Antonio Cromartie: I’m a ‘jackass’ with an ‘FU attitude’ on the field
New York Jets cornerback Antonio Cromartie is one of the cockiest players in the NFL. For the most part, he has been able to back it up throughout his eight-year career. Cromartie has 25 career interceptions and has filled in admirably as the Jets’ top cornerback since Darrelle Revis went down with a knee injury last season and was then traded to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
So what’s his secret?
“I’m a jackass (laugh),” Cromartie told Steve Serby of the NY Post over the weekend. “I talk a lot of trash on the field. I take everything personal when it’s on the football field. Even on the practice field. I have that F.U. attitude.”
Cromartie takes pride in his trash talking skills. When asked what the best piece of trash talk he ever hurled was, he brought up his San Diego Chargers days when he was matched up against Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver Dwayne Bowe.
“I think I told somebody, this is when I was in San Diego, I just told the receiver [Kansas City’s Dwayne Bowe], “You might as well go sit down on the bench ’cause they’re not gonna throw the ball to you.”
That was his best trash-talking moment? Cromartie might as well have told Bowe he plays ball like a girl. In any event, he said it worked. He also said he feels like he can cover any receiver in football one-on-one.
“I can go out there anytime I want to and go shut down any receiver I feel like it,” said Cromartie. “That’s how I feel. I don’t need help, I don’t need none of that. I can cover every receiver one-on-one. But for me, it was always trying to do it on a consistent basis, and that’s the thing I struggled with.”
Believe it or not, Cro has said crazier stuff like claiming he was one of the best wide receivers on the Jets at one point. New York needs Cromartie to be a shutdown corner more than ever this season. He got off to a rough start on Sunday giving up seven catches and 154 yards against Vincent Jackson. Maybe his smack talking skills were too rusty.
H/T LBS tipster David