And I have to mention Alex, there’s yet to be a game where I haven’t, at least in the back of my mind, aimed to out-tackle him. Oh yeah, I also have a long-running beef with weight-related contract incentives, but that’s a story for another day.
Words: 246
The funny thing about rivalries is, just like grudges, they require active thought about a person that is not you. Which leaves me in a bit of a pickle -- because that’s just not in the cards. I don’t care which eleven players are lined up in front of me, regardless of who they are, my job is my job. Of course, as you can tell from the phrasing of the prior sentence, there’s also the less egotistical problem that linebackers don’t really have specific offensive counterparts. Corners and receivers have each other, so to do defensive and offensive lineman. But for a zone-oriented off-ball linebacker, there just isn’t anyone to pinpoint as a natural, positional rival. And without other people bringing my name into stuff –I’ve been mentioned in maybe one article the entire year – I won’t really find myself in any true rivalries.
I will say that I have a few friendly rivalries with teammates. My main function in the defense isn’t to stop the run but, that said, when you have the best running back in the league on your team, there’s some measure of pleasure in bringing him down. And I have to mention Alex, there’s yet to be a game where I haven’t, at least in the back of my mind, aimed to out-tackle him. Oh yeah, I also have a long-running beef with weight-related contract incentives, but that’s a story for another day.
Words: 246
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