Michael Sam, the first openly gay player to be drafted into the NFL, failed to make the St. Louis Rams' roster or practice squad over the weekend and some are putting the blame on ESPN.
The sports network controversially reported on the 24-year-old's shower habits in the Rams locker room last week, quoting an unnamed source who said it appeared Sam would wait for his teammates to rinse off first so as not to make them feel "uncomfortable."
ESPN later apologized for the report, but now some are pointing to the remarks as the reason Sam didn’t make the team.
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Buffalo Bills center Eric Wood took to Twitter to take a stab at the sports network on Sunday.
St. Louis Rams star player Chris Long also hammered ESPN on Twitter after the report first broke last week.
On Saturday, Sam was one of the Rams' final cuts as the team opted to hold on to undrafted rookie Ethan Westbrooks of West Texas A&M instead. Rams coach Jeff Fisher called it a
"football decision," according to the blog Saturday Down South.
"I will tell you this: I was pulling for Mike. I really was," Fisher told the media. "I don't say that very often, but Mike came in here and did everything that we asked him to do. He got a chance to play a lot of snaps. He had the second most snaps on the defensive line, to Ethan Westbrooks. He had well over 120, 130 snaps and was productive."
Earlier this summer, former Indianapolis Colts coach Tony Dungy told the media that, were he still coaching, he would not have drafted Sam because he wouldn’t have wanted to "deal with all of it" — presumably the drama and hype of signing the first openly gay player in the league.
"I was asked whether I would have drafted Michael Sam and I answered that I would not have
drafted him," he later told the Tampa Bay Tribune in a clarification of his comments. "I gave my honest answer, which is that I felt drafting him would bring much distraction to the team."
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