Sherman Being Sherman

Photo Courtesy of FoxSports.com

Richard Sherman broke Twitter and Facebook last night following his interview with Erin Andrews.

Since then, people have taken their time to throw the Seattle Seahawks' lockdown cornerback under the bus. Before you go joining this fiasco of name-calling and mud-slinging, you've got to understand who Richard Sherman is.

Richard Sherman thrives on the idea of being the best...as most athletes should, but Sherman will let you know that he's the best verbally only to back it up with his play. In last night's game against the San Francisco 49ers, Sherman was thrown at twice. Once he was called for holding and we all know what happened in the other instance. Then, the interview happened. Since that interview, people have gone on to call Sherman "ignorant", "classless" and "a thug."

Photo Courtesy of WashingtonPost.com

While I don't know Sherman personally, I do know that an emotionally charged interview just minutes after making the biggest play of your career does not make you any of these things. Honestly speaking, if I were in his shoes and Crabtree talked that noise to me, I'd publicly let him have it too. Here's the other thing about Richard Sherman. The guy graduated from Stanford, one of the most prestigious institutes of higher learning. Before arriving at Stanford, Sherman was near, if not at, the top of his high school class when he graduated. Don't let a screaming black man with dreads wearing a fitted cap fool you. Sherman knew exactly what he was doing.

Now, people are saying that Sherm was wrong and should have toned it down. Again, he wasn't part of that 10-minute cooldown period. Erin Andrews literally plucked him away from celebration and asked him questions that would have been answered differently by anyone else, but this is Richard Sherman we're talking about...a guy who thrives on getting into your head and staying there. Trash talk has been and will always be a part of the National Football League. If you're going to talk it, you better back it up and Sherman, over the last couple of years, has done that.

Photo Courtesy of SFGate.com

Granted, you see a lot of players give the politically correct answers in their interviews and do the "classy" things by tipping their cap to the oppositio. But when you thrive on eating the opposition alive with your play and with your words, why would you expect anything less? Cris Carter says that Sherman didn't have respect for the game. So I guess neither did Deion Sanders...another Hall of Fame cornerback that was famous for what he did on the field and what he said off of it.

Get off the guy's back. "Sherm Being Sherm" is not an excuse if the guy's not doing anything boneheaded (i.e. Manny Ramirez). Truth be told, there are a lot of you out there talking noise about Sherman who are fans of teams who need a guy like him to get your team above the 6-win plateau.

Let me put it this way if it's still not clear to you. Richard Sherman is not a thug. Prick? Jerk? Maybe, but that interview doesn't make him a thug. He didn't even have the worst media appearance by a cornerback yesterday...but we'll talk about Aqib Talib later.

In case this wasn't enough, here's some extra reading on Richard Sherman for you to enjoy.