The verbal sparring going on between WFAN’s Tiki Barber and ESPN’s Ryan Clark has branched out into others chiming in. One of those speaking out is Barber’s WFAN teammate Gregg Giannotti. Giannotti had talked recently on Boomer & Gio about his feelings on Clark, after Clark had put out a rather interesting social video about his contract negotiations with ESPN.
Giannotti said, “He goes on his podcast, whether his or somebody else’s, and just destroys Tiki Barber for no reason, whatsoever…he’s claiming that ‘Tiki taught me how not to be a veteran’…like, OK Ryan…I’m just putting my two cents in here… Ryan Clark was a d-bag in that locker room…If Tiki Barber taught you how not to be, then Tiki Barber was doing the right thing in the locker room because you were a di**”
Giannotti went on to tell the story about seeing Clark go off on a newspaper reporter when he was a member of the Pittsburgh Steelers. He said a reporter from a smaller newspaper was talking with Clark and “asking him a legitimate question. Ryan, I saw it with my own two eyes, Ryan Clark just undressed this man verbally and made him feel like a piece of crap. He said, ‘You just don’t like the fact that I’ll be able to do your job better than you in three years when I retire.’ [And he was] pointing in his face and stuff. So, you’re the classy guy? My ass you are…So, don’t sit up on some high horse thinking that you’re the professional in the room and Tiki Barber is some jerk that didn’t treat you right…Just stop.”
Earlier this week, Barber was taking some heat for his opinion on New York Giants running back Saquon Barkley leaving the team to join the Philadelphia Eagles. Clark was on an episode of The Pivot podcast and weighed in on Barber’s comments. He said, “SaQuan earned that deal to Philadelphia, what he had to go through in New York to get through this point being a franchise tag last year. Now we’re going to get to Tiki. Tiki taught me what I didn’t want to be as a veteran. Tiki taught me how you don’t make a young player feel welcome, how you don’t make a young player feel like this could one day be his team. The way he made me feel as a young rookie and a second-year player, I said I don’t ever want to be that dude. And he’s continued to be that person.”
Barber replied to what Clark said the next day on WFAN, saying, “Wow. Ryan Clark, you are making blank up. Because you don’t know me like that, dude. What is he talking about? I didn’t embrace young players? Ask Brandon Jacobs…if I embraced him,” Barber said, adding he “honestly doesn’t remember interacting” with Clark when the two were teammates on the New York Giants. “Now that he’s a big wig at ESPN, he thinks he can just take shots and his word is gospel? He’s making a story that fits his agenda.
“He doesn’t know me well enough to talk about me. So shut the hell up, Ryan Clark. Please. You sound like a fool. You think it’s cool and trendy to make me the bad guy because it makes you cooler and trendier. By all means, shoot away, Ryan.”
Tiki Barber continued his takedown of his former teammate by claiming the ESPN NFL analyst is ignorant.
“He’s uninformed. He doesn’t know me that he doesn’t know me like that. Don’t talk about me like that. You don’t know me like that. You don’t know my relationships with my team, my former teammates, the organization, but you act like you know. You speak in a nice, calm, controlled way. It’s not true. It’s an opportunistic shot that he’s taking because he thinks that he’s gonna gain advantage by being a jackass to me. Congratulations, Ryan. Good luck in your career, as well.”
