Rod Walker: Call it 'Silence of the (Jimmy) Graham' as ex-Saint mum before, after return to New Orleans (1 Viewer)

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Call it 'Silence of the (Jimmy) Graham' as ex-Saint mum before, after return to New Orleans

By Rod Walker -- Advocate



By the time you read this, perhaps Jimmy Graham will have broken his silence.

The former New Orleans Saints tight end, who now plays for the Seattle Seahawks, didn’t speak to the media leading up to Sunday’s game against his former team.

And he didn’t utter one mumbling word to the media afterward, either.

He wasn’t present when the locker room was opened. Thirty minutes later, reporters were told he would talk outside the locker room.

He still didn’t.

Instead, he walked straight through a crease he saw among the media members, took a left turn and headed back toward the field. He kept walking, right under one of the very same goal posts he dunked a football over so many times in his five seasons with New Orleans. And then he walked some more, 100 yards in all — about three times as many yards as he had in his return to the Big Easy, a 25-20 Saints victory.

A few fans in the stands who were still hanging around screamed his name: “Jimmy! Jimmy!”

He continued on, fading away into the tunnel on the opposite end of the Mercedes-Benz Superdome, leaving behind nothing but memories and bitter feelings (at least it seemed that way after the game) from the trade two years ago that shipped him off to the great northwest.

MORE -- Advocate
 
I want him back.
He can now see that Sean and Drew are very important in making Jimmy..."Jimmy".
Time heals wounds, maybe we bring him back cheaper.
There is no denying his success with our scheme.
 
I want him back.
He can now see that Sean and Drew are very important in making Jimmy..."Jimmy".
Time heals wounds, maybe we bring him back cheaper.
There is no denying his success with our scheme.

I'd take him back too. But we had to dump him when we did, we couldn't afford him. He'd grown into too much of a superstar, and we were hurting for cap relief. His cap hit was 8 mil, then 9 mil, then 10 mil, IIRC.
 
The reason the Pats are so good is because they know when to get rid of guys. We got rid of him at the appropriate time and I have no regrets. Let's look forward to Fleener getting more comfortable with the playbook and Drew
 
The dude got traded to a contender and he's the one that harboring bad feelings??? I wish we could have traded him to Cleveland and then this story would just fade ...
 
I think winning the game has helped me be a little more sympathetic to Jimmy in this situation -- but I am disappointed in him that he couldn't even stay on the field and shake hands with guys like Drew after the game. I don't really care that much about him ignoring the media. Ignoring his old teammates was wrong. I think he is emotionally immature and should be over us trading him by now, but he's not.
 
The dude got traded to a contender and he's the one that harboring bad feelings??? I wish we could have traded him to Cleveland and then this story would just fade ...

Excellent font size use. Kudos.
 
The reason the Pats are so good is because they know when to get rid of guys. We got rid of him at the appropriate time and I have no regrets.

No we didn't - we gave him a big fat contract in 2014. The right time would have been 2014.
 
Someone needs to sit him down and say "Son,......"

(it never gets old)
 
He has only his big head to blame -- the one that got big asking for "wide receiver money." That, coupled with a lack of mental toughness after teams simply started roughing him up until the refs felt like doing something about it, sealed his fate here.

I can think of a prior example of a prolific offensive weapon who was traded after asking for a big contract. John Jefferson, one of the Chargers' many targets in the late '70s, was traded to the Packers (when that team was very much like the current Saints, with the D being the drag on a potent passing O) after a contract dispute. I do remember him from watching games at age 7,8,9 or thereabout. His career stat lines show him going from the first WR to gain 1,000 yards his first three seasons to having just role-player numbers the rest of his fairly short career.

Point of all that? Graham is headed the way of John Jefferson.
 
It was not the janitor, but I did hear from someone that I respect that has very close ties to many with the Saints so take it for what it is worth - word is that JG wants to be here and back with Brees and that is the reason he didn't talk to the media as he did not want to slip up saying something that might hurt situations with his current team.
 
a bit disappointed in the writer - essentially he's saying, "i have no real information for this story, but i'm not going to let that stop me"

that being said, we can all do better with the whole "walking a mile in someone else's shoes" thing
when we first got Jimmy, we were hugely sympathetic to his early story and all the mini-docs made about it
but now i'm sure several of us will have some "if i could afford Jimmy's shoes, I'd walk from here to Seattle" (you might even be more pithy than that), but it's bizarre that we always make the assumption that getting big contracts will somehow erase the trauma of childhood, when probably all it really does is give players easier ways to distract themselves from that pain
 
I think winning the game has helped me be a little more sympathetic to Jimmy in this situation -- but I am disappointed in him that he couldn't even stay on the field and shake hands with guys like Drew after the game. I don't really care that much about him ignoring the media. Ignoring his old teammates was wrong. I think he is emotionally immature and should be over us trading him by now, but he's not.
I bet my '99 Camry that he had some special "**** it!" Celebration had he score a TD. I have no sympathy for him as I know this silence comes out of not having anything to brag about AND losing the game.
 
I want him back.
He can now see that Sean and Drew are very important in making Jimmy..."Jimmy".
Time heals wounds, maybe we bring him back cheaper.
There is no denying his success with our scheme.

My friend works for the Saints. He's told me before that Jimmy and his boss were either friends or would talk regularly when Jimmy was here. My friend said Jimmy talked to his boss and told him that it's messed up that he's not still here.
 

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