Fierce Turley is a warrior in a changing time
Aug. 2, 2002
By Jay Glazer
SportsLine.com Senior Writer
THIBODAUX, La. -- In the NFL's brand of Sunday Bloody Sundays, Saints tackle Kyle Turley is the ultimate team vigilante. He's the type of player every quarterback would love protecting him on and off the field. But he's also ripped outside his locker room for his demeanor.
Turley sat across from a reporter at lunch this week, explaining the NFL through the eyes of an NFL vigilante. Football is a game bred upon violence, a contest won by who spills more blood.
But halfway through lunch, the obvious needed to be broached. After gathering enough steam, bracing for the fallout, the reporter put it as bluntly as possible: Are you a psycho?
The Saints' Kyle Turley hurled a Jets helmet on national TV and acquired a reputation. (AP)
"Am I a psycho? On the football field, yeah, I am -- that's my element. I turn it on game day and crank it up a notch," said Turley, who has taken on folk-hero status in the Big Easy because of his pro wrestler look and on-field brutality. "I know people perceive me to be something that I'm probably not, but that's just the way it goes. I'm not like that in practice or off the field. Not at all. In practice I'm trying to learn and work on things and in my regular life. I chill with my buddies, play my guitar.
"But when that game day starts, it's another element. You go out there for war. That's what it is to me, that's how I perceive it. If I don't do my job I'm letting down those guys and the coaches and all the guys on the sideline. So yeah, I take that very personal. I get jacked up for it."
Hey, that wasn't so bad.
As the interview progressed, Turley made his argument. His point of view began to make him look less and less like a messenger for the dark side and more and more like the type of man you can't do without in the heat of battle.
"I was taught to always protect the little guys," said Turley, who this year moves from right tackle to the left side. "When I was growing up, whenever I got into a fight it was always to protect the little guy, and that mentality for me carries over.
"I put an emphasis on playing this sport for not only myself but also for my teammates, getting their backs all the time and going the extra mile to be assertive and to be the enforcer who protects them. To be one of the best offensive linemen in the league and to protect your guys the right way, you have to be a bad ass. You can't teach that. You can't teach the tenacity and aggressiveness. You are either a killer or you're not."
Turley's reputation and wallet took a major PR nosedive last year when he ripped the helmet from Jets safety Damien Robinson's head and used it like a discus while being led from the carnage. The altercation was the lowlight of the Saints' loss and Turley's image was painted as that of an out-of-control monster. While he says he cannot go back and rewrite the past, the massive blocker also insists there was more to the story than that of a crazy ogre.
"I play 100 miles per hour, full speed every single play," he said. "I'm not Randy Moss playing when I want to play. I won't take a play off and stand by when my buddy is getting his head ripped off.
"People only see the video of that game. They don't hear the audio, they don't hear Aaron Brooks screaming for his life. When something like that happens, I've been trained to protect my quarterback at all costs.
"Nobody knows what it's like out there. Like Jim Mora said in his infamous interview, people think they know, but they really don't. People only know Xs and Os, but they don't count the intangible things within that play, outside of the routes and the blocking schemes."
Turley was fined $25,000 by the NFL while Robinson was given a fine of $20,000. Worse than the fine was the fact that Turley became a poster child for NFL road rage. He also was blamed for losing the game, despite the fact that the Saints turned the ball over several times and played horribly on the offensive side of the ball.
Turley now is trying to come to grips with the fact that he might not like the laws governing the trenches but if he doesn't obey them, he's not just hurting himself.
"Last year was a big learning year for me because of all the things I realized as far as hurting myself and hurting the team," he said. "Personally, the only reason I went too far is because of what the rules are now. Fifteen years ago, I'd get a 15-yard penalty and that's it. Now, everyone gets so sensitive and politically correct, they are trying to make football a PC game. Football to me is anti-PC, everything about it. It's a shame because this game was originated upon violence and loyalty to your teammates and standing up for them and being a team guy, whatever it takes, but now I know I just do whatever it takes.
"I'll have to think about things more. It's hard because I've got to change something that was ingrained in me. It's been ingrained in a lot of guys, but now I'll have to think twice and that's too bad. Guys like me are a rarity, and the way they are making this game, we're going to be even rarer."
While the Jets debacle painted Turley in a negative light, those around the Saints argue that the picture is completely false. Not only is he one of the NFL's most effective tackles, the team says he does more charity work than anyone on the roster. Last season, Turley bought a luxury suite and each week invited 15 inner city youths to have the run of the place. He also holds events to help raise money for the September 11 Fund, and is beginning a program to send troubled youths to a California oasis to put them on the right track.
That's a far cry from the man who makes opponents cringe when he plays them.
"A lot of players perceive me to be dirty, cheap, out of control," he explains. "There are some guys out there who are just punks, they talk crap and say I won't make the Pro Bowl because I'm cheap. Dude, quit your whining. If I beat your ass say it. If you beat my ass, I'll admit it.
"It's football; quit your whining."
One defensive end that played against Turley last year said he looked over at the Saints, saw this 6-foot-7 mountain with long hair, covered in tattoos looking like pro wrestling's Undertaker character and said to himself, "I've got to play this guy? You've got to be kidding me."
If you're on his side of the ball, there is no better place to be. If you're on the other... well, watch your back, brother. However, he may not be as insane as people think, off the field that is.
He's sane enough to change one reporter's view of him after a mere 30 minutes. |
