One of the most vociferous online debates of the last few weeks in NFL circles has surrounded Jalen Hurts and Cam Newton. The latter left the reigning Super Bowl MVP off his list of top 10 QBs, sparking a debate over whether Hurts is already better than Newton was during his playing days (he’s not… at least not yet).
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This prompted Philadelphia Eagles superfan Gillie Da Kid to call Newton out, leading to a war of words between the two. It wasn’t exactly a battle Gillie was likely to win, given Newton’s NFL resume and Gillie’s complete lack of one. But that’s social media for you.
Another former NFLer, albeit a far less accomplished one than Newton, Johnny Manziel, also took a shot at Gillie online. He said that if he ever saw him, he would “slap” the podcaster/rapper for his comments about Newton. Gillie, of course, responded in kind, bringing up Manziel’s past drug issues.
After watching the back-and-forth between these two B- and C-list celebrities, Chad “Ochocinco” Johnson suggests they put their money where their mouths are.
“Here we go again. We got a money-making opportunity again, Gillie. In the ring,” Ocho said on the latest episode of Nightcap.
“Gillie, you know you got that Philly shell on you… Gillie can box too, now, Gillie and Johnny settle they differences in the ring. Headgear. 16-ounce gloves. Four rounds. Three-minute rounds. Oh, you’re gonna slap me when you see me? Now’s your opportunity! Boom. Get the sponsors behind it. Keep the main thing the main thing.”
It has become common over the past decade or so for pseudo-celebrities and retired athletes to get in the ring and wail on each other in far-from-professional exhibition boxing matches. Ochocinco is simply suggesting another one like that.
It seems unlikely, however. And while Ochocinco seems to be basking in the drama, hoping it continues, Shannon Sharpe said what most reasonable people are thinking with regards to this situation: let it go. Football season is coming up. We’ve got more important things to talk about.
“Gillie. Cam. Can we be done with this? You’ve made your point. We’ve got a lot of other stuff to talk about. We’ve got football season right around the corner, we’ve got training camp. We’ve got a lot of stuff we can talk about. You’ve made your point. Everybody’s made their point. We get it. I get it.”
Gillie Da Kid (Nasir Fard) has been a rapper since the early 2000s, but didn’t rise to fame until his Barstool Sports podcast took off in the late 2010s. Being from Philadelphia, he’s always been a big Eagles fan.
He even played the role of “unofficial hype man” for the Birds during their title-winning season last year. He’s probably at the height of his fame right now or just coming down from it, so why not squeeze every ounce he can while he’s still got it?
Johnny Manziel, the man who took a nation by storm during his Heisman-winning season in 2012, has had a rough go of it since then. He’s dealt with alcoholism and other drug issues that precipitated his quick dismissal from the NFL as well as the CFL. He was also the subject of an episode of the Netflix documentary series UNTOLD in 2023, which pushed him back into the national consciousness.
Hopefully, all these guys listen to Shannon Sharpe and that cohort of the public and squash all of this pointless talk. If they go the Ochocinco way of making money off of silly and conjured-up controversy, it wouldn’t be surprising, however.
And by the way, Jalen Hurts was great in that Super Bowl, but he’s got to do a lot, lot more to come close to what Cam Newton accomplished in the league. That one 15-1 MVP season and a trip to the Super Bowl in 2015 with Ted Ginn Jr. and Travis Benjamin as his top targets should be enough to end the debate.
Not that Hurts couldn’t pass him, eventually. But for now, it’s a premature debate. Right now, it’s like saying Doug Williams was better than Dan Marino because one was a Super Bowl MVP and the other was only a league MVP.
