Is this man helping run Mike Evans out of town?
One Joe likes to use the word “silly” when he hears nonsense. “This Joe” guesses that word is a little more palatable than “horsesh!t.”
Yesterday, heard exclusively on WDAE 95.7 FM/AM 620 (the station’s new FM signal can be heard up in Ocala) Tom Krasniqi interviewed Mike Evans’ agent Deryk Gilmore. Evans, of course, is a pending free agent. Gilmore announced recently his client plans to test the free agent waters in March.
Gilmore has played people before in past contract negotiations. And let’s be real: Agents are nothing more than paid representatives of their clients. There’s no reasonable expectation for them to be honest and objective and forthright. They do very much have a financial incentive in being subjective on behalf of their client.
So Gilmore discussed with Krasniqi some subjects that may chase Evans out of Tampa. One, Gilmore said emphatically, was the Tampa weather, in particular training camp weather. Gilmore implied the Tampa weather is why Evans has recurring hamstring issues.
Joe found this to be high-grade baloney.
Evans has always had hamstring issues, ever since his rookie season. In fact, the running joke of the Tampa Bay pen and mic club is that a Bucs training camp is not complete without Evans tweaking a hamstring.
So we are really to believe Evans’ hamstring issues will magically vanish if he played in, say, Buffalo?
Until last season, the Bucs were able to keep injuries to a low level. This has gone on for years. Joe is pretty confident that even the most devout climate change alarmist would admit the Florida weather hasn’t changed that much since Evans was drafted in 2013.
And besides, we’re talking about a player who has decided to have a home in Tampa and a home in suburban Houston. The same guy who grew up in Galveston, which has a very similar climate as Tampa.
In the summer, Evans voluntarily chooses to work in the outdoors with his trainer in Texas. Not sure if any of Joe’s readers travel much to South Texas, but go ahead in May and June and see how long an ice cream cone lasts outdoors there.
So this is a long-winded way of Joe cautioning fans that not everything coming out of an agent’s mouth is heartfelt sincerity.
(Hey, Denis Phillips — who is a regular in Joe’s fantasy football league — Joe is just having some fun. But your weather forecasts may be too accurate for Deryk Gilmore.)
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