Steve Smith Sr. is the prototypical tough but undersized wide receiver that treats every play of every game like the guy across from him just insulted his mother and told him he wasn't good enough to sniff his jockstrap.
This perpetual (and often imagined) underestimation has led Smith to have quite a successful career, first with the Carolina Panthers and now with the Baltimore Ravens.
The problem with a guy like Smith though, arises from this seemingly constant determination to view everything as a challenge to his abilities as a man and as a player and his inability to shut his mouth about it.
But it sure makes for one hell of a great quote.
Smith, whose current team, the Ravens, took his former team the Panthers to the woodshed this weekend, couldn't just let the game be the end of things.
According to CBS Charlotte, "Smith called into WFNZ 610 AM The Fan's 'Bustin' Loose' today to clear up rumors concerning his dismissal from the Carolina Panthers in the off season."
Smith felt the need to let the people of Carolina know that GM Rick Gettleman and Coach Ron Rivera were both what he considered, dishonest, with him during his final days with the team.
"Every time I keep reading stuff and reports come out, I just think I was stabbed in the back," Smith said. "Just like coach Rivera said he wasn't a sore loser, but yet he never even spoke to me through the whole ordeal. Not one time. He didn't look at me man-to-man and said this was going down. He said he's a player's coach but he never came in and said, 'Hey Smitty, this is going on. Wanted to give you a heads up.' He hid in his office.
"Then you come at the end of the game and I play decent and then you come and shake my hand and say, 'Congratulations. I hope the family's well. Good luck.' But we were supposed to be boys and respected me. You would have done it from the jump. You don't do it at the end. And then you tell the media. Why? So you can look a certain way."
When Smith spoke to Gettleman ahead of his release, he alleges that Gettleman referred to him as a "shadow" of his former self.
"He doesn't even have the cojones to tell us to our face [about being released]," Smith said. "We have to hear it from someone else. Then he calls and says it wasn't personal. If the first thing that comes out is 'Well it wasn't personal,' then guess what? It was personal."
He also took issue with the suggestion that he was a distraction - especially in light of the Greg Hardy situation.
"I've always been a distraction?" Smith said. "But I didn't hit my wife. Yeah I hit some teammates six or seven years ago but I didn't beat my wife. I didn't get arrested for DUIs. I didn't fall off no motorcycles.
"All I did was charity work in Charlotte. I made mistakes. But building this big ol' crutch about it like as if I pushed their hand?"
He also refuted NFL Media Insider Ian Rapoport's report that he wanted to be released by the Panthers.
"I never asked for a release. I wanted to play ball."
The bottom line is that Smith was an older player on a team determined to get younger. He didn't get along particularly well with quarterback Cam Newton and, as his skills deteriorated further and further, his act wore thinner and his personality became less bearable.
