Michael Bennett: Jimmy Graham's my teammate now but I still think he's soft and overrated
Seattle Seahawks defenders Michael Bennett and Bruce Irvin almost came to blows with then-New Orleans Saints tight end Jimmy Graham during pregame warm-ups before their 2014 NFC divisional playoff game.
"Jimmy was warming up in our area and I just asked, 'Could you go on your side of the field?'" Irvin said after the game (which the Seahawks won). "And he said, 'I'm Jimmy.' And I said, 'Who is Jimmy? I don't know Jimmy.'"
Graham then ripped Irvin's hat off and had to be restrained from fighting him.
The bad blood continued after the game, with Bennett calling Graham soft and the most overrated player in the NFL.
Fast forward 15 months and Graham is now teammates with former foes Irvin and Bennett.
But that doesn't mean Bennett plans to change his opinion of Graham.
"I still feel the same way. Just because he's on my team, I don't stop feeling that way," Bennett said, according to Jessamyn McIntyre of 710 ESPN Seattle.
Bennett continued: "Obviously I'm gonna be a better teammate to him, (because) he's on my team. I can't do the things I was doing. ... We have a different philosophy than he had (with the Saints). The things he was expected to do (with the Saints) are different. ... We're a running team, so he's gonna have (to) block and do all those things. I don't feel as hard as I did ... (because) he's my teammate now."
Teammates don't have to be best friends for a team to excel, but there could be a few awkward moments in the Seahawks' dressing room when Graham shows up for offseason work.
Bennett also dismissed rumors that he asked to be traded in the offseason.
"Man, like I said, they made rumors about Jesus, they’ll make rumors about anybody," Bennett said, as reported by Bob Condotta of The Seattle Times.
"I never asked for it. I didn't come to them asking for a trade. I'm still trying to figure out how a guy from Dallas (the report came from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram) (can) make up a story about me, I'm living in Seattle, I'm like how does that happen? I'm in Hawaii surfing, got the kids surfing in the ocean and they are talking about something else."
The Seahawks have also denied the report that Bennnett requested a trade.