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Former Chicago Bears tight end Martellus Bennett retired from the NFL in 2018, but he has continued to give the occasional interview about his time in the league.
Bennett spent 10 seasons in the NFL, three of which were with the Bears from 2013 to 2015, and he made the Pro Bowl in 2014 after a memorable 916-yard, six-TD season.
He also spent time with the Dallas Cowboys, New England Patriots and Green Bay Packers, and in October of 2021, Bennett raised eyebrows with comments he made about one of his former quarterbacks in New England, current San Francisco 49ers QB Jimmy Garoppolo.
In an appearance on Jason and Devin McCourty’s podcast Double Coverage With The McCourty Twins, Bennett went viral for making inflammatory comments about Garoppolo, and while some questioned it at the time, Bennett’s former teammate, wide receiver Julian Edelman, just threw his support Bennett’s way.
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Bennett Called Garoppolo a B****
Back in 2016, when ex-Pats QB Tom Brady was serving a four-game suspension for his role in the Deflategate scandal, his then-backup, Garoppolo, was filling in. Bennett told the McCourty twins that New England’s third-string QB at the time, Jacoby Brissett, wound up playing in Garoppolo’s place, suggesting toughness was an issue for Jimmy G.
“Bro, we lost two games,” Bennett told the McCourty brothers. “One of them was because Jimmy Garoppolo was being a b****. He decided not to play right before the game. Jacoby came out and played with a f***ed up thumb and played his heart out, but Jimmy was just being a b**** about it all.”
Bennett didn’t stop there, crediting Brissett, who was a rookie at the time, for his toughness while skewering Garoppolo for waiting too long to opt out of a Sunday contest.
“You can’t win with a b**** for a quarterback, first of all,” Bennett said, referring to Garoppolo. “That was the whole thing with him: He didn’t want to come out and do anything because his agent was trying to protect his body or some s*** like that. Which, I can’t fault him for that. But like, you should have made that decision on Thursday. Now it’s Sunday. So anyways, he’s not going out there, so now Jacoby straps up and we lost to the Buffalo Bills. We shouldn’t have lost.”
Edelman doesn’t disagree.
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Ex-Patriots WR Julian Edelman: ‘I Can Understand Why Marty Thinks That’
On the June 27 episode of the “I AM ATHLETE” podcast, Edelman, who spent the 2009-2020 seasons with the Pats, was asked his thoughts on Bennett’s comments, and he revealed several Patriots players weren’t happy with Jimmy G’s inability to play through what was perceived to be a minor injury to his non-throwing shoulder.
“A lot of guys got mad at. it I’m not going to lie, I got mad about it,” Edelman said. “I sacrificed my body all day long. I was taking shots for this, numbing up that, ribs, broken ribs, shoulders, Grade 3, hanging on by limbs just to play. I can understand why Marty thinks like that.”
Some felt that Bennett, who has become an author of children’s books since retiring, may have been too harsh in his criticism of Garoppolo last October, but after Edelman’s comments, it’s clear Bennett wasn’t alone in his judgment of the current 49ers quarterback, who has been the subject of trade rumors for months.
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