It’s been a crazy offseason for the Saints star receiver Michael Thomas, to be more obvious it’s been a crazy and long year for Michael Thomas. Reports, news, and updates have all led to the NFL and some of the Saints fan base to hate on Thomas without knowing both sides of the story. People have been reacting to these reports based on first impressions rather than thinking about the process behind each move and action.
It started week one of the 2020 season when the Saints were up 34-23 with two minutes left in the game, and Sean Payton called a running play with the number one player on the team (at the time) blocking during garbage time and a garbage play which caused the injury. Now here we are almost a whole year later, dealing with this same injury.
Fast forward to the start of the offseason Michael Thomas was expected to receive surgery on his ankle. Michael Thomas was told by the Saints medical team and team doctors that he should receive surgery (he was told this after the season). Thomas wanted a second opinion from another doctor, so he got the second opinion and that led to Thomas attempting rehab. The decision to rehab backfired and Thomas had to receive surgery anyway.
A few days ago Jeff Duncan posted an article on how Thomas ignored calls from the team for months and had a lack of communication with the Saints. This then led some Saints fans to believe that Michael Thomas wants out of New Orleans, and question his loyalty to the team after paying him $100 million. Things like “He doesn’t want to play now that Brees is gone” are now the overall belief around the league because of one report and nobody knows who Duncan’s source is or how reliable they are.
Today, Thomas posted this to Twitter:
This caused a crazy havoc from Saints fans believing that the tweet was aimed at the Saints organization, but the tweet was definitely aimed at the media portraying him as the bad guy without knowing his side story. The media continues to portray Thomas as a dramatic player rather than getting more context from the situation.
Thomas hasn’t said anything about the situation, but actions speak louder than words. Here are some tweets that Michael Thomas liked that can give us an idea of his side of the story:
There have been issues with the Saints team doctors giving false information about injuries (Delvin Breaux, Keenan Lewis). Thomas was told that his injury didn’t need surgery (during the season) with hopes that he would play to help Brees win a ring in his final year, which Thomas did. He played on one foot for Drew and the team, but fans will continue to hate on Thomas.
Don’t let the media manipulate what you believe and see because that’s one side of the situation. Thomas is not the bad guy here, the media portraying him as the bad guy is the bad guy because they want clicks. All of this happened because of a garbage time play. For everyone saying “trade Thomas”, we would lose $22 million in cap space and would not be ideal and hopefully out of the picture.
In order for this situation to blow over, Thomas and Sean have to talk about what’s happening and what needs to be fixed.
Written By Kadin Janisch
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