Cleveland Browns defensive end Myles Garrett has started up some more controversy shortly after being reinstated into the National Football league earlier this week.
After the mid-November brawl that saw Garrett grab Rudolph’s helmet off and smash him over the head with it, he stated to the league the Pittsburgh Steelers QB used a racial epithet.
“He called me the N-word,” Garrett told Outside the Lines’ Mina Kimes during an interview that aired Thursday night on SportsCenter. “He called me a ‘stupid N-word.'”
Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Mason Rudolph fired back at those claims in a response on Saturday, calling it a “bold-faced lie,” among other things.
Rudolph also said he “would not utter a racial slur.”
Rudolph’s legal team also released a statement regarding this situation and they seemingly threatened legal action:
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“Mr. Garrett maliciously uses this false allegation to coax sympathy, hoping to be excused for what clearly is inexcusable behavior. Despite other players and the referee being in the immediate vicinity, there are zero corroborating witnesses – as confirmed by the NFL,” Younger & Associates said. “Although Mr. Rudolph had hoped to move forward, it is Mr. Garrett who has decided to utter this defamatory statement – in California. He is now exposed to legal liability.”
In November, Rudolph’s attorney, Tim Younger, called the allegation “wild and unfound” in a statement on Twitter.
In Garrett’s recent interview with ESPN, he described the incident in the following manner:
“When he said it, it kind of sparked something, but I still tried to let it go and still walk away. But once he came back, it kind of reignited the situation. And not only have you escalated things past what they needed to be with such little time in the game left, now you’re trying to re-engage and start a fight again. It’s definitely not entirely his fault, it’s definitely both parties doing something that we shouldn’t have been doing.
“I don’t say the N-word, whether it’s with ‘a’ [or] ‘er.’ To me personally, just shouldn’t be said, and whether it’s by family, friends, anyone, I don’t want to use it because I don’t want [people to] find that appropriate around me for anyone to use.”
