Since Rex Ryan joined ESPN in 2017, he’s made plenty of headlines for much-derided game analysis, feuds with players like Geno Smith, and shots at much better analysts like Tony Romo. Ryan is again making headlines, this time for a rant he delivered on Mike Greenberg’s Morning Hot Take Parade (otherwise known as Get Up) Friday about Dallas Cowboys’ receiver Amari Cooper, who the team signed to a five-year, $100 million contract last month on the heels of a 2019 season where he posted 1,189 receiving yards and eight touchdowns. Ryan was…not impressed.
"[Amari Cooper] is the biggest disappearing act in the National Football League. … I wouldn't have paid this turd."
—Rex Ryan pic.twitter.com/A8gzRJqBnD
— Get Up (@GetUpESPN) April 3, 2020
“I agree with Dan on the fact that I wouldn’t have paid this guy. To me, this is the biggest disappearing act in the National Football League. He doesn’t show up on the road, he doesn’t show up against…when the competition is good, when he’s against the top corners, that guy disappears. To me, he reminds me…it’s only one time that I can remember in recent memory on elite receivers and disappearing acts like Amari Cooper, that was the kid that the Raiders had a few years ago, oh, that’s right, that was Amari Cooper. This is who he is.”
“And Dan, he doesn’t love football. Hell with it! He stops his routes, he does all this. I wouldn’t have paid this turd. No way in hell. No way in hell you pay this guy. To me, you pay Dak Prescott, you forget all those numbers, they’re number one in the league because of Dak Prescott, not because of this guy. It’s a deep draft at receiver, they made a huge mistake right here.”
That’s quite the take, especially on a 25-year-old receiver who’s recorded more than 1,000 receiving yards in four out of his five NFL seasons to date. And Cooper was widely seen as one of the best free agents available this offseason. But beyond that, while Ryan’s certainly entitled to argue that a particular contract is bad or good, he sure seems to have gone out of his way to make this personal with comments like “I wouldn’t have paid this turd.” And “he doesn’t love X sport” is the lamest sports analysis in the world, something that’s still somehow being used all these years after J.P. Ricciardi and Adam Dunn. But hey, it’s nice that Rex Ryan gets paid to call a player a turd and give us the analysis of “he doesn’t love football.” That’s clearly a vital job to preserve in this economy…
