ESPN’s Cris Carter advised NFL rookies to have a ‘fall guy’

Borland said that players were told to get themselves a fall guy so that if they got in trouble, they would have someone who could take the rap.

It was important things like: working hard, not getting caught up in past success, being a pro on and off the field and picking a friend to be a fall guy if the NFL player gets in legal trouble.

BroBible.com did a great job to find the video from the symposium, which was displayed on the NFL’s website (Carter’s “fall guy” speech starts at 16:51, at least before the NFL takes the video down).

“Y’all not gonna all do the right stuff. We’ll get him out”.

The in-depth ESPN The Magazine piece this week from Mark Fainaru-Wada and Steve Fainaru on 49ers linebacker Chris Borland’s decision to retire from football at age 24 had plenty of fascinating insights into the world of the NFL and head trauma, but it’s now emerged that one of the most interesting anecdotes in that piece happens to concern a ESPN colleague.

“I know none of y’all going to never drink late, I know none of y’all going to never use no drugs or anything, all of y’all going to go to bible study”, Carter said in a sarcastic tone. Borland declined to name the player, but as Sportsnaut’s Jesse Read writes, it’s none other than current ESPN analyst Cris Carter. “What am I supposed to do?'” he recalls.

Carter was elected to the Hall of Fame in 2013.

Ironically, Sapp probably could have used a “fall guy” when he got busted for soliciting a prostitute over Super Bowl weekend, or for the three counts of domestic violence stemming from an April incident in Las Vegas. And the NFL had the video on its site. Wow.