For some of the CBS NFL Today crew, the most intense moment from Sunday occurred after their AFC Championship Game broadcast. There, Boomer Esiason, Bill Cowher and Nate Burleson encountered a belligerent football fan at the Baltimore train station.
Monday morning on his WFAN radio show, Esiason provided a detailed recount of the incident. He explained that he was traveling back to New York with Burleson and Cowher via the Amtrak Acela train. But to do that, it meant sitting in the Baltimore train station, where there were undoubtedly plenty of fans who just finished watching the Ravens lose the AFC Championship Game to the Kansas City Chiefs.
“The Raven fans couldn’t have been any nicer at the stadium and even in this situation, for the most part,” Esiason said. “Except for one total asswipe douchebag.”
The encounter with the asswipe douchebag began cordially, as the person exchanged pleasantries with Esiason and Cowher before returning to his seat. At the time, Burleson was in the restroom.
“And then he decides that he’s gonna come over and he’s gonna talk to us about how the NFL is rigged. And he’s using very colorful language,” Esiason said, explaining that he chose to look away and ignore the belligerent fan, but Cowher opted to engage.
Esiason proceeded to do a gut check with an impartial person sitting next to him, making sure he had a witness who could vouch that the angry fan was the aggressor in this situation.
“I said, ‘Listen, if he gets any closer, I may have to get up and effing smash this guy right in the face.’ And I’m pissed off now. I’m trying to watch the [NFC Championship Game on his iPad], this idiot is screaming about how the NFL is rigged,” Esiason continued.
That’s when Burleson came back and started jawing back and forth, seeming ready to come to blows with the fan. “Nate’s ready to come out of his suit and ready to rip this guy’s face off,” Esiason recalled of Burleson. The WFAN host, meanwhile said he kept yelling ‘CBS News’ at Burleson, to remind the former wide receiver of the importance of his weekday morning TV gig.
“We’re not gonna let anybody go after Coach Cowher,” Esiason said, tabbing himself as the person with the least to lose, deciding he would get physical with the fan before letting Cowher or Burleson do anything, if it came to that.
But the person sitting next to Esiason, who also happened to work in the New York Giants analytics department, ultimately decided to stand up and attempt to defuse the situation by imploring the fan to just leave everyone alone.
“It was nuts!” Esiason said, noting that CBS Sports president David Berson then walked over to see what was going on. “And then another Ravens fan started yelling at this guy and then the cops came in.”
Ultimately, Esiason, Cowher and Burleson were able to avoid engaging with the fan physically, but that’s still a wild ending to their Championship Sunday. Esiason expressed surprise that he had not seen any videos from the exchange posted on Twitter yet, although it would seem almost certain that someone in the area whipped out their phone during the incident.
[WFAN]
