It’s a well-worn cliche that professional athletes often give boring, cliche filled interviews. The reasons why are well-known: some just aren’t great public speakers, and the media often doesn’t help, filling post-game press conferences with inane questions designed to elicit predictable responses.
And it’s also true that athletes have an incentive to avoid saying anything remotely controversial — even innocent statements can end up generating the kind of click-bait headlines that put them in hot water with coaches and teammates.
At the Vikings press conference Thursday, there were moments when Vikings star wide receiver Stefon Diggs seemed to be trying to tow the line. His comments were always going to be under close scrutiny, as he had just returned to practice after missing the day before for unknown reasons, and Twitter was abuzz with reports that he was asking for a trade — rumors his selective emoji use had done nothing to quell.
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— DIGGS (@stefondiggs)
September 30, 2019 There was a telling moment when a reporter pressed him on what he would need to see to be more satisfied with the team’s offense. He started by saying the kind of earnest but bland things you’d expect. First, he avoided the obvious danger of citing anything or anyone specific (Hi, Kirk Cousins!) and said he’d been with the team for awhile (true!). He then added a “I'm just kind of getting through it,” as well as a “We are where we are right now,” (Also, by definition, true) — variations of the sort of “One day at a time” responses athletes turn to when things aren’t going well.
But, as he made his way through his answer, Diggs seemed to lose patience with the pretense of the whole affair.
“I'm saying a lot to say nothing right now, so you can get where this interview is going to go,” he told reporters.
It was a strikingly honest admission, and one that was also surprisingly meta, at least for an NFL press conference.
He had taken the same honest-but-indirect approach moments before in the press conference, addressing a question on the trade rumors by saying, “I feel like there is truth to all rumors,” before adding a perhaps unintentionally ironic “I won't be saying nothing on it. I won't be speaking on it at all.”
As someone once said, ““The first rule of Fight Club is: You do not talk about Fight Club.”
Video is very hard to hear. But Diggs said "I feel like there's truth to all the rumors. I won't be discussing that."He also said "I'm saying a lot to say nothing." "Anything I've said is just the state where I am right now."Playoff hero's time with Vikes may be ending. https://t.co/4bpUMKtQc1
— Austin Eldridge (@AustinOnAir56)
October 3, 2019 Diggs didn’t need to spell it all out to make it clear to everyone how he felt, and it made sense that the same man who once told a reporter, “I don’t force myself into categories of doing things the way everybody else wants them done,” might also have trouble sticking to script he evidently didn’t believe in.
